Review of Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India (2001) by Mohamad F — 23 Oct 2009

Good. God. This is up on the list of the greatest movies I've ever seen. Easily. Now, this one, unlike Main Hoon Na, isn't good because it grows on you. First, time you watch this movie you know you're watching a masterpiece of all cinema and not just Indian cinema.

The positives. The plot is original by Indian standards. Well, then again, most Indian plots for movies seem to involve the same thing repeated about 7000000000000 times in different scenarios with different character names. This one is somewhat of an exception. It has the usual love story but it's kind of downplayed, although like all Indian love stories, it gets its own song. However, it is original elsewhere. The traditional underdog story is the driving theme behind it along with your classic undertones of patriotism. Also, employing cricket as a final battle style scenario is new to all cinema. Anyway, it's pulled off fantastically. The acting, much like all Indian movies, is amazing. Just, amazing. I'm not even kidding when I say that this is easily some of the best acting I've ever seen. Watch this movie, then watch the Star Wars prequels, or the Harry Potter series, or the new Transformers movie or any other movie that I've bitched about having bad acting. This movie's acting really helps prove my point that good acting does not exist in those movies. This movie really helps you put all ideas of acting skill in the correct scale. And in the end, the actors have to lip-sync too, and dance and make ridiculous plots seem perfectly plausible. Which gives them a hell of a lot more to do than American actors. On to the the music. Mind-blowing.A.R. Rahman at his absolute best. The singers are fantastic, the dancing is entertaining. This is the best music I have ever heard from a movie or musical. PERIOD.

Overall, this movie is a masterpiece of the cinema. Proof to my point is that it was put up for an Oscar for foreign films and won pretty much every Indian award it could get. My suggestion, rent it, or grab it from your local library, grab some popcorn, and kick back with one of the greatest movies ever.