Pretty Good

Just perfect...

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Shootout at Lokhandwala is a fantastic movie that is full of violence. The movie has many famous actors all in one movie. Amitabh Bachchan stars in a small role as the lawyer who is listening to what has happened. Abishek is in a 2 minute scene and both father son give a standard performance. Sanjay Dutt the main lead of this film gives a good performance as the Police officer. Sunil Shetty and Arbaaz Khan give decent performances as Police officers. Tusshar Kapoor is great as a gangster, and he even improves on his childish voice. The star of this movie has to be Vivek Oberoi who has delivers a Superb performance an Maya the deadly gangster. The film has many other actresses like Amrita Singh who did a good job as the hot headed mother. Aarti Chabria looks sexy in the song and I would like to play with that jism of hers like Tusshar does. Neha looks pretty kaash mein suhaag raat karta us ki saat.

The overall movie I feel is good, but could have been a lot lot better, only if the director would have stopped to make an effort to make the movie more entertainer. What I mean by this is some scenes, almost all songs, and Abhishek Bachhan are not only unnecessary, but they also kill the mood. Let me start with the good points. The movie shows the battle between cops and shooters. The plot is very good, the movie has a good pace. Sometimes you feel cops are right and sometimes you think the underworld gang should survive. It is this part which makes you switch your side, made the movie watchable. Also it has given exactly the same weight to family matters as it is needed. The next comes the actors Sanjay Dutt and Vivek-Anand Oberoi. The entire story revolves around the characters they have played, viz. ACP Samsher Khan, and Maya Dallas. All care have been taken to make an impression about these two characters. Showing them walking in slow motion, walking around without caring about the bullets being fired around, the punch lines, and the dialogs. Watching these two on screens doing the stuffs in their style is a good experience. Apart from story line and these two actors, all other things are ordinary. But fortunately they doesn't make the movie bad. Other actors Sunil Shetty, Arbaz Khan, Rohit Roy fits in their characters, and have done good, at least no harm to their characters. Just that I feel that those hi-fi conversation between Arbaaz and Sunil could have been removed. It hurts the characters and purely unnecessary. Now the bad part. First I will mention Tushhar Kapoor. Though his outfit is changed to suit as an "don't care" shooter, his acting is very pathetic. One can clearly tell that he is trying hard to get into character, but he can not. Also his character Buwa also misbehaves differently in movie. In the beginning it feels that he is a serious thinker, and not of type "just do it". But later in the movie he is shown just shooting the people unnecessary, laughing at unnecessary points, and making unnecessary comments. I feel that if this character could have been portrait better, it would have done a lot better for the movie. Watching Tushhar Kapoor on screen is just a terrible punishment. The songs as mentioned by many, is a total useless addition. Though they are good to listen and watch, they harm a lot to the story line. In fact, it is this part, which makes the movie unrealistic. The songs are to be blamed major for not having this movie in the quality of Vaastav or Satya. I will just say that, if you haven't watched the movie, go and watch it. But just don't put much expectations. This is based on true rumors, and exactly has got nothing to do with reality.

The star cast is huge. The director is decent. The production house is creative. The claim is that it is based on true rumors. All these appeals to audiences, and I too was! The story is based on so called true events that lead to a broad day light shootout in a residential area flat named Lokhandwala of Bombay; of underworld mafia by Bombay police lead by Anti Terrorist Squad (ATS). The movie is clearly divided into two halves. The first half showcases the emergences and development of all key characters and their past through several flashbacks and recollections. The second half is more engaging with the actual shoot-out taking place in the last 40 minutes.The ATS squad is lead by Shamsher Khan (Sanjay Dutt) who selects several officers for the task (Suniel Shetty and Arbas Khan are the key two). The underworld mafia is remotely controlled by Dawood Ibrahim from Dubai through a small gang led by Maya Dolas (Viviek Oberio) of four other members (one of them is Tushshar Kapoor). The character of Lawyer Dhingra is played by Amitabh Bachchan who cross examines the ATS squad (that leads to several flashbacks) and finally wins the case for them.As the movie is based on research the directors have tried to show all the sides of the story and the key one is of Shamsher Khan getting the tip off of the mafia hide out from Dawood or a local informer – both the events are shown for the audience to judge the truth.The movie is too loud and noisy with continuous action scenes, chases and gun-fire. Apart from that there are too many song and dance sequences that are specially made for the front benchers. The first half of the movie is boring, whereas the second half holds good attention. Three songs before interval are lousy and one song after the interval (Ganpat Chai La) is excellent – music and choreography are good.All the actors have performed well. Amitabh overacts a lot during cross examination. The movie belongs to Sanjay Dutt. He performs the role of Shamsher Khan to the hilt – the personality, the emotions and the sway of his walk steals our heart. Daringly his counter part role has been performed brilliantly by Viviek Oberio, who puts his heart and soul into this black role of Maya Dolas. After Company, Viviek would be remembered again for this portrayal for a long time. Viviek is ably supported by Tushshar Kapoor who too has acted well.There is too much of guns and violence. The camera angle is journalistic and at times jarring. The music is over the top and loud. The overall direction is not up to the mark. The Director – Apoorva Lakhia could have done a wonderful job with this volcanic subject. But there are no second chances! (Stars 5 out of 10)

the plot was poor, very predictable. the same old over abused story of gangsters trying to overpower the don with the hybrid of fake police encounters. what is the meaning of hundreds of policemen firing aimlessly at a building? and yes, the random shots managed to kill no one. the story was unclear on whether they want to show some petty criminals struggle become the mafia, or some devoted policemen's attempt to get rid of crime and criminals. poor hybrid of the 2 distinct plots made the story pathetic. the "petty criminals" were too petty to arouse any viewer interest, cause they danced and relaxed most of the time in the bar to pose any serious threat to the existing don or to really trouble the law and order of the city. the dignified policemen were just too naive in their approach, planning and execution that they deserved to die at the shootout instead of the criminals. but as said before, the "petty criminals" were too petty!!overall, you should strongly recommend this movie to your friends, if you have wasted your time on this already. Why should they be spared of the torture :-)