Aladin

Genre: Fantasy

Cast: Amitabh Bachchan, Hritesh Deshmukh, Jacqueline Fernandez, , Sanjay Dutt, Ratna Pathak Shah and Saahil Khan

Director: Sujoy Ghosh

Being screened at theatres near you

KATHMANDU: As the name suggests, Aladin is a movie based on the classic tale of Aladdin and the Magic Lamp loved by all children. But unfortunately the whole essence of magic and fantasy is lost somewhere in other typical movie elements in this movie.

The movie deals with the story of orphan Aladin (Hritesh Deshmukh), who lives in the city of Khwaish, whose odd name makes him the butt of all jokes in school, with rubbing lamps being the order of the day.

Then beautiful Jasmine (Jacqueline Fernandez) walks into his life and gives him a lamp as a birthday gift. Finally he gets to do the thing that everyone has been teasing him about since childhood — rub a lamp. A genie named Genius (Amitabh Bachchan) comes out of the

lamp and pesters Aladin to quickly make three wishes so that he can retire.

As with everything good comes the bad, there is the evil Ringmaster (Sanjay Dutt) who is out to kill Aladin. But nobody knows for what? It is only later than one comes to know that his evil plan is connected to the magic lamp and a comet which he desperately needs.

Director Gosh makes a decent effort to make a modern day adaptation of an age-old tale, but ends up cramming too many plots. This makes the script too confusing eventually making the movie one big pile of unintelligible babble.

Deshmukh has perfectly portrayed the meek and submissive character of Aladin. The superstars — Bachchan and Dutt — whom the director was probably trying to cash in on, aren’t impressive. Though both have strong roles, they are not able to deliver what people expect from them. Debutant Fernandez does what Bollywood newbies do the best — look gorgeous.

The music of the movie doesn’t leave an impression on viewers and songs are put in between unnecessarily. In movies like these the role of special effects is as vital as that of actors, however, this movie falls short in this department as well. One person who needs a pat on the back is the art director Sabu Cyril, who has created a wonderful imaginative city of Khwaish.

However, children could find the movie interesting.