Cast and Crew:

Movie Title: London Dreams
Release Date: October 30, 2009
Language: Hindi
Genre: Drama/Romance
Cast: Salman Khan, Ajay Devgan, Asin, Om Puri, Rannvijay Singh, Adithya Roy Kapoor
Cinematography: Sejal Shah
Editing: Amitabh Shukla
Music: Shankar- Ehsaan-Loy
Written by: Suresh Nair
Produced by: Aashin Shah
Directed by: Vipul Amrutlal Shah

The Movie:

This film is entirely a composition of friendship, trust, passion, jealousy and sacrifice with the backdrop of music.

The story:

The story is about two childhood friends Arjun (Ajay Devgn) and Mannu (Salman Khan) from Bhatinda, a small village in Punjab. The movie starts from the early days of Arjun and Mannu, when in school. While other teenager’s think to become doctor or engineer, Arjun aims to be a Rockstar and Mannu aims nothing.

Arjun is extremely passionate about music and his dream is to make it big and sing at the London’s Wembley Stadium with thousands of fans cheering for him where his grandfather failed to perform and fulfil his dream, thus committed suicide. Arjun’s family consequently develop hatred towards music and stop him from entering the industry. On the other hand, Mannu is lighthearted and capricious and evidently more talented than Arjun as he is gifted with great voice of singing. However, mannu does not realize his innate musical talent and hence he is nowhere near as focused or ambitious.

Once, arjun escapes from his native to fulfill his dreams to London. There, he develops the band ‘London Dreams’ with Priya (Asin) and two Pakistani brothers Zoheb (Rannvijay Singh), Wasim (Adithya Roy Kapoor). When Arjun realizes he is in love with Priya, he decides to hide his feelings from her and focus on music and only reveal his love when his dream is fulfilled.

One week prior to the concert, Arjun returns to Bhatinda to meet Mannu and realizes Mannu is extremely gifted with great voice and can do wonders with music. He takes him along to London to join his band and to perform on the concert. Somehow in mid of their performance Arjun finds difficulty in singing and asks over Mannu to takeover. Hence Mannu due to his natural way of singing touches the heights of glory instantly and becomes the favourite of the masses, which is the first sign of jealousy for Arjun. Mannu later starts loving Priya whom Arjun loved but failed to express, thus making Arjun more insecure. The ‘overnight’ fame Mannu becomes more renowned than Arjun and thus Arjun’s dream seem to be failing. As a result Arjun decides to destroy Mannu and go ahead to fulfil his dream at Wembley. After a solo performance at Wembley public desire to hear Mannu and that’s where Arjun bursts open saying “London Dreams mera sapna hai Mannu ka nahi aur wo kabi perform nai karega”. Thus the concert fails and the band separates. Post concert failure Arjun realizes his mistake and accepts the fact of Mannu being more talented than him. Who wins the musical battle to fame and success? Are they unite to bring back their true friendship? This forms the rest of the story.

Performances:

Both Ajay Devgn and Salman Khan really rocks the screen! They both have recreated their brilliant performances they did together in ‘Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam’. Ajay Devgn perfectly fits into the role of angry young man and his performance is unblemished. Salman Khan’s acting is just perfect and he does really, really well in the emotional scenes! He simply touches the heart! Asin is admirable and her chemistry with Salman works. VJ Adithya Kapoor and Rannvijay of Roadies fame are decent and had a good start. Om Puri impresses in a small part as usual.

Unexpectedly, the music by the trio Shankar- Ehsaan-Loy is not upto the mark. They fails to recreate the magic for London Dreams as it created with Rock On.

The director of the film, Vipul Amrutlal Shah made a emotional drama on friendship with the backdrop of music. Despite of most talented actors, the film somewhat lacking behind due to overdose of emotions and sluggish screenplay in the first half. The climax is indigestible. How can anyone very easily forgive a person who decided to destroy you? The director narrates Salman Khan as ‘God’ to forgive the sins!

Verdict:

London Dreams - Dreams Fulfilled.. with emotions!

CineFresh Rating:

Tags: Asin, Bollywood, Reviews, Salman Khan