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=SIVAJI THE BOSS

I knew this was going to be a Bollywood masterpiece when I saw the trailer for this crazy live-action political cartoon movie. Bollywood movies suck ass and stink with cheese, but if there is one Bollywood to see this year, go see SIVAJI THE BOSS! This movie cost around 100 Million dollars to make. See how they spent the money! The character Sivaji is played by India Tamil's biggest star Rajini (equivalent to Jackie Chan of China or Sharuhk Khan of India Hindi), whom does one movie once every 2 years (extremely impressive for Bollywood actors whom usually do a movie a week) and he just whoops ass through out the whole flick. Like all flamboyant Bollywood actors, who think they are cool just because they are aware of current western trends, speak some English, and act like they are so hot, watching Rajini is like watching a serious version of Austin Powers. You can't help but like him. SAVAJI THE BOSS can be interpreted as a perfect spoof of a Bollywood film or as a perfect update of the 70s/80s Bollywood action movies which star old, not-so-sexy hairy mustached Indian dudes in the lead. This totally entertaining three-hour film is about a rich American Software System Architect who returns to his homeland India to try and open up free hospitals and free colleges for the people. All he wants to do is do good, but he is prevented from doing so by corrupt dirty officials. Eventually after struggling to get things done the lawful way, he takes matters in his own hands and kicks the crap out of the corrupt officials to do his good deeds for the nation of India. Along the way, he creepily stalks a 20-year old hot Tamil girl hopefully to become his wife. (wow, "courting a girl" is so passe, but "stalking a girl" really works in India - such slick cassanovas!;)). The film is also riddled with some great songs done by the famous A.R. Rahman (Bombay Dreams).
Shankar, the director of SIVAJI, is one of the most ballsy Bollywood directors for consistently critisizing the corrupt Indian government in most of his films (Deepha Mehta and Mira Nair are controversial Indian directors as well, but they ain't Bollywood). Shankar is also famous for making the biggest budget Bollywood flicks and using the most current special effects that are found in other Western action movies. He made the first Bollywood martial-arts film - ANNIYAN, which I also recommend. He's still a bit obsessed with the Matrix movies, as many of the action scenes are inspired by those flicks as well as Robert Rodriguez. For a Bollywood film, his movies have pretty sweet action scenes (no comparison to a western film, but he's getting close). SIVAJI THE BOSS has tons of well choreographed action scenes, martial arts scenes, and one pretty damn original and intense car demolition derby scene. The movie is worth it alone just to see this goofy nerdy leading man transform into a goofy version of Matrix's Morpheus. Rajini has a stunt double, sometimes obvious in some of the action scenes, but overall Rajini seems to move pretty damn well for a 50-year old.
SIVAJI THE BOSS is a great film for anyone who has fantasized of a really honest politician or philanthropist taking the law in his own hands to help one's own nation. It's a wacky cheesy Bollywood film of course, so you should know what to expect for anyone who has ever seen a Bollywood flick.
The DVD is a UK Tamil ALL-REGION NTSC 3-Disc DVD produced by Ayngaran.
Disc 1 has the movie in DTS Tamil, English subtitled.
Disc 2 has the movie in DD 5.1 Tamil, English subtitled.
Disc 3 has just two extras, non-English subtitled.
The anamorphic video quality of the is pretty damn nice. Some knicks and scratches pop up througout the film, because India ain't known for quality. But other than that, it's a colorful film well-represented on DVD.
The original audio, Tami, DD 5.1 and DTS, are both pretty good. Surrounds and subwoofer are pretty active all throughout the film. The film will most likely be dubbed into Hindi and be released on Hindi DVD.
The English subtitles are pretty sloppy and overall insulting to the English language. The translation and grammar are just awful. If the English subtitles were edited better, the movie would have been a lot better.
The extras are just two featurettes - one's a 2-hour long conference with the actors and filmmakers. And the other is a 30-minute making of the film. Both featurettes are NOT SUBTITLED.
If you are in the USA, a cheap and quick online store to find this DVD is at
http://www.bhavanidvd.comFILM: 8.5
DVD VIDEO: 8
DVD AUDIO: 8
ENGLISH SUBTITLES: 6
EXTRAS: 2