Pretty as a picture, but no substance. Review on Blue

It’s like going to a 5 star hotel for dinner. Great ambience, excellent food presentation, but…after all this you dig into the well laid out meal and find that it actually lacks what you desire the most - taste! Watching Blue felt something like this. Full marks for photography, camera, location, designer wear…but story, screenplay, script…whoa…what’s all that?

Debutant director Anthony D’Souza it seems spent a lot of energy in choosing the location and focused so much on the photography that he forgot the rest of it. Having said that – the locations are certainly droolable! I would go and watch it again just to gawk at the scenery and exotic locales. Camera work is amazing. Some absolutely breathtaking shots on land as well as underwater!

The story? Well…my five year-could easily have cooked this one up! There are these three Alpha males. Akshay Kumar – who plays Aarav – is the owner of a sexy, swank boat and runs a successful business (not sure what business!). He declares “duniya ka sabsey bada nasha hai – risk”making you sit up in your seat and wait for things to happen! (Yeah…keep waiting). Then there’s Sanjay Dutt – who plays Sagar – the most experienced diver in the region – who supposedly knows the sea like the back of his hand. But given his weight and his oversized paunch – he seems to find it difficult to walk – let alone dive. You wonder if he might just sink in like a stone! And to add to his woes, poor Sanjay Dutt looks troubled and constipated throughout the movie. (Wonder what they fed the cast and crew?). Then there is Sanjay’s little brother Zayed Khan (Sam) – who is a real dude and zips around in Bangkok in some delectable looking bikes.

Then there is Lara Dutta who only needs to look hot, sexy and nice in designer bikinis and she does that rather well. She looks very fit and drop dead gorgeous – as she is meant to, so let’s leave her alone here. Katrina Kaif has a blink and you miss kind of role. So I shall not waste web space on her.

Ah but lets not forget the lead character of the entire film. The Lady in Blue. The sunken ship with its sparkling treasure that’s been lying out there since 1949.

Right from the start Akshay with his salt and pepper goatee keeps grinning like an goat and keeps asking Sanjay Dutt to help him get to the treasure and every time Sanjay Dutt grabs his collar and refuses to do so!

In the meanwhile, some really spectacular bike racing scenes later, Zayed Khan gets into big trouble in Bangkok. He needs to pay someone 50 million dollars (!!!!!!!! and how many zeroes does that have?!!!!!!!!). So he scoots from there and comes to hide at his brother’s place in the Bahamas.

Things drift along at a lazy pace like a boat floating along in the Blue with Kylie Minogue going ‘Chiggy Wiggy with you’in between and Akshay constantly trying to scare you saying the colour of the water is red – because so many people have shed their blood trying to look for this treasure. So you wait and wait for the omnipresent sharks to gobble up a few people. For some action to happen. For the blood to start flowing.

More bike chases happen. The stunts with the bikers on top of a moving train is incredible! So your adrenaline gets pumping and we wait for more action to happen…

However, as has been repeatedly told in all the reviews so far – the climax is a damp squib! They get to the treasure so easily that you wonder what the fuss was all about. And of course anyone with below average IQ will also wonder why no one ever got to it before them, and how come its all gleaming so bright despite having been in water since 1949??

Well...never mind the questions…it all ends well in the end. So life goes back to a happy, floaty pace for the Alpha males.

The music – like the pace of the movie is inconsistent. Sometimes inspired. Sometimes mediocre. Or perhaps it will grow on us – like Rahman music usually does. But anyways for me - overall - the music and the background score was not so exciting.

So if there’s no story and no substance why must you watch it? Here are a few reasons:

• Location, location, location

  
  




• Underwater camera work is incredible

  
  




• Bike stunts are fantastic

  
  




• Lara Dutta looks hot (you’ll readily forgive her for the rather dumb dialogues she has to utter)

  
  

It’s not so boring really. You can float around with the pace of the movie and enjoy yourself. Just don’t go looking for something earth shattering…