Categories
Whatay!

What we learnt from ‘Koffee With Karan’

Some major learnings, none of them pleasant. Here’s a list of 5 top reasons we’re ditching this show’s next season.
by The Editors | editor@themetrognome.in

We all love a good dose of gossip, especially about celebrities. And what could be better than celebrities bitching about other celebrities? On the face of it, Karan Johar has a good formula on his hands – he invites the biggest names from the Hindi film industry to the show, he sometimes asks them about their love lives point blank, he laughs at himself and is generally a friendly presence.

And yet…Koffee With Karan Season 4 was an extremely shallow, bordering-on-pathetic attempt to make our desi stars appear more glamorous and more intelligent than they already are (not). If Karan was hoping to make a better impression this time around and lay the groundwork for the show’s next instalment, we are sorry to say that this season has been terrible, and during the father and daughter Kapoor’s last episode, we nearly stabbed ourselves in the eyes with a blunt pencil.

If this show comes up with Season 5, and it will, we are going on vacation and coming back only when the show’s over. Here’s why:

1. Karan Johar is homophobic.

We don’t know about you, but Karan gave us a headache in every single episode with his ‘At gunpoint, if you had to have a gay encounter…’ question. At gun point? What’s so gun point about having a gay encounter? Then he thought it was very funny that Aditya Roy Kapur ‘admitted’ to a gay relationship with Ranbir Kapoor. What’s more, the question and the resulting giggles indicated that Karan, and his guests, wanted us to think that everybody in the room was straight.

Next time, Karan, if you must start a question with ‘At gun point…’, consider these endings:

– Which of my films would you watch on loop for a week?

– Tell me, what do you really think of the coffee hamper?

– Tell me, why does nobody remember the name of the dog in Hum Aapke Hain Koun?

2. The dumbest guests always make it to the show.

Sonam KapoorA case in point is Sonam Kapoor, who took top spot this season from such worthies as Alia Bhatt (“My GK is bad!”) and Anushka Sharma, whose only response to any question about Virat Kohli was a giggly “Shut up, Karan!” Not only were Sonam’s views on ‘art films’ and ‘not good-looking people are not necessarily good actors’ astonishing beyond anything else we’ve heard this year, she kept peppering each sentence with the word ‘like’. Like, every four words, she would say ‘like’.

And then, like, she said, “Robert deNiro!” to the question, ‘Who said, ‘An eye for an eye makes the world blind?’ Like, really, Sonam. Did you leave your brains in your other fashionista suit?

3. Karan invites very boring guests with nothing to say.Salman Khan

For all its so-called ‘fun and candid’ quotient, our celebrities are remarkably boring on the show. Most of the guests this season made us yawn with their responses to questions – we’re not saying the likes of Aamir Khan and Madhuri Dixit are boring people, they probably get like that for Karan. The only exception to this parade of yawn-worthy guests was Salman Khan, who was merely an ass. What’s more, the show does not invite anyone outside of Mr Johar’s immediate clique – why not invite Kangana Ranaut, Richa Chadha, Huma Quraishi, Randeep Hooda, to name a few? Maybe they’re too intelligent for this show.

4. The coffee hamper is getting increasingly tacky.

What was that thing, really? We swear that picnic basket thingy is so tacky, if it met Sonam Kapoor in a dark alley, she would first have hysterics and then comment on how ‘not good looking hampers are not necessarily good hampers’.

And why do Karan’s guests pretend to fall all over themselves for the chance to win it? More to the point, what is in it? Why are the contents so secret? We’re dying to get our hands on the hamper, so that we can set fire to it.

 

5. This show is a cesspool of lies.

So. Many. Lies. On. One. Show. Either these people really believe their own deluded statements or they think viewers are nuts. The following is just a small list:

What they said What they meant
“I never read gossip magazines or papers.” I gloat over gossip written about others.
“We’ve never been friends, but we’ve always been cordial to each other when we meet.” Except for the times when I look through her/him, which is always.
“I don’t have any enemies in the industry.” Only frenemies, because I’m a bitch that way.
“I’m not insecure. There’s place for everyone.” I will do whatever it takes to sabotage my rivals’ projects.
“He’s never given me a reason to not trust him. We love each other too much to cheat.” So what if I caught him 12768 times? At the end of the day, he always comes back to me, like a homing pigeon.
“Finally winning this hamper is a monkey off my back.” Only a monkey on crack would actually want to win that thing.
“I didn’t marry a hero because I was not interested.” Also because the hero I was seeing then suddenly got himself arrested. What a bummer.

 

(Pictures courtesy www.india-forums.com, www.in.com, www.indiatimes.com, idiva.com) 

What did you think of Koffee With Karan, Season 4? Tell us in the comments section below.

Categories
Watch

Gana wala song

The hilarious spoof of ‘Ishqwala Love’ from SOTY has got over 3,300 likes already. Check it out.
by The Diarist | thediarist@themetrognome.in

We are frankly amazed by how many filmgoers actually dislike Karan Johar and his films. This is evidenced yet again by this spoof of Ishqwala Love, the sweet and slow number from the filmmaker’s latest offering, Student Of The Year, in which the creators of the video, The Viral Fever Videos, have gone to the extent of singing the track again, fitting in their own lyrics as per the situations in the song. The video is very popular on Youtube and has been liked over 3,000 times in just four days of going online.

The spoof is titled Gana wala song: the Q-tiyatic version, and has some hilarious rewritten lyrics. Check out the video here 

Sample some of the new lyrics:

Gana wala song

Shahrukh wala, foreign wala, budget wala song,

In phoolon se bhi halke, lyrics wala song,

Gana wala song…

A rather dismal-sounding male voice croons the song, and we suspect, the same voice has sung the female lines as well. The overall effect is extremely entertaining, to say the least.

Two thumbs up for creativity and coming out with a remixed version that looks and sounds really funny in the new context.

 (Picture courtesy: www.santabanta.com)

 

 

 

Categories
Film

Has-beens and their brats

Bollywood continues to open its floodgates to a new generation of star kids. But are they really worth a watch?
by M | M@themetrognome.in

I feel sad. Sad to know that we have finally seen the last of those days when actors were discovered in the dingily-lit rehearsal halls of a drama school. Where genuine emotions of pain and hunger on the actors’ faces were a reflection of their several days and years of hardship and struggle.

I feel particularly sad, then exhausted, when I watch the offspring of yesteryear stars prancing around in frocks purchased in their (the offsprings’) infancy, draped as fashionable eye candy on the arms of metrosexual men. Yes, I am talking about the cast of Student of The Year, so bite me. This film doesn’t make sense to me at all. Its songs don’t make sense to me. Its cast is a big puzzle. The girl, Alia Bhatt, has just one expression on her face – a persistent cringe – and the guys, Siddharth Malhotra and Varun Dhawan, only seem to be dancing around her. Methinks, it take a little more than that to be the student of the year, even at a dance school, and it will take much, much more to please the audience. Better luck next time, Karan.

Coming back to a bigger worry, where are the real men and women? Look at the casting of Student of the Year. Alia is Mahesh Bhatt and Soni Razdan’s daughter, Varun is David Dhawan’s son, his brother is Rohit Dhawan (of Desi Boyz fame) and Siddharth Malhotra is reportedly related to Karan’s close friend Manish Malhotra. The rumour mills have been buzzing with stories of Karan and Siddharth’s ‘close friendship’, where they have been spotted at various pools and restaurants at five- star hotels across the city, even hinting at the-couch-that-must-not-be-named. Sure, the cast boasts a high pedigree, but where’s the talent, folks? From what we’ve seen so far, their biggest talent is that they resemble their parents.

Not so long ago, there was Always Kabhi Kabhi; this was a film made to please the Morani brothers by casting Zoya Morani in the film. It was produced by Red Chillies Entertainment, and Cineyug was a silent partner in the company. A marketing brouhaha was created around the film, and SRK himself shot a music video to promote it. Needless to say, the film bombed at the box office and Zoya Morani was sent packing home.

Backtrack a little more and meet that other star kid disaster, Jackky Bhagnani. His dad, Vashu, will force him down upon us once again in a movie called Ajab Gazabb Love, slated to release next week. I had to pay for therapy after watching just the promos. Jackky’s performance in his debut film Kal Kissne Dekha, for which he won an IIFA award (Star Debutant) was as good as the title of his next release – FALTU.

Not long ago, a rich father was even willing to pay huge sums of money to get a theatrical release for a film directed by his son. Still, the distribution house that usually pays to procure the rights of a film, refused this lucrative offer for fear of losing face, and also because good sense sometimes does prevail in Bollywood.

There are many other star kids, who (to put it bluntly) came and went, without leaving any impression on the audience. Not that they were worse than the ones that get a bigger release – like Jackky and gang,  but this game is all about the parents. The chances of star kids getting a decent break are directly proportionate to their parents’ social equation in the industry. Even the filmmakers know that looking for talent in these kids is futile.

In the near future, I can see the Dharmas and the YRFs of the world setting up a school for these kids, where the dumb are separated from the dumber. The weekly PTA meeting over cocktails will have a one-point agenda – which parents do we like the most, and whose kid should be cast in the next flop?

The film industry has always inspired many to pursue their passion for acting and in return, the stars  narrate this great story of their struggles to the world, thus inspiring others, and so, the circle of life in cinema continues. But it seems that this circle is moving towards recycling has-beens through their children; children, who are not even passionate about this fascinating art, but still enter the profession with good baggage and some meagre acting skills.

I really wonder what these kids will say if they ever reach the pinnacle of stardom (chances of which are as high as a cow winning India’s Got Talent), but it sure will go something like this: “Oh, I was watching reruns of Jersey Shore, when Karan uncle called me to say that he spoke to Daddy and told him I would be acting in his next film. I was like, OK, since I am doing nothing right now and I am not good at anything else either…so I gave it a shot.”

Guess it’s a long wait for the next Amitabh Bachchan and Ranjikanth of this generation.

Till then, I’m going to blindfold myself and listen to soothing music, hoping that this Friday passes me by quickly.

(Student of The Year releases Friday, October 19, 2012. Picture courtesy: www.apnatimepass.com)

Exit mobile version