Monday 14 December 2015

I-genius Young Singing Stars

I-genius Young Singing Stars was brought to you by max life insurance this year.

The second season stated with a a bash !

The contest was judged by well renowned music composer Salim Merchent, Youtube sensation Shraddha Sharma and Devraj Sanyal the Managing Director - Universal Music Group.

After sorting and searching for the top ten finalists out of over 200000 entries the finale was held on 10th of December at Vivanta by Taj , Mumbai

The list of finalist was as follows

The junior group:

1.      Kirtana ( Bangalore )
2.      Chelsy ( Orissa )
3.      Tanishtha Puri ( Lucknow)
4.      Pranjali Sinha ( Bangalore)
5.      Harmanpreet (Delhi)
The senior group:

1.      Arth Kumar (Mumbai)
2.      Maithili Thakur (Delhi)
3.      Chirag (Jammu and Kashmir)
4.      Chahat Malhotra (Lucknow)
5.      Sakhshi Kaur (Kolkata)

The contest was divided into two rounds for each group.

The first round had a range of all kinds of songs.

Even the so called talent shows on T.V. might not have explored such young talent.

The first round ended with a performance from melodious Shraddha Sharma.

The second round very quickly after a lunch break .

Listening to all kind of music along with a live band we didn’t even realise that these are small kids 
singing of mere age group of 8 to 14 years.

After the completion of the second round  the most awaited performance happened !

Yeah Salim Merchant performed!

The tough call of declaring the winners was done by the judges later.

Winners declared from each group were as follows:

The junior group:
·         Tanishtha Puri ( Lucknow) - Winner



·         Pranjali Sinha ( Bangalore) - Runner-Up

The senior group:

·         Maithili Thakur (Delhi) - Winner



·         Chahat Malhotra (Lucknow) – Runner-Up




 I am blogging to share my experience of the #YSS2

Thursday 15 October 2015

Bridge Of Spies




Plot
An American lawyer is recruited by the CIA during the Cold War to help rescue a pilot detained in the Soviet Union.

Cast



            Mark Rylance                                               Rudolf Abel
             Domenick Lombardozzi                                 Agent Blasco
             Victor Verhaeghe                                          Agent Gamber
             Mark Fichera                                                 FBI Agent #1
             Brian Hutchison                                            FBI Agent #2
             Tom Hanks                                                   James B. Donovan
             Joshua Harto                                                Bates











Acting
Mark Rylance got the depth of a Russian spy in his performance to the extreme correct.Tom hanks was as usual great in his work. The supporting characters also made it look realistic.
Billy Magnussen was good at his job too but Mark Rylance took the movie into his court even though he had only small bits in the movie.
90/100  

Direction
Its Spielberg ,What do you think!
There is not a single moment where you can give out errors in the entire movie.
Spielberg made it look legit "the era of cold war." One can actualy feel he is in the world of wars!
 90/100

Dialogues
Dialogues here where pretty simple and raw. However there were some catchy lines like "WOULD IT HELP" which brought a certain amount of laughter even during such an intense film.
65/100

Screenplay
The pace of the first half of the movie was a bit slow but however second half of the movie was at its best.
Screenplay was fascinating.
65/100

Editing
Editing couldn't have been better. There was not a single scene that could have been dropped out of the movie.
95/100

Story
The movie starts with a man in his early 60s drawing a painting and within 5 mins we find out this simple looking old man is actually a Russian spy . He is caught and held in the court of justice .
The court provides him with a lawyer ( James B. Donovan ) where thee actual story starts.
James tries to get the spy treated properly in terms of their justice system. In parallel to all this fudge there is a team of pilots selected to work for CIA where one of them crashes during the mission and is captured by Russia.  
90/100

Overall
Go watch this movie if you are a fan of Tom Hanks or you are interested in historical drama.  
Verdict
My rating is 3.5/5.

Trailer

Friday 9 October 2015

The Intern


Plot
70-year-old widower Ben Whittaker has discovered that retirement isn't all it's cracked up to be. Seizing an opportunity to get back in the game, he becomes a senior intern at an online fashion site, founded and run by Jules Ostin.

Cast





Robert De Niro...
Ben
Anne Hathaway...
Jules
Rene Russo...
Fiona
Anders Holm...
Matt
JoJo Kushner...
Paige
Andrew Rannells...
Cameron
Adam DeVine...
Jason
Zack Pearlman...
Davis
Jason Orley...
Lewis
Christina Scherer...
Becky
Nat Wolff...
Justin
Linda Lavin...
Patty
Celia Weston...
Doris
Steve Vinovich...
Miles
C.J. Wilson...
Mike





*Source IMDB



Acting

Now who can I say about Robert De Niro. His expressions ruled the entire Scene!
He didn't even need to say the dialogue and you can literally feel the emotion.
Anne Hathaway was also good at her job.Coping up with Robert De Niro is however a big deal. 
90/100 for actors
  


Direction

Nancy Meyers has done an excellent job in terms of catching each and every emotion of the characters.
But however we have seen similar movies in terms of direction so nothing extra ordinary here. 
70/100 for direction

Dialogues

The lines written here were upto mark. There were moments in the movie where the dialogues makes you laugh and cry at the same time!
60/100 for the dialogues.


Screenplay

Scenes where written such that every part of the movie would touch your soul.
Screenplay supported actors very much.
90/100 for the screenplay writer.

Editing

The job could have been much much better .
Some scenes though nicely written felt a drag for the movie.
40/100

Story
The movie revolves around two characters viz.
1) A senior citizen (Ben) ,bored of life,finding something new and exciting for his age.
2) A workoholic girl (Jules) CEO of a successful online shopping website who face a lot of issues from her investors on one side and from her husband on the other .
Her investors find her inexperoanced and so suggest her a new CEO to help her out.
The husband is a full time father and seeks time from her, saying that he starts cheating on her and later realizes his mistake.
The story is quite unusual as this man in his 70s opts a job at this firm as an intern.
But doesn't even know how to use a computer.
He helps this girl to manage all her problems in quite  traditional ways.
And...thats your story....
60/100 for the story

Overall

A nice emotional movie which touches your heart leaving tears of joy at the end.

Verdict

My rating is 3/5.

Trailer




Wednesday 30 September 2015

The Martian

Plot
During a manned mission to Mars, Astronaut Mark Watney is presumed dead after a fierce storm and left behind by his crew. But Watney has survived and finds himself stranded and alone on the hostile planet. With only meager supplies, he must draw upon his ingenuity, wit and spirit to subsist and find a way to signal to Earth that he is alive.

Cast



Matt Damon...
Mark Watney

Jessica Chastain...
Melissa Lewis

Kristen Wiig...
Annie Montrose

Jeff Daniels...
Teddy Sanders

Michael Peña...
Rick Martinez

Sean Bean...
Mitch Henderson

Kate Mara...
Beth Johanssen

Sebastian Stan...
Chris Beck








Acting
Hats Off to Matt Damon. This might be one of his best performances so far and he would find it very hard to beat this one! Some of his scenes will make you feel his pain and agony rooted deep inside him .
The supporting characters also played genuinely a decent part.
80/100 for the actors. 
  

Direction
Ridley Scott's vision of the movie from the book is mind bogling!
100/100 for direction.

Dialogues
Nothing great about the dialogues. I guess no importance was given to this part of the movie.
Actual over repetition of the same dialogues about "" music choice made it even worse
40/100 for dialogues.

Screenplay
Screenplay was fascinating.
VFX were great but its nothing new for Hollywood. They are been doing an awesome job in terms of vfx for a decade now. But some scenes of the movie were too good to be expressed in words.
The opening scene , where we see a tiny vehicle roving on the surface of mars and then an astronaut steps out of it to leave u amazed by the size of the "red" mountains in the background!!
Cinematographer did awesome job here!
MUST WATCH IN 3D.
95/100

Editing
Editing couldn't have been better. There was not a single scene that could have been dropped out of the movie.
95/100

Story
The movie starts with a futuristic concept of when human have reached mars physically and not via the rovers like today.
The team on mars decide to evacuate and return immediately since there is a forecast of a storm which they cannot handle.
The entire team moves towards their space ship when the communication channel gets detached and strikes "Mark Watney" in his stomach. Mark gets pulled away by the immense force of the storm.
The rest of the team considers him dead and captain orders to launch.
Later we find out the Mark is still alive with only limited supply of his needs to survive.
The entire story revolves around Mark's quest of survival in a stranded planet millions of kilometers away from home .
Cannot reveal the details as i dont wanna give any spoilers away!
70/100

Overall
It is a must watch movie for all space lunatics. Go with your friends and enjoy the expireance in 3D!

Verdict
My rating is 4.5/5.

Trailer

Sunday 27 September 2015

THE TATA SKY + TRANSFER



People especially in Mumbai have to travel a lot on a daily basis.

We as Mumbaikars spend on an average 4 hours a day on travelling after a 9 hour shift of work.

Getting time to watch favorite shows on T.V. is quite difficult (except on weekends).

What is the only mode of entertainment during this time of commute ?
Yes, your mobile phone!

I literally stock up my phone with many movies and episodes of my favorite shows.

But I miss watching some shows which get telecast everyday.

To solve this problem Tata sky has come up with it new product.

THE TATA SKY + TRANSFER

The new setup box allows you to carry around all your recorded shows anywhere and everywhere you want.

The setup box automatically syncs all the recorded data with you phone !

For more on this please visit
http://www.tatasky.com/transfer/


THE TATA SKY + TRANSFER AD

Thursday 24 September 2015

Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials


Plot
After having escaped the Maze, the Gladers now face a new set of challenges on the open roads of a desolate landscape filled with unimaginable obstacles.

Cast

 
Dylan O'Brien                       ...  Thomas
Ki Hong Lee                          ...  Minho
Kaya Scodelario                    ... Teresa
Thomas Brodie-Sangster       ... Newt
Dexter Darden                      ... Frypan
Alexander Flores                   ... Winston
Jacob Lofland                        ... Aris Jones






Acting
Actors did their job here with excellence.
I could not tell whose performance was better among all as each and every character played their part with immense depth.

Direction
Direction was one similar to the previous part. i have only one complain with the director that is repeated use of OTS shots. Other than that he has done an awesome job here

Dialogues
Nothing great about the dialogues. I guess no importance was given to this part of the movie.
Screenplay
Screenplay was fascinating.

VFX were great but its nothing new for Hollywood. They are been doing an awesome job in terms of vfx for a decade now.

Editing
Editing could have been better. There was a scene where our lead caharacter gets high at some rave party club kinda place,the entire scene cud have been droped. Also i felt the climax of the movie was too stretched.

Story
Movie continues from where it was left at the first part.Thomas finds his friends and himself in a dorm with other immunes. He later finds out it is controlled by WCKD (world catastrophe killzone department) i.e. "the bad guys". The movie revolves around their escape where they try to reach to the "Right Arm" i,e, the good guys. During this journey they meet many interesting characters.Movie ends at a very high note where WKCD destroys the entire base of The Right Arms but some how most of the characters survive the ambush and take an oath to take their revenge. 

Overall
The movie in terms of acting and writing is a job done good.But VFX makes a mark here.

If you are a SCI-FI fan,you would like the movie.

Verdict
SCI-FI and thriller fans would love it.
My rating is 4/5.

Trailer