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Disclosure: This review is being written by someone who has seen not one of the previous five ‘Transformers’ movies. This, he is finding out, can be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, he can judge the sixth movie of the series, ‘Bumble­bee’, based solely on its cinematic merits. On the other, the review risks coming out as a little (or a lot) short-sighted.Anyway, let us jump right into it. First, it’s a storyline of a typical sci-fi movie: a tale of ‘good’ and weak­er creations of science triumphing over ‘bad’ and superior ones. On the planet of Cybertron, the good guys are the ‘Autobots’ who are in a civil war against the evil ‘Decep­ticons’. If the Autobots lose, the planet is doomed. But then they are losing the war.

They need time to regroup. Opti­mus Prime, the leader of the Auto­bots, sends B-127 to planet Earth where he will prospect the land for an Autobot base. If B-127 fails, that will be the end of the Auto­bots. Once on Earth, B-127, which can take the shape of any car in its view, opts for the body of a yellow Volkswagen Beetle.

Who should watch it?

If you are a die-hard fan of sci-fi action movies, and have loved previous Transformers flicks, you may like this one too. If you are not, you can skip it.

To cut a long story short, one day, teenager Charlie Watson (Hail­ee Steinfeld) finds this car in an old garage. She repairs the car and makes it come to life.

Watson finds that instead of an old car she has invited into her garage a good-hearted human­oid robot. Since the robot cannot speak, she names him Bumblebee. Unbeknown to Watson, when she starts the car, Watson also inad­vertently signals the Decepticons in Cybertron. They now know the Autobots are trying to regroup on planet Earth and resolve to destroy both the Autobots and the planet that could be their potential refuge. Without giving away the plot, what happens next should be familiar to any fan of a superhero movie.

 On planet Cybertron, the good guys are the ‘Autobots’ who are in a civil war against the evil ‘Decepticons’

Steinfeld’s performance as a fatherless 18-year-old rebel living with a stepfather she does not con­nect with is nearly faultless. She is that all-important human touch in a movie packed with metallic char­acters. There then is John Cena, the wrestler who plays an agent of Sector 7, a government agen­cy that monitors extra-terrestrial activities on Earth. He is a hard-noised former US Army Ranger who finds himself embroiled in the fight on Earth between the Autobots and Decepticons. Cena is perhaps the only wrestler in the WWE history who has been consistently projected as a ‘good guy’—an image that ‘Bumblebee’ amply exploits.

Based in 1987, ‘Bumblebee’ might offer those who grew up in the US at the time a sense of nostalgia. But for the rest the nei­ther-here-nor-there timeline can be hard to relate to. Moreover, the instant bonding between Watson and Bumblebee appears forced, as does the depiction of Watson’s love for her deceased father.

There are great action sequenc­es, especially the ones showing physical combat between the ‘good’ and ‘evil’ robots. And there are some hilarious moments when Watson is teaching the bungling Bumblebee disguise technics. Yet the film feels far too metallic and far too less humane. Not a bad movie at all. But it may not be to the taste of everyone.

Movie:  Bumblebee

Genre:  ACTION, SCI-FI

CAST:  Hailee Steinfeld, Jorge Lendeborg Jr., John Cena

DIRECTION: Travis Knight

We Nepalis are lovers of rice and if that rice comes to our plates in long grain, with exquisitely cooked meat gravy and garnished on top with saffron and coriander, we just might go crazy.

The Hyderabad House at Bhatbhateni (50 meters towards the Bhatbhateni Temple, opposite the Bhatbhateni Supermarket) has been titillating the taste buds of Nepali foodies with its big-portioned biryanis and other rich titbits. Hyderabad House gives you the taste of true Indian and Mughlai cuisines and surprisingly with a small collection of Chinese dishes too.But you might not want to order Chinese there. You’re better off with platefuls of kebabs, dumpukht biryanis, Hyderabadi soups called marag and other spicy, succulent Indian royalty like dishes.

Just a little reminder the dishes, tasty as they are, are a tad expensive at Hyderabad House. If that is no problem, you won’t regret a visit, we tell you.

THE MENU

Chef’s Special:

- Chicken Afghani Kebab

- Biryani

- Kebab Platter

Opening hours: 11 am - 10 pm

Location: Opposite Bhat Bhateni

Cards: Accepted

Meal for 2: Rs 3,000

Reservations: 4443839

As a kid when he is locked up for picking pockets, the orphan Sanghram Bhalerao aka Simmba sees the perks of being a cop. It’s not about maintaining law and order that attracts him to the job. He’s rather blown away at the potential of how much a cop can make underhand. Simmba eventually grows up to be a bent police officer who likes to scoop up fat ‘commissions’, acting as a middleman for both criminals and their victims. This corrupt cop played by Ranveer Singh is the protagonist in Rohit Shetty’s latest ‘Singham’ spin-off ‘Simmba’. Under Shetty’s pure masala aesthetics and ear-splitting back­ground score, we see cars float in mid-air and the hero lift off a dozen men in one take. When the film doesn’t take itself seriously, Singh’s natural energy makes us buy his anti-heroic qualities. It’s when the film shifts gear to give a sermon on a sensitive issue like ‘rape’ and slaps us with a populist stance that the film feels unbearably childish and narrow-minded.

 Who should watch it?

‘Simmba’ is designed as a crowd-pleasing masala film and packs in equal doses of action and comedy to fans of wholesome masala action films like ‘Singham’ and ‘Dabbang’. But it has a problematic social message that may upset many.

After we’re introduced to Simmba, the plot wastes no time to kick in. Simmba is transferred to a police station in Goa where a local kingpin Ranade (Sonu Sood) and his brothers dominate orga­nized crime. Simmba is quick to impress Ranade and enlists himself on Ranade’s pay-list, much to the dislike of Simmba’s junior officer, the honest head constable Mohile (Ashutosh Rana). In the meantime, Simmba also falls for Sagun (Sara Ali Khan), a girl running a catering business outside Simmba’s police station and whose deceased father used to be a daring cop.

In the film’s lighter moments early on, Ranveer Singh abandons all inhibitions and delivers an over-the-top Simmba, reminiscent of old-school Govinda and Salman Khan’s Chulbul Pandey from ‘Dab­bang’. He keeps things cool and funny with a flawed character like Simmba, although we can pretty well predict the transformative journey his character is going to take. But a rape sequence is then ill placed as Simmba’s coming-of-age moment. For once, Shetty and his screenwriters milk this moment for shock value and deliver patriarchal vigilante justice to a deep-rooted patriarchal problem. Women of this film remain in the periphery, while the men take things in their own hands to combat violence—with the help of violence.

Sara Ali Khan, who was impres­sive in her debut film ‘Kedarnath’, is used only for cosmetic purpos­es in this faux-feminist film. She makes random appearances during the film’s songs and turns into a wallflower among a parade of sup­porting characters.

‘Simmba’ doesn’t dig too much to make its flawed protagonist examine himself or to go through a personal crisis to come out with a changed heart. He rather changes suddenly without any personal growth or greater understanding of the world around him. And the plan of action he chooses is noth­ing short of the immature Simmba we meet at the film’s start.

Rohit Shetty is unmatched in orchestrating high-end action sequences but he still comes off raw in handling dramatic scenes with nuances. Shetty likes to make his point through heavy dialogue and takes a swing at challenging social problems with ultra-manliness and heroism. This has resulted in giving us ‘Simmba’ that breaks no new ground but solidifies stereotypical populist treatment of a sensitive issue that required more artistic and dramatic probing.

Movie: Simmba

Genre: Action

CAST: Ranveer Singh, Sara Ali Khan, Ashutosh Rana, Sonu Sood

DIRECTION: Rohit Shetty

‘Zero’ is a tall tale about a short man. This man is played by Bolly­wood’s evergreen romantic hero Shahrukh Khan, who digitally shrinks to become the four feet tall Bauua Singh, a self-centered and motor-mouthed 38-year-old bachelor from a small town in Meerut, India. It isn’t the first time we’ve seen Khan shed out his arms-wide-open lover boy persona. We’ve watched him play a video-game character turned superhero (Ra.One) and an obsessed fan of a Bol­lywood superstar (Fan). Here too he pushes through a physically challenging role with some help from his Red Chillies VFX team. But take away the scale of the film’s production and its visual effects, and ‘Zero’ is a very problematic film that hops from one genre to another and takes giant leaps of faith. The result? An unsta­ble film that impresses, con­fuses and frustrates in equal proportions.

Who should watch it?

If you can buy the outlandishness of the movie and get past the film’s giant logical leaps then you might find ‘Zero’ entertaining.

It isn’t the first time we’ve seen Khan shed out his arms-wide-open lover boy persona

Bauua Singh is introduced as a wayward son of a well-off father (Tigmanshu Dhulia). Bauua spends his time either annoying his belt-wielding father or throwing cash at any­one who flatters him by link­ing him with his Bollywood crush, actress Babita Kumari (Katrina Kaif). Bauua’s search for a matching life partner takes him to Aafiya (Anushka Sharma). There’s a one in a million chance that Aafiya, a scientist suffering from cere­bral palsy (whose research has helped discover water in Mars) will fall for Bauua (whose studies stopped after 10th grade).

But Bauua woos Aafiya with his street-smartness and Aafi­ya finds his antics non-judg­mental and unlike the pity she receives from everyone around. She goes head over heels for Bauua and even fights off her parents who badmouth Bauua for his height and education. And then just Bauua’s dream-girl Babita Kumari crosses his path. He’s so smitten to see her in real life that he aban­dons everything, even Aafiya, to pursue her.

‘Zero’ populates itself with quirky characters that we don’t often see in a mainstream masala film. Aside from Bauua and Aafi­ya who suffer from unique physical conditions, the oth­er major character Babita Kumari is drawn from real life. She’s a spoilt celebri­ty, drinking away her wor­ries to get over a breakup. And Katrina Kaif finds the right mojo to give us a no-holds-barred Babita Kumari. She even over­shadows Anushka Sharma’s inconsistent and overtly dra­matic portrayal of the wheel­chair-bound Aafiya.

When you watch Bauua and all the other main leads of ‘Zero’ in isolation, there is so much to like about them. But when they are pitted together by a plain plot that is not ashamed of its outlandish façade, we as audience lose connection between parts and forget what kind of movie we are watching. Is this a romantic epic? Is this a space explo­ration sci-fi flick?

Director Aanand L Rai and his frequent screenwrit­er Himanshu Sharma fail to deliver a coherent narra­tive. In ‘Zero’ they bank on Shahrukh Khan’s charm to pull off big and highly imag­inative set pieces. And Khan pulls out all stops to give us an earnest Bauua. But the plot’s silliness is too much to handle after the film’s mid­point and Bauua’s change of heart feels unearned and too hasty.

The silly ambition to patch up a rickety storyline with king size budget and high quality VFX work has dwarfed ‘Zero’ into a film that only impresses in parts and disap­points on a massive scale.

Movie: ZERO

Genre: Romantic Comedy

CAST: Shahrukh Khan, Anushka Sharma, Katrina Kaif

DIRECTION: Aanand L Rai