Anurag Kashyap 's big gangster saga dream project and his second Mainstream Bollywood directed film became
an Epic Disaster. Bad reviews and enormous economic losses - BUT ... this can result in something good, that
Kashyap will start making his low budget indie films again and return to the New Wave of filmmaking that made
us take notice a decade ago. Will he yet again become the Orson Welles of indian film ?

BUT, that said, this Epic Gangster Saga is still a GREAT FILM. Anurag prepared this production for 7-8 years
and the building of the sets took 10 months (and was placed in Sri Lanka for some reason, maybe it was sponsored
by the government there? In the films intro the filmmakers sends special thanks to the ex-president of Sri Lanka).
AND, this film looks and sounds FANTASTIC, the jazzy music score by Amit Trivedi and the costumes and
dresses all is great. The singing by Anushka Sharmas Goa girl Rosie was performed by Neeti Mohan

and sounds great, i love these Nightclub jazz numbers and Anushkas dresses looked really yummy.
This film is a Mainstream film, so there's no Kashyap Palma-esque visual fireworks here as in his earlier indie
works but still, this film looks gorgeous. The CGI/VFX works great too and you don't notice it which is good,
even the explosion and the gunfire (which usually looks like shit even in Hollywood blockbusters). It seems
that Bollywood really has something working out fine there, i've now seen Big Retro outdoor street scenes in
this film (Bombay view) and in Detective Byomkesh Bakshy (Calcutta view) with trams and lots of people,
all made in CGI without me noticing the computers at work, impressive.

This film depicts Bombay in the 1950's and 1960's during the alcohol prohibition, the gangsters - bootleggers
and killers, corrupted politicians and the lucrative property development market in building the new Bombay.
Nothing new storywise, Bombay Velvet is like a conglomerate of every gangster film ever made and Ranbir
Kapoor seems (maybe) to take on the young Robert De Niro persona of the Godfather.
But it's also a Love Story and the chemistry between Anushka and Ranbir felt quite good and true to me.

Ranbir Kapoor:

I thougt Ranbir Kapoor was pretty good in this film but seems to have got bad reviews in India. I will here
confess that this is the first time in many years i've seen him in a film. Why?
I've avoided him all since seeing him in his debut disaster, the stinking turd Saawariya where he stunk up the
screen and then i saw him in the desperately bad and UNFUNNY comedy Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani
in 2009 where he also STUNK UP the screen. Terrible. Awful. Painfully BAD.
Ha, ha, ha, only India has got Indian film critics and these brainrotted cretins awarded him a Filmfare Award
for his disastrous work in Saawariya and nominated him for best actor in the terrible turd APGK.
Well, i gave him a chance here as i love Kashyap and had to see the film, and he was good, not great but good.
This Ranbir Kapoor wasn't the same as the old one i saw in the above mentioned films. He's an actor now.

The Strange Mystery of the Indian Film Critic - these poor creatures seems to have absolutely NO
comparative cineastic knowledge of what constitutes a great film at all. They live in their own bizarre universe
where no rules apply, the worst ham actors in the most syrupy infantile films gets their praise.
If Orson Welles had made his Citizen Kane in Bollywood these idiots would've hated it.

Anushka Sharma:

She plays the jazz nightclub singer Rosie Noronha from Goa and she's the Gangster Moll to Johnny Balraj.
Anushka didn't get any good reviews for her role either but i thought she was just fine in the role. She's a sociopath
too, as Johnny, traumatized as a child getting mistreated and possibly raped and modelling for nude pictures on
her arrival to Bombay. Rosie don't react at all when she sees Johnny brutally murder a man in front of her, so
she's rotten but beautiful. In this film Anushka shines in the nightclub song numbers as eye candy in gorgeously
spectacular dresses. Actually, the nightclub song numbers is the best thing in this film, it even beats the shootouts.
I first saw Anushka Sharma in the charming Band Baaja Baaraat in 2010 and loved her.

She's GORGEOUS with a killer figure BUT has for some unfortunate reason done the Plastic Boogie with her
face and got her some Duck Beak Lips. Nothing wrong in looking like Gina Gershon (and maybe GG's a natural),
but why jumping on this model/actress hysteria getting baboon ass looking lips when Anushka was perfection
before. Anushka Sharma didn't become a top model because the photographers wanted to see duck lips.

The Story:

It starts in 1949 with The Bombay Prohibition Act and 2 kids grow up in the slums and Red Light district of
Bombay, Johnny Balraj and Chimman (as grownups Ranbir Kapoor and Satyadeep Misra) and become friends.
10 years later Johnny and Chimman are murderers and work as henchmen to the newspaper and nightclub
owner and bootlegger crime boss Kaizad Khambatta (Karan Johar, the famous director who's really good in the
role, best actor in the film even, among with the mighty Kay Kay then naturally).

Rosie Noronha (Anushka Sharma) starts singing in the nightclub Bombay Velvet, but really is a mole to the red
agitator journalist Jamshed Mistry (Manish Chaudhary) who wants to take Khambatta down.
Johnny and Chimman runs the club for their boss but Johnny wants a bigger part of the Bombay Cake, he wants
a part of the lucrative property development in the city, something corrupt politicians and Khambatta runs.
Kay Kay Menon plays a crime squad detective and is as always great but in a too small part.

There's singing, a bit of romance, lots of violence, shoot-outs and a great Feel Bad ending and everything looks
yummy. Raveena Tandon can be seen in a cameo role as a nightclub singer and she looks yummy too.
widescreen 2.35:1, Dolby true HD 5.1 hindi with english subs. Bonus featurettes:
The Making of Bombay Velvet sets 6 min, Making of Johnny Balraj 5 min, Making of Rosie Noronha 5 min,
the story 7 min, the making of costumes 6 min