Everyone I know is cribbing about Kites like they were expecting the guy who ripped off The Apartment and the people who brought you Jaadoo (the alien in Koi Mil Gaya ) and Krissh to come up with a masterpiece. Seriously?
Strictly from this perspective, Kites is simply the best film this combination could've come up with. It is not a classic or an intelligent film by any measure, but when did realism become integral to cinema?
Ask Michael Bay and he'll have five cars bang up and blown to smithereens before he says, “Excuse me?” Robert Rodriguez will smile, cue in the guitaring and have his Desperado fire away in slow-mos. And Quentin Tarantino will speak Samuel L Jackson-ese if you try suggesting that cinema needs realism or any kind of restriction on what is humanly possible.
This is no way in defence of the inane, no-brainer action entertainers that plague Indian cinema. But why would you look for realism, logic and rationality in a film that's gorgeously stylish (Ayananka Bose's cinematography is lyrical) dripping with star charisma, old-world romance and drama. It's True Romance and the El Mariachi movies re-interpreted in a uniquely Bollywood style but in a structure that lends itself more to Hollywood action entertainers.
There is no interval block in Kites . The film just breaks for an intermission halfway without really trying to create a situation five minutes before the break to get you to come back and see what happens. Which is why many Indian movie-goers believe there is no story in Kites .
As the title suggests, the film is about two free-spirited entities that connect accidentally in the sky… Or in the sea for all practical purposes here. They mingle, their lives intertwine before the people flying them lose control and they meet their destinies with an almost poetic resolution.
It's an endearing plot. Rakesh Roshan's generic story about two people who don't speak each other's languages falling in love gets a True Romance makeover, thanks to Anurag Basu, as the couple suddenly find themselves on the run, away from cops and gangsters with just a friend and a Cadillac for company. In fact, Basu pays homage to Tarantino's first screenplay retaining the Cadillac and employs the railroad motif, the mainstay of Sergei Leone's westerns.
The filmmaker who sold the script to the studio did not get the ending he wanted for True Romance because Tony Scott (the villain in Kites is called Tony but that may be a co-incidence) had a mind of his own. But Tarantino sure would love what his student Basu has done to restore the spirit of the ending that he originally wrote.
Never mind the silly Michael Bay car-explosions and the convenient hot-air balloon escapes, the ending of Kites alone deserves an extra star. Only a Tarantino fanboy with his heart in the right place would've done it.
Far from ripping it off scene by scene as he did with The Apartment for one segment of Life in a Metro , this time around Anurag Basu has given nice little twists to this road movie caper. And it helps that Hrithik and Barbara have such a crackling chemistry.
There are plenty of loose ends and some conveniently tied up ends (like Kangna teleporting herself to the climax after going missing in action for half the length of the film) and the melodrama in some portions is cringe-worthy indeed, but let's look at all that's good for a change because the guys who have consistently only ripped off ideas from Hollywood films have attempted a bold experiment at the risk of alienating their staple (the lowest common denominator that made Kaho Na Pyaar Hai, Koi Mil Gaya and Krissh work) in an effort to take all that's Indian to an international market.
Time's up Banderas, there's a new Mariachi in town who can do everything you can and boy, he can dance.
If we can celebrate a foreigner's interpretation of India and Bollywood with Slumdog Millionaire , why not cheer an Indian filmmaker's interpretation of American pulp fiction in a language of our own and in a grammar they understand better.
Kites may not have a thread guiding it, but it flows like a breeze.
Kites
Genre: Action
Director: Anurag Basu
Cast: Hrithik Roshan, Barbara Mori, Kangna Ranaut, Kabir Bedi
Storyline: Two cons fall in love, ditch their respective partners from a mafia family and hit the road, True Romance style, dodging cops and gangsters.
Bottomline: A tribute to Sergei Leone, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino, done Bollywood style for an international audience.
