Ritam Banerjee bagged the Best Cinematography award at Tenerife film festival for the Movie SandCastle

Sandcastle’s Director of Photography Ritam Banerjee won the Best Cinematography award at the London International Film Festival. Movie was also screened at LA Femme Film Festival in Los Angeles on Sunday, 20th October, 2013.

‘Sandcastle’ was nominated in four categories at the film festival – Best Actor (female), Best Supporting Actor (Male), Best Cinematography and Best Feature Film. It has also been nominated for Best Foreign Language Feature Film at the International Filmmaker Fest of World Cinema.

Directed and written by Shomshuklla Das, ‘Sandcastle’ also has dialogues written by her. The name, she says, is a metaphor for the film, which revolves around the journey of a young woman to find her inner calling. It stars theatre actors Sahana Chatterjee and Malvika Jethwani.

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Music: Ram-Leela’s Song Ishqyaun Dhishqyaun

Ram-Leela’s Ishqyaun Dhishqyaun Song is a nice song, sung by Aditya Narayan and the music is by Sanjay Leela Bhansali. Ranveer Singh and Deepika Padukone have shown some fun moves in the video. Song’s lyrics are penned by Siddharth – Garima.
Ishqyaun Dhishqyaun Lyrics:
Dil ki ye goli chale nainon ki bandook se..
Bam bhi girenge ab pyaar ke sandook se.. -(3 times)

Ishq ye tera mera ishquan ke dhishqyaun ke dhishqyaun!

Yahan ishqyaun re wahan dhishqyaun.. -(2 times)

Ladaaku vimaan hai, par tu meri jaan hai

bistar ye tera mera, arey jung ka maidaan hai – (2 times)
Jo tu trigger dabaye, toh main chumme chalaun -(2 times)

Ishq ye tera mera ishqyaun ke dhishqyaun ke dhishqyaun!

Yahan ishqyaun re wahan dhishqyaun – (3 times)

Ishqyaun Dhishqyaun

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Review: War Chhod Na Yaar

Rating: 2.5/5 (Two & A Half Stars)

War Chhod Na Yaar, a war comedy, is nothing like what we have seen before. A fine comedy with a decent message to go along with it. We have seen soldiers fighting with their guns but in #WarChhodNaYaar, you will see them fighting with their tongues. Director’s presentation of two countries going to war and in between sharing their thoughts through their witty humor is refreshing. First half of the movie comes as a surprise and totally entertaining but the second half is confusing and biased. The on-going war between Indo-Pak is hilarious but with the entry of other countries, it loses the charm of being a war comedy. It seems more like as if they are on a mission to throw chinese products out of India.

The movie take us to the time where the war is about to get declared and Defense Minister (Dalip Tahil) visits border along with a national news channel reporter Rut Dutta (Soha Ali Khan) to shoot the war efforts in advance. He instructs Captain Rajveer Singh Rana (Sharman Joshi) to help reporter shoot the hostility at border to motivate the country. Now starts the funny ‘war of words’ and a show which has never been performed in Bollywood before. By the time Rut Datta’s shoot is over, she decides to tell about the war to captain Rajveer. India and Pakistan both the countries are bribed and pressurized by China and America to attack and get engaged in a nuclear war. Captain Rajveer and Rut Dutta plans with Pakistani army to overthrow the war. They also reveal the corrupt minister’s plan on national tv. It helps them to cease the evil plan and finally both armies celebrate peace.
Movie has some of the best comedy actors on board. Sharman Joshi, Sanjai Mishra and Javed Jafri have given their best performances in War Chhod Na Yaar. Sanjai and Javed shows some witty sense while impersonating Pakistani army soldiers. Sharman is in a new avatar and doesn’t disappoint at all. Soha Ali khan has very limited role to show her moves, she is just average and more or less just the filling the gap of a required female face in an Indian movie.
Movie’s music is average and has nothing special to talk about.
War chodd Na Yaar is Director Faraz Haider’s first venture. He has done a good job with the subject. On top of everything, he has penned down the script, most of the dialogues and song lyrics. It seems too many responsibilities made him lost focus and finally he presented us with a confused and half baked script.
First half of the movie is way too entertaining but second half has too many flaws. Movie’s twisting climax saves the day and makes War Chhod Na Yaar a good watch. If only director would have concentrated a bit more on humor and entertainment till the end, he would have provided us with another masterpiece like Hera Pheri. Some dialogues are going to be remembered as popular jokes for years. If you really want to laugh your hearts out and get entertained till the intermission and then leave the theaters.. then War Chhod Na Yaar is your cup of tea.

Overall Ratings : 2.5/5 (Two & A half Stars)

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Review: Sandcastle (2013)

Sandcastle is not just any random movie. It talks about the struggle to find your own identity, it’s about freedom, and it’s also about independence, which isn’t easy. It leaves you on a positive note that we all are unique in our own way. The movie has some loopholes, but the spirit of the movie and the closely captured emotions are worth a watch.
The entire movie is played in chapters and showcases some real life scenarios. Relationships, Independence, Expectations and the rest.. all captured beautifully. The movie is about genuine issues and is close to real life, not a spicy mix of old classics.
Shahana Chatterjee and Malvika Jethwani have performed well whereas the guy playing Sheila’s friend is very fake and breaks the flow of the movie. There are certain other characters in the movie not worth a mention except Sheila’s husband Vikram (Rajat Sharma).
Sheila is an aspiring writer, wife to a rich husband, and an ideal daughter and mother. From an outsider’s perspective, her life is perfect. Like it’s said, what is perfect to one, could be abject misery to another. In the process to launch her first book, she faces the hard reality of life (focused on women of urban India). Everything starts slipping from her hands. Would she be able to speak for herself ? Would she be able to build her own dreams?
She found the answers to all those questions in becoming a perfect and independent woman; there she meets Maya, her own perfect image. She learns to be free from Maya and starts to enjoy life from a new prospective. Later, when her family gets to meet the new Sheila (through Maya), they accept her but refuse to replace her with old Sheila. Will she go back to her old persona or will she adopt maya’s personality? Will she learn to be happy with her old self or change everything to become a perfectionist?  Watch it to know more.
The initiative to expose the common topic is very uncommon. Fiction is easier but to research, understand and portray the reality is an achievement already. Direction is good whereas the screenplay is average. Script and the concept of the movie are the winners. A little more efforts collectively would have taken the movie to another level. Movie’s dialogues and situations are placed intelligently.
The starcast could have been better. Maya as gypsy could have been more attractive and the character of Sheila’s friend could have been played by a better artist. Also, though the climax was a clever choice of action, it wasn’t executed with perfection. In some parts you are totally confused about what’s happening. 
If you can ignore some parts of the movie with flaws and would like to enjoy a genuinely intellectual movie, witness the struggle of women of Urban India in Sandcastle.
Overall Rating: 3/5 (Three Stars)
Directer: Shomshuklla
Producer: Tina Sen
Technical Director: Abraham Cherian
Director of Photography: Ritam Banerjee
Story: Shomshuklla
Screenplay: Shomshuklla
Music: Ankur Mukherjee
CAST:
Shahana Chatterjee
Malvika Jethwani
Rajat Sharma
Uditvanu Das
Iti Pawar
Sagnik Mukherjee
Aindrila Mitra
Vaishali
Himangi Mahabaleshwarkar

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