Hindi
Inspired yet insipid
MUMBAI: A coming of age film again; Imran Khan is 25 year old and Kareena Kapoor ready to enter her 27th. They say the generation today is fast and matures before teens, Imran, though in mid 20s (in the film) and a veteran of over half a dozen films, is still coming of age. Well, if he is taking his time coming of age, it is fine but an Indian film where the female actor is mature and smarter than the male actor and in full control is a rather dicey theme to attempt; what is more, the hero stays a loser till the very end! Whatever happened to happy endings?
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Producer: Hiroo Yash Johar, KaranJohar, Ronnie Screwvala. |
Imran Khan has been sacked from his job by his architecture firm in the US and the sacking happens to coincide with the two day visit of his parents, Boman Irani and Ratna Pathak, from India. The only son of rich parents, Imran Khan has been brought up with their idea of discipline from brushing teeth thrice a day to which colour tie to wear. He can‘t wear socks and underwear unless pressed And one thought film heroes were supposed to be idols! Imran Khan‘s first thought always is what will his parents say/think? and he decides not to tell them about losing his job. Boman Irani plays the kind of father who was never happy with his son winning a silver medal but unhappy about losing out on gold one.
Single, suppressed and jobless, Imran Khan bumps into Kareena Kapoor at a utility store who on her part has just been ditched by her boyfriend she keeps referring to as Sam. Kareena Kapoor is everything that Imran Khan is not; extrovert, fun loving and full of stories about her past affairs. It is Christmas eve and Kareena Kapoor invites Imran Khan to celebrate the evening with her at a shady bar; not quite the hero‘s class but that is what an always tight on money Kareena is used to. A simple beer drinking evening turns into tequila guzzling session, one thing leads to another and both end up in an instant marriage chapel only to come out married to each other. (If it sounds familiar the basic theme is from the 2008 Hollywood film, What Happens In Vegas). The realisation strikes the morning after and both decide to annul the marriage.
However, the circumstances lead Kareena Kapoor to take shelter in Imran Khan‘s pad before she makes a trip to India in a few days. Fondness grows and she convinces Imran also to join her on her trip and yes, he can live at her house and his parents need not know. So what if Mumbai is so huge and crowded, Imran Khan can‘t hide from his parents as he is spotted crossing a road by his mother and it is time to change tracks as over a dinner Imran Khan opens up before his parents and guests breaking the shackles over his life. The story moves back to its original track, Imran Khan and Kareena Kapoor; the former has by now fallen head over heels for Kareena who does not share his feelings and is content telling him about her various past encounters! Her feelings for Imran Khan are purely platonic and that is how it remains as the film ends. The hero remains an eternal loser!
This is a thin and routine storyline with mostly two characters, not equally talented, to carry it through. The funny moments and gags are few and far in between which makes the going very slow, dull at most times. Direction is routine. Musically, only the title song stands out. Dialogues are good at places, but not enough to make it a laugh riot.
Performance-wise, Imran Khan has few expressions to offer coming out bland most of the time. Kareena Kapoor gives one of her better performances and does her part convincingly. Boman Irani and Ratna Pathak Shah are good.
Ek Main Aur Ekk Tu is an insipid watch with poor prospects at the box office.
Hindi
Remembering Gyan Sahay, the lens behind film, television and advertising
From a puppet rabbit selling poppadums to Hindi cinema, he framed it all.
MUMBAI: There are careers, and then there are canvases. Gyan Sahay, the veteran cinematographer, director, and producer who passed away on 10 March 2026 in Mumbai, had one of the latter. Over several decades in the Indian film and television industry, he turned lenses, lights, and the occasional puppet rabbit into something approaching art.
A graduate of the Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) in Pune, Sahay built his reputation as a director of photography across a career that stretched from the early 1970s all the way to the digital age. He was the kind of craftsman who understood that a well-composed shot is not merely a technical achievement but a quiet act of storytelling.
For most Indians of a certain age, however, Sahay will forever be the man behind the rabbit. His direction of the iconic long-running television commercial for Lijjat Papad, featuring its now-legendary puppet bunny, gave the country one of its most cheerfully persistent advertising images. It was the sort of work that sneaks into the national subconscious and takes up permanent residence.
His big-screen credits as cinematographer include Anokhi Pehchan (1972), Pagli (1974), Pas de Deux (1981), and Hum Farishte Nahin (1988). In 1999, he stepped behind a different kind of camera altogether, making his directorial debut with Sar Ankhon Par, a drama that featured Vikas Bhalla and Shruti Ulfat, with a cameo by Shah Rukh Khan for good measure.
On television, Sahay was particularly prized for his command of multi-camera production setups, a skill that made him a go-to technician for large-scale shows and reality programmes. In an industry that has never been especially patient with complexity, he was the calm hand on the rig.
In later life, Sahay turned teacher. He participated regularly in masterclasses and Digi-Talks, often hosted by organisations such as Bharatiya Chitra Sadhna, sharing hard-won wisdom on cinematography, the comedy of timing in a shot, and the sweeping changes brought by the shift from celluloid to digital. He was also said to have been involved in a project concerning a biographical film on Infosys co-founder N.R. Narayana Murthy.
Tributes from the film industry poured in following the news of his passing, with colleagues remembering him as a senior cameraman who served as a rare bridge between two entirely different eras of Indian cinema. That is, perhaps, the finest thing one can say of any craftsman: he kept up, and he brought others along with him.
