Date:08/10/2006 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2006/10/08/stories/2006100802290200.htm

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Andhra Pradesh

`Zindaggi' sucks!

FilmReview

FLOP SHOW: Sushmita Sen in "Zindaggi Rocks"

Zindaggi Rocks (Hindi)

Cast: Sushmita Sen, Shiney Ahuja, Kim Sharma

Director: Tanuja Chandra

Last week Mahesh Bhatt moved us to tears with "Woh Lamhe". That was moving without being mawkish. Now, Tanuja Chandra leaves us feeling sad, silly and sentimental. Sorry, but that is hardly befitting a storyteller who regaled us with "Dushman" and "Sur". "Zindaggi Rocks" is an experiment that suffers because of many reasons: bad, real bad music, listless acting, dark picturisation.

The viewers suffer because of one mistake -- entering the hall to watch this film, starring the vivacious Sushmita Sen and the promising Shiney Ahuja.

A story of a rock star with an adopted son, "Zindaggi Rocks" is supposed to help Sushmita Sen show off her acting skills, her dexterity on the dance floor. She is in love with Rehan (Shiney), a doctor who can heal without a scalpel. The passing years have taken toll on Sushmita's lovely face. Her voice, though, is enough to make heads turn.

But she is severely handicapped by Anu Malik's listless tunes. A film like this needed music as if flesh, blood and life. Malik provides mere bones, no soul.

Then the dialogue writer alternates between the drab and the poetic. Top that with some real mediocre support for the lead duo.

While Kim Sharma does her best to blend with the furniture, Moushmi Chatterjee is an absolute misfit in a double role: glib talking, English-speaking aunt, and a tough matron. The film picks up life only when Sushmita decides on an unusual way to save her son's life.

For a while the suspense holds good.It is short-lived, though.

This film is niggardly in graces, generous in blemishes.

ZIYA US SALAM