Livestonth I am only giving this movie a 1 for the great cast, though I can't imagine what any of them were thinking. This movie was horrible

FrogGlace In other words,this film is a surreal ride.

Aneesa Wardle The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Brooklynn There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

Sreeram Iyer Has all ingredients of an all-time great movie! Powerful storyline - Love, Romance, status & clash of social values, joy/sorrow, desire/surrender, success/failure,covetousness, suspense of the who-dun- it, control interference and the fight for freedom, purity/sin, justice retribution/understanding, the dilemma of science (physics) vs metaphysics(spiritual/religious thought), the deep hunger/urge in man for meaning & Verities/"Truth" and ideas of Eternal/Ephemeral existence - in short a cameo of LIFE itself."Banaras" even has "action", murder/violence/death which is idiomatically alluded to for each viewer to visualize - or is simply depicted with quiet finality - as in life! I cannot say when I last enjoyed such a totally absorbing masterpiece. I has always wondered if someone would attempt to make a movie that would address all these issues in 2/3 hours. I finally found one that fits the bill! The portrayal of culture, locale is excellent and authentic. The superb music and lyrics - which run completely true to storyline - mood and message as well as events - both timely and timeless. Banaras presents even very deep "fantastic" spiritual concepts: such as 1. the expansion/mergence of the human consciousness with super/cosmic consciousness and 2. Love as the bedrock of all existence 3. The guru-disciple relationship which fords life, death and Infinity seamlessly 4. Principles of spiritual crisis and healing 5. The karma - the cause and effect principle (where we sows the result if our actions - and create/destroy our joy/life by our actions), 6. Forgiveness - cessation of "blame" by absolute love/understanding/surrender (despite awareness of the "sinful" actions) 7. Intuitive transmission/reception of thought/ideas in an excellent manner - with seemingly effortless natural ease - which is again as it should be because "Truth is simple". I saw this once and then had to go back to see it again - because I felt I needed to be a true critic more balanced in my opinion and so must find fault if there is some. I could not fault even the cinematography. The perception of the untouchable - was expressed through the sweeping, the rising of the dust, and the dropping of the broom, all too effectively - the effect was almost viscerally tangible!The authenticity of portrayal of "supernatural" events with real spiritual experience is also astounding!A big thank you to the team! Kudos to each performer - for perfect portrayal of each role and to Pankaj and the editors for a very slick presentation. If Oscars were mine to give - Banaras would surely have had them! May it be the first of many more in its genre - to come from my beloved India!

asana Is it merely a cultural thing that did not allow me the illusion that this film seeks to portray? Having visited India I know that this movie displays a very tiny facade of what Indians think would be appealing about their fascinating country. The Bollywood film _Ek Dhun Banaras Kee_(qv) never leaves the realm of comely mass entertainment.So in great wonderment I saw only the most beautiful facades of the oldest holy city on river Ganges, a sadly polluted river shown here as clean as a mountain stream. There is no reality street life in this movie, we are forced into the unreal world of a film as if ordered by the city's Tourist Development Agency.'Ashmit Patel'(qv)'s pretty-boy face is directed like a south-American music video with all smiles and no substance. There was no acting demanded of him. He would do well selling deodorant in France.The story wants to be spiritually deep and socially conscious by juxtaposing two stylized lovers from different castes. The potential conflict are undramatically produced, after we are given about twenty minutes of showing the couple at Banares' famous temples and river banks, looking at each other in unspontaneously staged settings that really irks everyone who want to be swept away by a movie's illusions instead of watching a long toothpaste or chewing gum commercial. This is a good travel promotion or a boring music video, and one can only wonder what audience it was made for. If it is shown to Indians, they must be proud of a movie of aesthetic beauty that shows their country without problems, except the unfortunate castes system. Shown to western audiences it become a romantic travel film, and as we have seen, accepted both quite favorably by IMDb users of Indian decent and Westerners alike.Besides a cast of pretty people --even Babaji the spiritual teacher floats about with the neatest beard and most perfect robes in white and red-- the film wants to teach basic Hindi and Buddhistic values. It even forewarns its audiences at the beginning that it does not want to promote superstitions, but in almost every scene the accoutrement of superstitious beliefs are shown: ornaments, mystic sculptures, flower petals strewn about, chants and incense. Even the character played by the beautiful 'Urmila Matondkar'(qv) indulges in dreamy superstitious rituals. I respect all belief systems, but if a director forewarns of something he is supposedly not wanting to promote, and we see it all over his film, we have a choice to either believe that he does not notice ritualistic superstitions any longer due to his cultural blindness, or that he really beliefs that his message has transgressed superstition. And it is exactly this message that one would have liked not to see running into sturdy road blocks.Namely the endeavor to transgress a banal and forbidden love story without careful exposition, and fall into the trap of cinematographically created ambiance that actually overpowers the actors. Pretty pictures are nice if you can not travel to the heart of the holy city, but in this case the story suffers and certainly takes away from the filmmakers ambitions.And the story is the age-old apparent conflict between science and religion. Do we get enough information and exposition to learn something new, or even care to contemplate this important topic? No. Is Banares well photographed? Yes, the parts that are devoid of real street life and real people, who normally bring life to the temples. Is there a tension between the lovers? No. Are we happy for them falling in love because we feel their hearts? No. Is the parent-child, castes conflict melodrama powerful enough to move us? No. Are age-old chants well produced like a music video? Yes, excellently. Does the movie do justice to the promos and hype about the alleged conflict of religious beliefs and modern science, or its presentations of the philosophy of love or even as found in romantic love? Nothing deep there. Is the storytelling moving the film forward? No, it stops too often to dwell on its on pretty pretensions.It's eye candy at best, and the two protagonists do not connect except as another daft acting job. The dying dad at the beginning gives much story away, but even he looked pretty healthy as if there was no make-up designer on duty that day. Melodrama, yes. Sizzling love and real drama over the lingering castes system and parental cultural fossilization, no.

echeles I had preservations about the movie.i had read opinions of critics about the movies before seeing it and they were not very encouraging.so i started watching the movie with a cynical attitude and maintained it till the first 10 minutes.but then!!!!!!whew!!!!i was overwhelmed.the dialogs-the acting-the direction everything was superb.of course the dialogs were a little difficult for masses,but then good films are never meant for masses.the acting were tremendous.neither ashmith nor urmila are bad in acting.ashmith is very impressive concerning his experience.urmila acts a little bit typically in the traditional love scenes and dance situations,but she acted so superbly in the other more complicated scenes,that she must be forgiven for the trifle.really,according to me urmila has great potentiality and should be given chance to use and develop it in more art films.naseeruddin shah,in a very mystic role,remained as zestful and as fresh as ever,dimple who got very few chances to show her talent,showed it with a vengeance in one or two scenes,and made her appearance special.raj babbar's acting was astonishing.from a loving father to a dying hopeless man,he portrayed the sheds of his character very beautifully.i will be really upset,if he don't get at least a nomination for his stupendous acting. same may be said to the underrated charismatic Ms Matondkar.honestly,the script was faulty at times,but then everything can not be perfect,except rare cases.the music was classy,so was the direction.lastly,my verdict of the film is,though not a masterpiece,it is surely an excellent film with a fresh concept and dedicated efforts and has encouraged the so called different flow of bollywood,with a very rare clean treat.its a must for people who like to explore life,and are not too cynical.some things may seem overrated,like baba's story,but overall it will be worth watching for those,my guarantee!!!

v-gobind Ek Dhun Banaras Kee.I've been looking forward to see this movie. This movie is not just about a man meets a woman en they fall in love. No, Soham (Ashmit Patel) falls in love with Shwetambari (Urmila Matondkar). Sweta is from a higher class in society and Soham is an orphan from the lowest class. The outcome of this relationship is predictable. The outcome is predictable. Sweta's brother finds out Soham's background and tells this to her father (Raj Babbar). He gets angry and doesn't want Sweta to meet Soham anymore. She gets angry to and explains why she loves Soham. Soham is a student of Babba (Naseeruddin Shah) and she believes Soham is more than a man. Then the parents of Sweta agree with a engagement and a wedding. But then the night before the wedding Soham gets a weird feeling. He gets killed that night.Police tries to find out who the killer is, and tries to get in touch with Babba via Sweta. But Babba seems not to be someone Sweta thinks he is! The way to find the killer seems almost impossible. This movie is almost refreshing. There was a similar line you could pull with the movie Mohabbatein in the relationship between Sharukh and Aishwaria. The songs were beautiful. Ashmit is a very bad actor, so is Urmila. When she dances she makes movements with her head and her mouth I have seen in a lot of her movies before. Only the words 'what the hell is she doing?' come into my mind. Naseeruddin had a very small role to make things up with the other bad performances.In the beginning you can see Raj Babbar on his death bed. This gives a lot away from the story. That is a pity. Even though it was worth watching.Virin G.