Sep 10, 2003 11:08 PM
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(Updated Sep 10, 2003 11:14 PM)
It is a known fact that Bollywood is bereft of anything original. It seems like every other film is a remake of an American blockbuster or classic. ''Khwahish'' is no exception. This movie is a very bad remake of the most beloved romance classics of all time, ''Love Story'' (1971) starring Ali Macgraw & Ryan O'Neil. Most scenes & even the dialogue have been lifted off verbatim from the original movie. What makes it worse is the director & producers of this movie stupidly assume that we as an audience can't tell the difference. Well, for the most part, they are right. There are still quite a few South Asians that saw this movie without even seeing the original. You know who you are & for you I say ''SHAME!''.
On with the story - Lekha Khorzuvekar (Mallika Sherawat) and Amar Ranawat (Himanshu Malik) play the parts of Jenny Trillone (Ali Macgraw) and Oliver Barret III (Ryan O'Neil) respectively. The problem is, our Indian couple do not do justice to the part. We have Lekha, a middle class Maharastrian girl and Amar, a rich boy from Pune. They fall in love, get married & then the climax that should have been good was instead the worst tribute to a death scene I have ever seen. You see, this movie failed on several accounts. First, ''Love Story'' was a small film. A small humble, sweet love story of two young people that come from different backgrounds. There was never a need to add any cheap scenes like Mallika purchasing condoms at a local store (I'm not against this idea at all. I think women should always take the initiative in terms of birth control but this scene was added for the girlfriend-less & tacky front benchers so they could have a good loud chuckle). There was also no need to make a big deal about Amar touching Lekha's cleavage.
One of the worst scenes was the the wedding ceremony because it was totally unnecessary. In the original, the boy & the girl decide to have a very small, informal wedding ritual and the remake should have at least stuck to that original format because the significance of making your own wedding vows was very profound in ''Love Story''. Last but not least, the worst scene of them all was the final scene at the girl's deathbed. Mallika Sherawat gives one of the most unconvincing death scenes in cinematic history. It was embarrassingly bad to the point of nausea. The heroine might be beautiful, but DAMN...she's a horrible actress.
With all this in mind, are there any plusses in this movie at all? Well, Mallika is stunning and has an enviably slim figure but that's not enough for ANY movie let alone a remake of a great classic. I'm giving this movie 2 stars. It really deserves 1 but the saving grace was these kids look good. Both Himanshu & Mallika do look good together. As always, I would recommend the original ''Love Story'' than this tired remake. For those of you who have seen the original, you know what I mean. For those of you that haven't, please stop wasting your time watching these Hindi remakes & watch the original one. You won't regret it like you regretted watching this load of crap.
