The Burning Train

Directed by: Ravi Chopra

Starring: Dharmendra, Vinod Khanna, Jeetendra, Hema Malini, Parveen Babi, Neetu Singh, Danny Denzongpa, Simi Garewal

Released: 1980

Verdict: destroy every copy – horrible – bad – whatever – flawed but enjoyable - good – great – amazing

Choo choo! This ride gave me quite a few surprises. Firstly, I was a bit skeptical about a film with a title basically giving away the whole plot. Secondly, the post-Sholay action films are not always my cup of tea. And finally there was Jeetendra listed among the cast, which so far has always been enough to turn me off a movie completely. However in the end curiosity got the better out of me and I ended up not only enjoying the this speeding and flaming journey, but even spent a whole day thinking about it and singing the songs from it in my head.

A mix of masala and American catastrophic genre, The Burning Train may not be completely original when it comes to situations it chooses to show, especially as the big tragedy starts, but at the same time it manages not to feel wanna-be-ish. It starts like a standart Indian masala – since childhood Vinod and Ashok were the best of friends, brushing aside easily angered Randhir (and being actually quite assholes to him for no reason), and the relations remained unchanged even after they grew up into Vinod Khanna, Dharmendra and Danny Denzongpa respectively. After being pushed out from a little train by Vinod, after being rejected by Parveen Babi in favour of Vinod, as well as being rejected as a supervisor and creator of a new luxury train in favour of Vinod, Randhir decides that enough is enough and once the ambitious „Super Express“ is launched with great fanfare, he has a way to sabotage the train and thus taking his merciless revenge. Soon enough Super Express is racing through the countryside with no breaks. And to ensure the film title is accurate, somebody leaves the gas running in the kitchen.....

From the beginning of the ride we are one by one introduced to quite a few people and couples, each having a little story of their own to told – a pregnant woman, a smuggler on the run and a detective going after him, a newly-married couple, a teacher supervising little kids...... Most notable among them being none other than Ashok and Seema (Hema Malini), who have once upon a time planned a wedding, but all went wrong and they drifted apart, and then there is also a thief Ravi (Jeetendra) hoping to rob the runaway bride Madhu (Neetu Singh).... As the film progresses, everything that can go wrong does, to the point one asks themselves what are the chances.

Flaws in logic bugged me. It is great that we have heroic men willing to take a risk, but why in the world would you not try and lessen the possibility of killing yourself? Why, when they first decide to climb on the top of the train in order to reach the locomotive, don´t they normally walk to the first boogie right behind it and THEN climb out? Not only safer, but also lot quicker, and would have spared us the whole burning drama. I guess our heroes had the logic blackout for the sake of the film not to be called „Speeding train“. This was not the only instance when I had to roll my eyes and accept that movie logic is not even a distant cousin of real life logic.

Super Express has more than an impressive starcast. There are so many well -known faces it was impossible to list them all above. From Dharam and Vinod and Jeetendra, to their three girlfriends and Simi Garewal singing religious songs with bunch of kids and many, many more. Everybody does their job well (except for Hema Malini, who just fails to impress me yet again, but thankfully has not much screentime), nobody really overshadows anyone and the many pieces of the star puzzle fit nicely together. As I have mentioned, I was properly shocked by actually liking Jeetendra. I don´t know what happened to him later in the 80s, that he became was utterly boring, bad and ridiculous, but here he was watchable enough. Makes one wonder what it was that kept the filmstars so much without ego, because there is no way one could pull off three major male and three major female stars in one film casting coup today.

The Burning Train has a great thrill and tension factor. The pace is even and not slowed down by the songs (brilliant album overall – meaning you remember them all after just one listening!) or emotional scenes. There is not time to loose as the fire gets nearer, and so the filmmakers do not loose it – something that is not always considered an option. One only wishes there was more shown about our villain Randhir, then again I suppose we are not supposed to feel for him, no matter how unreasonably awful our heroes had been to him.

Alibaba aur 40 chor

Directed by: Latif Faiziyev

Starring: Dharmendra, Hema Malini, Zeenath Aman

Released: 1980

Verdict: destroy every copy – horrible – bad – whatever – flawed but enjoyable - good – great – amazing

In some Arabic country, in a city going by the name of Gulabad, there lives Alibaba, younger son of a wealthy merchant Yusuf. However it has been long years since Yusuf left for one of his dealing trips and he has not returned as yet. And so little Alibaba has never seen his face and all he knows is what his mother told him, and what his brother Quasim shared. The family is longing dearly for the return of its head, and unknown to them their dream is about to be fulfilled. Yusuf is coming back. However before he manages to reach the city, he and his caravana are attacked by the feared gang of 40 bandits under the command of even more feared (and rather sleazy looking) Abu Hasan. But fortunatelly Yusuf is saved by a kind king and sends the message home for somebody to come for him. Alibaba is overjoyed at the prospect of finally meeting him and sets out on his journey.

Zeenat Aman looking freakin gorgeous.

Hema Malini looking freakin much like Sridevi.

However as soon as he reaches the destination, a beautiful princess Marjeena falls into his arms (literally) and explains that her father has just been murdered by an usurper, who now is keen on marrying her. Alibaba and his father flee from the city, taking the princess (already in love of course) along with them. But (yes, another but) while on the run Yusuf is killed and Marjeena falls into the hands of a slave trader. Alibaba manages to buy her, but his greedy brother Quasim, who lent him the money, asks him to give up all possible rights on family property. To make a living for himself, Marjeena and also his old mother, Alibaba starts selling wood. While on one of his trips outside the city, he comes across the secret entrance of a cave, that serves the notorious Abu Hasan and his men as a lair and treasury. All he needs to say is a magic chant to be able to step inside...

Alibaba and Marjeena in the bandit´s lair. Private, but not the best place for romance.

The story after this features some more buts and howevers, and also some more WTFs. We get to see some magic, some greedy men, some more usurpators and also we get to see a princess and the woman she´s been chasing singing a song about which one of them is more sexy in a bar. Loads and loads of people swering they will kill Abu Hasan, so if you have not yet noticed he is the bad guy here, this should give you a hint.

As a little child I loved this fairytale, that figures even in Czech story books. The film was the joined effort of Indian and Soviet production, which only added to the attractiveness for me (think whatever you want about Soviet politics, but their movies were excellent). Hence it bears not only the unmistakable stamp of Bollywood (there are songs and dance, indian setting, family ties..) but also reminds us of beautiful Russian fairytales, especially as far as technical background is concerned. If we perceive the film purely as a fairytale, forgiving all the plot holes and some illogical editing, then it is sure to be enjoyable. Should we perceive it more „seriously“, then it does not live up to any standart really.

PARTY TIME!

The three main leads – Dharmendra as Alibaba, Hema Malini as Marjeena and Zeenat Aman as Fatima, give a rather luke-warm performances. Zeenat is the only one who delivers some emotion. Hema Malini in her „just a heroine“ role does not have the space and seemingly not even an interest to shine, the dances she is given are forgettable. Dharmendra is good, but that´s where it ends. All the songs are rather unfittingly forced into the story and the disco colour-flashing floor in the bandit´s lair made me wonder if the shooting took place on the remains of the Saturday Night Fever sets. The visuals were most of the time beautiful though, and so were the costumes. The fight and battle sequences are well done and very convincing – but the convincing bit left me rather uncomfortable because my heart was bleeding for all those horses that simply MUST have been hurt during the shooting.

In the end I can only repeat: If you´re looking for a simple watch and you are willing to let go of reality and logic, or if you are a fan of Dharmendra/Hema/Zeenat (who does look gorgeous by the way), it is not a bad film. If you´re nothing of the above, you can live peacefully without watching it.