October 24, 2006

Pyaar Ke Side Effects - Ik hou van jou ?!?

I need to start to actually read the descriptions of the DVDs I plan to purchase. Such. And stop being greedy. When I read that bollydvd.net had the Eros DVD of Pyaar Ke Side Effects for under 10€ I ordered it immediatly. Lekin ek choti problem hai. As I unpack the DVD I am instantly confused. The movie is titled "Bijwerkingen Van Liefde". WTF? I put it in the DVD drive and Uarghh! Its PKSE but with Dutch subtitles as only option. Nahiiiiin. Not this movie. I was so looking forward to it. Ok. Take a deep breath and think girl. Your Hindi is about the lower mediocre level yet, and Dutch is a language thats pretty closely related to German (think Hindi and Punjabi with the same script). Ok. Lets try it.










Sid is a DJ in Delhi. During one not so cool job at a wedding he meets Trisha, the bride who gets very cold feet and runs. Some time later they meet again in Mumbai and fall in love. Being a great couple and getting along really well, one day Trisha (!) proposes to Sid who in stereotypical male manner panics. His fear of the shackles of being a husband
(and really not being helped by his friends)









leads to serious trouble in the house and since he is genuinely stupid he says yes when he still means no. And then ruins everything. We get a "Meet The Parents" moment with Trisha´s dad and in fact he all over acts like a jerk. So much that the engagement breaks. And Sid, obviously to late, finds out that a married life with Trisha is not as bad an idea as he thought in the beginning.









A simple, has been there (at least in western cinema) story. But we have something that your average movie does not have. Sid is played by Rahul "I loved him in Chameli and Mr&Mrs Iyer and he can do no wrong in my eyes" Bose and Mallika "I am very curious about you girl" Sherawat. An interesting pairing. With a great chemistry.
Rahul is cool as always. I want to see much more of him and I´m don´t care whether its mainstream or arthouse btw.










And then there is Mallika. So far I only knew her through the gossip pages. Then there were some reviews of her movies that said behind the sexbomb image was actually an nice actress and finally a (female) friend who met her at a party and told me that she was fun and down to earth in "real" life. So, very curious. And she is nice here. Really funny and sweet. No Meryl Streep but hey who is?










Some factoids that I really liked:
- Mallika is taller then Rahul and nobody cared or mentioned it.
- I love it when Sid talks straight into the camera.
- I dreaded the "My Way" cover song (which I hated on my Pyaar Ki Ek Kahani Song DVD) lekin song actually acchaa hai.
- the song Sid has to play 15 times at the wedding job where he meets Trisha for the first time is "Sajna Ve Sajna" from Chameli and he hates playing it
- the supporting cast e.g. Suchitra Pillai-Malik "me or them" Priya from DCH

PKSE is not perfect but its makes for a nice evening. Watch it.

P.S: "Ik hou van jou" means "l love you" in Dutch and "Bijwerkingen Van Liefde" is simply "Pyaar Ke Side Effects"

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

That's very funny. I'm glad for the warning, because that's the kind of thing that could easily happen to me, except my German is nowhere near the level of yours (obviously).

How big is the market for Bollywood among the Dutch-speaking population, I wonder? How many of these DVDs did they make?

I too love Rahul based on Mr. & Mrs. Iyer and I too am curious about Mallika. Can't wait to see it. I also just really enjoy saying the title out loud to myself.

babasko said...

I don´t know for sure, but what I do know is, that the Netherlands have a big asian community (stemming from the fact that indonesia has been a dutch colony for long)so thats were at least part of the audience would come from.

Anonymous said...

Oh, they do make lots of references to Rahul being not quite that tall in the movie, it's like a running joke. And I just love how they play with their images when Mallika calls him a pseudo-intellectual and he says he prefers classy girls as opposed to Delhi girl which are too "colourful". Yeah, Mallika is no worldclass actress but she plays her cards right, smart girl. It's sad you watched it in Dutch-Hindi though. The dialouges are a definite plus of this movie (the songs being a very strong minus).
And yes, Rahul! Can totally understand!

babasko said...

They did, julia? grrrrml. Then I guess I have to watch it again. Can´t get that let slip by me..

Anonymous said...

Yes and it's ueber-funny. First when Mallika makes him get on her little scooter she says: "hop on, Mr 5'6 foot". Then at their first date he says this isn't a date (although she is dressed to the nines), she retorts "I wouldn't date you anyway". A couple of beers later (and braver) Rahul inquires as to why this Delhi girl doesn't lust for his intellectual yet well-toned body the way we do, and she retorts: "You are short!"
Love it!
I am also more into the tallish Sanjay Dutt-guys but for you Mr Bose I might just make an exception.