Review of Main Hoon Na (2004) by Lurple J — 11 Jul 2008

When a movie is described (fairly accurately, as it turns out) as a cross between True Lies, Grease, Never Been Kissed, Toy Soldiers- with a little bit of Matrix-style action and the requisite Bollywood singing and dancing- how could it not be terrible beyond belief? Main Hoon Na (which apparently translates as "I am here now"), while it does live up to the description, is not what I expected.

The film bounces around from action to romance to drama, all interspersed with entertaining music and dance numbers. The movie is almost always light-hearted and fun (and I found some of the funny bits hilarious, to be honest), although the main plotline deals with the serious issues of disputes between India and Pakistan and terrorism.

There are two things that really surprised me about the Main Hoon Na:

1. It careens along its three-hour course with hardly a dull moment. For what is essentially a fun popcorn romp of a movie, it's amazing that it manages to run this long and still be enjoyably engaging for pretty much the entire time.

2. I still have no idea how the writer/director managed to combine such a bizarre mix of things so successfully. There's no way this movie should work, never mind work well, but it does.

So I say see it for yourself. It's not ever going to be an Oscar contender but it is a very entertaining and fun movie, which is exactly what it sets out to be. If you're not put off by some some singing and dancing, Main Hoon Na will be both familiar and refreshingly different for most westerners.