Sholay (1975)

What to say of this 'almost perfect Bollywood movie' and arguably among the greatest from the industry, it had absolutely everything in it, a blend of all the facets of Hindi cinema, yet modelled on the Western movies running in Hollywood at that time and before. No need to elaborate on any of the elements of this film, as any Hindi movie lover would know; but to mention just one, I would talk of the action sequences in the running train which were such perfectly shot that they seemed way ahead of its time. It had a slow opening in the theatres but gathered steam in the second week and o boy, it never looked back from there. I still remember it running as late as the 90s in some theatre or the other in the city and had a release every year whenever they found a slot for this classic. If the number of times a movie been watched by any viewer is the question, it would perhaps make the Guinness Books by now. 8/10

On a personal vendetta, retired policeman Thakur Baldev Singh recruits lifelong thieves Veeru and Jai to capture bandit leader Gabbar Singh. Two years earlier, Thakur had captured the two thieves. While transporting them on a train, they are attacked by bandits. Thakur releases them to help fight off the bandits. He becomes severely wounded in the fight but the guys risk imprisonment to save his life after flipping a coin for the decision. Along the way, the boys befriend talkative village girl Basanti.This is a blending of Bollywood and a spaghetti western. It definitely has elements of both and is able mix them well. There are lots of action although sometimes they fall short in terms of staging. There is also the song and dance element. There is broad comedy. I like Basanti but I'm less taken with the Hitler-stached jailer. He is way too broad. The main leads are charismatic and compelling. Overall, there is a solid Magnificent Seven feel and this is only a small step beneath that level of cinema.

I completed the top 250 during the last couple of weeks, which meant that I had to see a lot of Indian movies. Though I did not become a fan of Bollywood cinema, there were a few good movies among them. Udaan is a very strong movie, and Sholay is also very enjoyable.Sholay borrows a lot from established movies, mainly westerns. The family murder scene was very similar to a scene in Once Upon a Time in the West. The action is technically not as good as Hollywood (the blood looks ridiculous), but it doesn't prevent me from enjoying the movie. It contains a few classic elements (like the coin with heads on both sides), that we've seen before, so it doesn't surprise anymore.The film makers changed to movie enough to Indian values and style, such that this wasn't an unnecessary remake of the classic westerns. I thought the two main characters were very likable, there war some plot twists I didn't see coming, and there were also some funny side characters (I liked the jailer a lot).

Yeah Sholay or amber draws its cinematography from western spaghetti movie genre but this movie is a epic in its own respect. Amazingly multi layered, multi styled, multi varied yet singly packed this film is one blasting bomb of cinema.If you loved Once upon a time in west, the good the bad and the ugly then this movie is a step cohesive with them in a whole different style and still packed with much more enriching entertainment and music that can't be forgotten in many centuries. Number of attempts have been made to make a successful western styled movie where movies like unforgiven failed (though they win Oscar when they don't have much competition that year and were made in the USA) but nothing and never will any movie be made that can invoke this style and make a huge lot of progress in its shot.'Masala film' is the nick name given to its effect because this movie provides you with one of the best tonic of involvement and entertainment. Extremely well-made, beautifully edited, amazingly written, melodiously sung, damningly acted and truly evolved , Sholay is a movie for human beings.