Angrezi Barfeeeee!

In the order of having watched them... :)

Barfi! + + + - - -
One line review (even though it is quite late!): Sweet, without being diabetic! :)

I did manage to put my foot into my mouth by telling my friend/colleague from UK that the film's protagonist is deaf and dumb... and when Barfi started showing his worldly wise ways, she had only one comment to make: He's definitely not dumb! My mistake: I used an old, commonly used metaphor to describe someone who can't speak or hear! Lesson learnt: Correct term is deaf and mute, and yes, deaf and mute people do not have to be dumb... In fact, the loss of one sense often heightens another!

About the movie...

Pluses:
- Ranbir Kapoor's emoting abilities!
- Location - Darjeeling :)
- Mohit Chauhan's lovely rendering of songs

Minuses:
- BIGGEST MINUS: Missing connections between the brilliant moments...which all happen to be "inspired"! That's sad actually!
- Too much going to and fro from present to past to the older past to the present to the past... you get the idea! :D
- Priyanka Chopra's natural beauty takes away from her autistic character at times ...making it a little unbelievable, but she does manage to make an impression by the time the movie ends.

English Vinglish + + + + +
All pluses! :)
- A very strong social message to fellow Indians who look down on non-English speakers in India!
- Sreedevi and the rest of the brilliant cast
- Pleasant songs (nothing out of the ordinary, but catchy and hummable)
- Script and dialogues
- Surprise package - Amitabh Bachchan! (There, I've spilled the beans! lol)

This one scores and how!!! Sreedevi still has the ability to make one cry at the injustice meted out to her character. Her character is spunky (enough to do a Michael Jackson on the street in a foreign country! :D), determined to put her thoughts into action, brave to follow her heart, committed to her family... in all... a beautifully etched out personna and she does full justice to it.

The movie took me back to my Foreign language learning days... and of course to my experiences as a teacher. All the permutations combinations of words that the English learners used in the class in this movie happen in real life - multiplied by at least 10! :))) Which is one of the reasons why I'm hooked to teaching! :D

It also reminded me of how we as a society put extra emphasis on speaking English and look down upon people, who are unable to express themselves in 'Angrezi'! And are actually proud of the fact that our ability to express ourselves in Hindi (or in our native language) is limited!!! Ridiculous! (I'd have loved to write this post in Hindi, just to make a point, but the Hindi transliteration has disappeared from my tool bar!!! :o)

It is a pity that people who grew up in their own country can't express themselves in their native language!!! Actually this is something to be really ashamed of, if I may use such harsh words!

Coming back to the movie... Do go and watch it, if you haven't already done that. It'll open your eyes to the way you treat people around you! A great leveller! :)