cape fear: a triumph of departments

J. Lee Thompson's 1962 film is perhaps not as well known to a newer generation of film-goers as the remake directed by Martin Scorsese. This is quite a shame, because the film's a very effective thriller boasting some excellent acting, a creepy score by Bernard Herrmann (whose rejected score for Hitchcock's Torn Curtain adorned Scorsese's remake), great cinematography and sharp editing. I had watched the remake first and it's interesting to see the differences. Being more familiar with Scorsese's oeuvre now, I can see why the key players in the remake are morally unsteady (there are no clear good and bad guys); I can also see how the intense religious baggage (tattoos, quotations from the Bible) of De Niro's interpretation of Max Cady fit perfectly. The original black and white thriller, however, succeeds on its own merits, which, thankfully, are different from those of the remake. Max Cady is clearly sadistic and evil while Max Bowden is, for the most part, a diluted version of Atticus Finch. It's a clear case of good versus evil (with an obvious outcome). Given the inevitability of the proceedings, the excellent writing and performances lend each scene its modicum of suspense and dread. The film also succeeds by implying a lot without either saying or showing much (the word "rape" is never uttered and yet its spectre looms large; a lot of the violence is suggested and not shown, although the film is not completely without violence). The influence of Hitchcock is evident and I wonder if the Psycho house was just a coincidence because this was a Universal release. Given the film's effectiveness, it's hard to believe that it was a financial failure when it was released in 1962 -- perhaps the implied extent of Cady's obsession with Bowden's teenage daughter left people too uneasy for comfort.

extracts from the reading list

I have to toss a sop to coincidence when the phrase tout court shows up in two books that I picked up at the public library on Christmas Eve. I'm sure the phrase is not uncommon, but I have to confess that I haven't seen (or noticed) it before. As a tribute to the coincidence, here are some extracts from each book.

The first is the third book in Donald Spoto's series on Alfred Hitchcock. Spoto's name and work is known to any serious Hitchcock fan; A well-turned copy of The Dark Side of Genius: The Life of Alfred Hitchcock, the second volume in the series, lies in my bookshelf (gathering some dust, I must regretfully add). Employing a pun, Spoto calls the new book Spellbound by Beauty and it covers, as is evident from the title, the Master's obsession with his leading ladies (and especially blondes). Spoto has been accused of starting to paint a rather uncomplimentary picture of Hitchcock as a person, starting with his second book. This third book, as the preface indicates, seems to promise more material that is bound to offend those that hold Hitchcock in high regard, as a creative genius without blemish. But, as Spoto also points out, genius has never been free of a life peppered with hurdles, sorrow, hardship and personality flaws:

Writing or speaking anything other than the highest praise or failing to promote the most affectionate encomia for so august an icon as Alfred Hitchcock has become, in the eyes of many, equivalent to cultural sacrilege. But the craft of biography requires that the shadow side of subjects be set forth and comprehended - otherwise, their humanity is diminished, their pain minimised, and those they hurt are ignored. Any appreciation of Hitchcock's art and life must take into account the enormity of his psychological, physical and social suffering, as well as that which he (perhaps unintentionally) caused others. From his suffering came the obsessively recurring themes and the constant sense of dread with which he continues to astonish, entertain and enlighten.

The other bit comes from the wonderful introduction by Anthony Burgess to the compilation The Best Short Stories of J. G. Ballard:

Ballard considers that the kind of limitation that most contemporary fiction accepts is immoral, a shameful consequence of the rise of the bourgeois novel. Language exists less to record the actual than to liberate the imagination. To go forward, as Ballard does, is also to go back -- scientific apocalypse and pre-scientific myth meet in the same creative region, where the great bourgeois novelists of tradition would not feel at home.

The complete text of the introduction is available in the Google Books preview of the book.

The final extract (did I say two? I lied) comes from Emmanuel Carrère's book I Am Alive and You Are Dead: A Journey in the Mind of Philip K. Dick. It's a succinct description of what happens when a cult figure acquires mainstream acceptance and recognition:

Given the uniform Vintage editions of his complete works and the many articles about Dick that have appeared in both academic and popular journals, his fans must feel a little like the early Christians did when their faith was officially adopted by the Roman Empire: triumphant, of course, but also slightly nostalgic for the days when they lived in the catacombs. The Happy Few cease to be happy when they are no longer few. Dick has become part of the mainstream.

north by northwest ... again [june 18, 2005]

Alfred Hitchcock's masterful combination of a wild screenplay, his favourite theme of the wrong man, and a cross-country run of locales never seems to offer anything short of an interesting viewing each time I watch it. Of course, each viewing is more educational than the last. I now know that I can look at that little kid covering his ears before Eve fires at Roger Thornhill. I can relish how Hitch effectively exploited Cary Grant's star persona for the role (how many directors can manage to do that so wonderfully?). And then one of us had strong memories of the desii ripoff Inaam Dus Hazaar (distinguished for me by the RDB soundtrack).

Elsewhere, my notes on Trainspotting and my thoughts on Death Wish show up ...

bland guilt: selznickized hitchcock

The Paradine Case features a plot/premise that should be very familiar to people who have seen Jagged Edge (which hits the extremities of the obsession) or its outrageous embarassing Hindi remake Kasoor (which made the news for the "bold"[sic] bedroom moments shared by dubbed-by-Divya-Dutta-in-all-probability Lisa Ray and the dubbed-by-Vikram-Bhatt-in-all-probability Aftab Shivdasani).
This was Hitchcock's last film for Selznick and the burden and obligation of their association shows. The film feels more like a Selznick mush romp rather than a work of the master. The Hitch touches are there (the expressionist use of blinds, POV shots, a cool high angle courtroom shot) but the annoyances dominate (Waxman's running undulating strings-heavy score only augments my respect for Herrmann's work, the tacked-on pointless ending). If only Hitch could have exploited the moral dilemma at the core of the tale to greater effect. Still, I've seen it now. Just for the record.

clause 27

That's the red herring in Hitchcock's Foreign Correspondent, the viewing of which gained a touch of irony given the release of Lakshya featuring Preity Zinta as a TV newsreporter (which triggered off another superficial Rediff feature). There's a lot to relish in the film as far as Hitchcock touches are concerned: deadpan humour, a protagonist unable to get people to believe him or anything he has to say. Specific classic sequences must include the famous windmill sequence (see also: The Manchurian Candidate) and the sequence where Scott Ffolliott (George Sanders) and Johnny Jones (Joel McCrea) use Carol Fisher (Loraine Day) as "kidnapped" bait to force Stephen Fisher 's (Herbert Marshall) hand, only to have Carol walk out on Jones and end up back home with deathly timing. Not a bad link in the Hitchcock ouevre.

the fallen madonna and darkly funny new england

Thanks to a friend and some technology, I got a chance to relive some memories of bellyaches of laughter -- the cause: the pilot for the outragous ribald 'Allo 'Allo. One thing that went by unnoticed the last time I caught the series (when Star Plus was not infested with soaps and dimwit detergent dunderfests from the K-fetishist and her satellites!): Michelle's fake French accent differs from Rene's. The creators Jeremy Lloyd and David Croft were also responsible for the other ribald (and admittedly more risqué) Are you being served?. Now if only I could get my hands on the whole series and the other ribald rocker The New Statesman.

Finally, finally, finally, I caught The Trouble With Harry (on a collector's edition DVD at that). Although significant as being the first film that Hitchcock collaborated with Bernard Herrmann, this black comedy set in New England (sourced from a novel set in England) has been a rare gem. Very few Hitchcock studies or retros give it as much attention as his other defining works, despite it being a composite of elements that came the closest to defining this enigmatic director with the manners of a gentleman, and a wit so dry and droll it perfectly matched his obsession with death and all things related. Herrmann even collected some of the motifs of the film and created a suite (A Portrait of Hitch). The dialogues and the gory goings-on both complement and contrast the mindblowing Vermont colours. Keep an eye out for Hitchcock's cameo and a sharp ear for the first exchange of words between Sam Marlowe and Jennifer Rogers, as well as the temporally mind-bending discussion that Sam has with Jennifer's son Arnie. At one point in the film, Edmund Gwenn's character Captain Wiles notes "Blessed are they who expect nothing, for they shall not be disappointed". In agreeing with him, I'd only be faithful to the tone of the film.

hitchcock meets steinbeck on a lifeboat

Triviamongers have much to relish from Lifeboat, another of those mostly ignored works in Hitchcock's variegated ouevre: this is the only time Hitch collaborated with John Steinbeck (a strange combination, admittedly, and, according to reports and Donald Spoto, a very turbulent -- no pun intended -- one). Apparently, Steinbeck did not take too kindly to Hitchcock's idea of filming his original story on a closed set (all the action takes place on and in the vicinity of a lifeboat in the middle of a turbulent war-torn sea). There are several interesting exchanges of dialogue in the film, and a fair exploration of the issues of hatred and racism. Tallulah Bankhead easily takes top honours in the acting department, relishing a well-written part with aplomb. Being a minor Hitchcock work, you wouldn't find much of the master's trademarks to catch, except for my favourite Hitchcock cameo: in a newspaper ad for a weight reduction product called Reduco (the cyclorama skyline in Rope -- another closed set drama with the added twist of long extended takes -- also included an ad for Reduco, marking most striking similarities between any two cameos).

the man in lincoln's nose ... and the epic journey on the chisholm trail

As part of my gentle journey into the North by Northwest DVD, I watched the accompanying behind-the-scenes documentary. Most of the stuff I already knew thanks to my status as a Hitchcock fan, a Bernard Herrmann fan, a film buff, blah blah. 'Twas fun, especially to see stuff broken up for you to analyze and understand. I even began watching the film with just the score on. Proof enough of Herrmann's greatness. And Saul Bass' opening sequence is still great. And now, for the movie itself ... waiting ... waiting...

Howard Hawks' Red River is an exhilirating experience. I have long since stopped worrying about the length of westerns. The good ones make good patient use of their time. John Wayne gets a multitextured role that presages his work in The Searchers. The conflict in the film is underscored by soaring and saddening moments, great dialogue, and the epic feel of a journey. Along on the Chisholm Trail. It's fun getting to the destination. And a great movie to boot.

current reads and listens

Two wonderful books from Shashi Tharoor: India: From Midnight to Millennium is a welcome introduction for me to the background of Indian politics since independence (including "stuff that they did not tell you in your history textbooks"). The work is admittedly very subjective, but Tharoor's chapter exploring the changing caste system in Kerala and what it means to be a marunaadan malayaali really struck a very very personal chord. Not too many books have done that for me. Show Business, on the other hand, is a satire of the Bollywood movies and the moviemaking machine, written in true Bollywood fashion (how reflexive can you get!), and borrows a lot from the life and times of superstar Amitabh Bachchan. Complete with ditties, monologues, clichéd dialogues and situations, bad villain names, terrible costumes, and gossip. Even though I haven't finished either, I strongly recommend both, along with The Great Indian Novel. Tharoor also has a new book on Nehru coming out soon.

Revisited is my first long introduction to Blue Öyster Cult (connections include John Carpenter's Halloween and the TV miniseries adaptation of The Stand)

The Paradine Case is a very strange and deceptive title for what is essentially a compilation of piano pieces composed by Franz Waxman, Bernard Herrmann, and Alex North. The first track is from Waxman's score for Hitchcock's The Paradine Case, and gives the compilation its title. Good sleeve notes add value to the two Herrmann tracks (the reason I even picked this up), one from Hangover Square, and the other a short prelude for piano from 1935.

cape fear: every man has to go through hell to reach paradise

When Martin Scorsese's reworking of the 1962 thriller Cape Fear hit the theatres in India, the reviews I read talked about how De Niro's working of Max Cady was over-the-top and hammy. This was the only memory I really had when I started watching the film. Of course, since that time I had learnt more about De Niro, Scorsese, their working relationship, Scorsese's Hitchcock connections (Bernard Herrmann, Saul Bass, and in this film, production designer Henry Bumstead). I had also made the mappings: Robert Mitchum played Cady in the original and made a cameo here as Lt Elgart; Gregory Peck played Sam Bowden in the original and appeared (in what would tragically be his last cinematic appearance!) as the Bible-spouting righteous lawyer Lee Heller (which almost seems like a spoof at some level of his most cherished performance as Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird); Martin Balsam who played Police Chief Dutton in the original appears here as the Judge who puts a restraining order on Saw Bowden.

The film opens with a classic Saul Bass (who was now collaborating with his wife Elaine) sequence: the credits are overlaid on ripples of water, tinged with colours that reek of fear and unease, and somewhere in the background are eyes (I scream Vertigo!) and face shots (from what was, as the excellent Making Of tells me, unused footage from a sequence for the film Seconds). And you hear vintage Bernard Herrmann (in fact, Elmer Bernstein willingly took on the task of adapting Herrmann's score for the original for this film: a strong testament for the vitality of Herrmann's work!). "My reminiscences" are the first words you hear as an XCU of Danny's eyes switch from negative-B&W to colour, and we are informed that "Cape Fear" is a river in North Carolina (I haven't seen the original so I didn't know what the title referred to). Ft Lauderdale in South Florida aided with some innovative set design stands in for North Carolina here. The whole film works in flashback (ending with Danny's voiceover concluding here reminiscences). There is a reference to her working on this in the film: one of the many touches that elevate this film from being a very fast-paced (great editing from Scorsese regular Thelma Schoonmaker) tingling effective thriller to being a great addition to Scorsese's impressive canon. There are other Bass elements in the film too, but some are best left to be relished on viewing.

The original had Cady returning to punish Sam Bowden for having testified against him. This reworking has Sam Bowden playing Cady's defense attorney who, in 1977 in Atlanta, had to put together a defense for a charge of rape and battery. The victim was a 16 year old girl. In a moment of "playing God" and being self-righteous, Bowden had suppressed evidence of the promiscuity of the victim, evidence that would have helped Cady's case. Bowden believed that Cady deserved punishment, and in some sense, took the law into his own hands. Cady, meanwhile, suffering from the characteristic horrors of prison life, builds himself up physically and mentally: being illiterate he teaches himself to read and write, and educates himself in literature and law (the biblical references are ominous when De Niro spouts them in a very convincing Southern accent). All this we find out in the course of the film, which stays on track, as being a thriller demands. Not satisfied by adding so much grey to the characters of Bowden and Cady, Scorsese and Strick also take us on another horrifying journey to the rotting centre of the familial relationships of the Bowden: Sam's infidelity, Leigh's unease and Danny's insecurity, fear and emotional vulnerability. Cady's attack is not physical -- it targets the root of the evils that ail the family, twisting it about and extracting more pain than a simple man-to-man fistfight. Every alternative to tackling Cady's relentless attack proves ineffectual, right up the very end. Max's inevitable destruction at the end leaves the family scarred for life: Sam has indeed learnt about loss, and the reunited family has been devastated beyond repair. This is where the film really works: at the psychological level.

Everything works here, especially De Niro's well-researched performance (Cady's tatoos even reminded me of The Night of the Hunter, where the Reverend Harry Powell, played by Robert Mitchum, has LOVE tatooed on the fingers of one hand, and HATE on those of the other). Scorsese's maiden use of anamorphic Widescreen pays off as a great way to explore the dark tones of Strick's script. And there are the Hitchcock references: a silhouetted view of Lori Davis' (Illeana Douglas) vicious disfigurement at the hands of Cady recalls the shadows of Psycho; the 4th of July parade has strong echoes of the tennis match in Strangers on a Train; the never-ending climactic struggle between Bowden and Cady is reminiscent of Gromek's killing in Torn Curtain.

Speaking of Torn Curtain, Hitchcock/Herrmann fans will remember that this film marked the unfortunate parting of the two over a disagreement on the tone of the score (Elmer Bernstein's version on the accompanying Making Of varies a bit in that it attributes the choice of desired mood directly to Hitchcock instead of the producing studio, Universal). Herrmann's unused score for the film has popped up on several compilations since (Herrmann even used one of the cues titled Gromek in a later film). When Cady falls burning into the stormy river, another Herrmann cue begins to play. This cue, titled The Killing, comes from the unused score and not from the score for the original Cape Fear. A grand bout of acknowledgement to Scorsese and Bernstein for resurrecting this wonderful piece.

Saul Bass tribute site

happy birthday Hitch

It gives me great pleasure to see Google join me in wishing the late great Sir Alfred Hitchcock a very happy birthday. He would have turned 104 today. What other director would merit a question like What's your favourite Hitchcock film?.

A report on noisy golf fans takes the Hitchcock angle too far by offering an analogy to his film Notorious: "Notorious" is a terrific old Alfred Hitchcock flick that featured Ingrid Bergman and Cary Grant. It was loaded with nuance. The two most notorious golf holes on the PGA Tour are arguably the 16th at the TPC of Scottsdale and the 17th at Warwick .

murder!

Murder! is an unsung little nugget from the early sound days of Alfred Hitchcock. Although a lot of the film (Hitchcock's second talkie) appears stagey and crude, it still has the indelible marks of the master: the subtlety and economy of camera and sound (which was then in its early stages), the vestiges of his education in German filmmaking. Herbert Marshall tends to overdo it as Sir John Menier and the print I had was in a terrible state. But I'd recommend this one for Hitchcock's version of 12 Angry Men(which ends up being a tad unrealistically overdramatic) and the foreshadowing of future Hitchcock masterpieces like Strangers on a Train. CAMEO NOTE: Hitchcock can be seen about an hour into the movie walking past the scene of the crime.

TRIVIA NOTES:

* The film opens with Beethoven's 5th playing in the background. Thoughts on the significance and importance thereof are most welcome.

* There's the prelude to Tristan and Isolde playing during Sir John's (Herbert Marshall) interior monologue. Herrmann's score for Vertigo quoted this famous Wagner opera several years later. Common themes more than a coincidence I guess.

{external review}

classic double bill

The Rialto Centre for the Performing Arts in collaboration with Turner Classic Movies decided to celebrate women Oscar legends with a series of movies across Saturday and Sunday. While I was tempted to try more, I decided to go on with the first double bill: Suspicion and It Happened One Night.

The former is worth the big screen if only for the brief sequence where Cary Grant takes a glass of milk up to Joan Fontaine (shooting trivia: there's a light bulb in the glass, which explains why it sticks out of the screen and in your head). There are touches of Hitchcock's trademarks throughout the movie, but this has been recorded as one of his 'uncertain' movies: lack of decision on the title, the plot (altered significantly from the source novel) and a decisive ending. While Strangers on a Train suffered from a similar indecisiveness of endings, it managed to pull through thanks to an assurance that guided the rest of the production.

The latter is just a pleasure on the big screen (my reaction was ably supported by the applause at the end). This film is ample proof for the assertion that Mahesh Bhatt is aware of input/output programming fundamentals. One of the important things you learn when you copy one file to another is that it's faster and more efficient to do it in chunks. Mr Bhatt did exactly that with this film and his musical blockbuster Dil Hai Ke Manta Nahin. The sophistication and the well-scripted allusions to the walls of Jericho did not make it. The fact that the heroine is already married to begin with would also not have worked in the Bollywood framework of life. And then 105 minutes is too short by Bollywood standards, so let's put in some songs. And then we need to construct situations for these songs. Add some loud comedy to the mix. And voila! Another assembly-line Bhatt classic.

more books

The bad news was that a branch of Kudzu Books [a book chain in Atlanta] in North Decatur has decided to close. The good news is that they have a closing sale (and it's similar to the last time I visited them. I've also updated that post in the meantime). So I decided to go in and get some more books cheap. Apart from the fact that they had shipped all the computer books to another branch, I wasn't disappointed.

* Me and Hitch: Evan Hunter's slim memoir about his experiences working with Alfred Hitchcock on The Birds. I had read an extract when Sight and Sound reviewed this book in their June 1997 issue (must add a little plug of nostalgia for the veritable British Library branch on Fergusson College Road in Pune).

* Projections 7: Film-Makers on Film-Making. There's a whole series here, but this one had several magic words associated with it: Cahiers du Cinema, Martin Scorsese, Janet Leigh, Orson Welles, Psycho

* Making Meaning in Indian Cinema. It was so cool to find a compendium of Indian film criticism (by Indian writers) in an American book store -- and cheap too. Titles like "Kaadalan and the politics of resignification fashion, violence and the body" promise interesting reading

* Paul Verhoeven. An English translation of a biography of the interesting and controversial filmmaker

He said he looks silly in his tennis clothes

That's the last line of the last scene in the British version of Strangers on a train, which was on the flip side of the DVD I picked up a week ago. Spent most of the afternoon on Sunday piecing the differences between the British and American releases of the film (having different versions was something almost unheard of from Hitchcock, and despite this being a strong film there's evidence of uncertainty and improvisation here. He also had two different endings for Topaz, which was a much weaker film. And then there's the post-coda scene in Vertigo).

Highly recommended is the segment on special effects for A Beautiful Mind {reactions and review}. The other special features are really big-studio wishy-washy and so-so missable.

Going to Poona

So today evening I got The Best of Z Z Top from the public library, to get myself an introduction to these blues-rock Texans. Thence we proceeded to Poona, a South Asian restaurant on Pleasant Hill Road in Duluth. Yes, it was the name that intrigued us. Our hostess was a friendly Bengali lady who wasn't sure why they had named the restaurant Poona. Our entrees were Vegetable Korma and Chicken Chilli to go with 2 naans. The food was good, except their tendency to add chopped peppers into the Chicken Chilli to add the "spice" to it was an unwarranted Chatpatti-style act {these people add uncooked masala as toppings to dishes like paav bhaaji}. Clearly there is a prevalent warped idea of "spicy" food. The portions are below modest, especially for the price. You wouldn't notice this, however, because their spice trick just gave you a "full" feeling.

Back home, we caught the special features on the Vertigo DVD. I must say I was disappointed. Most of the commentary (if I may dare to call it that; it seemed more like outtakes of a cofee-shop scene in a forgettable B-movie) focused on the effort involved in restoring this classic, minus any interesting technical details. The documentary was moderately interesting, including the add-on subdued ending and previews for the original release and the re-release. The original preview was a good indicator of why the film didn't do well -- the studio was clearly in no position to understand the property they had and persisted on marketing it with the tags that you would associate with Hitchcock. The re-release preview was much more faithful, except for the Powerpoint-style intertitles. Wish they had the good sense to get a film scholar to talk over the film. The closest they get is Steve Smith, Bernard Herrmann's biographer. Sadly, he deviates from the score of the film itself to other works by Herrmann, and his voluble description of Herrmann's music soon overstays its welcome. So, unless you want to listen to people go on tangents for over two hours, skip the commentary.

who's the black private dick ... and a 50s TV show...and some vertigo

The weekend has been fair (barring some Oracular unpleasantries). Caught three movies in all (phew!) in addition to the inevitable Star Trek TNG Sunday marathon on TNN. VH1 was running The Godfather II {aping TNN's efforts last month}. The nice touch was the use of Guns n' Roses' début single Welcome to the Jungle in the promos. Quite apt, considering the subject matter of the film.

Shaft (2000): John Singleton's sequel to /retake on the cult Richard Roundtree vehicle has Samuel L. Jackson as John Shaft Jr., the nephew of the original John Shaft (Richard Roundtree, doing an affectionate cameo, and making good on the opportunity to take digs at the character that made him famous) and even reuses Isaac Hayes' classic Oscar-winning theme. Although everyone does their best in the flick, the clear winner is Jeffrey Wright's Peoples Hernandez, who seems to have received the generous blessings of both screenwriter and actor. I liked the ending too, but everything else in this film reeks of glossy conventional action (having Armani do Mr. Jackson's outfits took the cake), losing out on the familiarity that the original had. The other great things in this good entertaining piece of fluff are the cameo by Gordon Parks (as Mr. P), director of the original, the Isaac Hayes video for Shaft's Theme added as a DVD bonus and Hayes talking about the theme itself (to paraphrase: "everything's a minor 7th -- starting with B-flat").

Pleasantville follows siblings sucked into a black and white 1950s TV sitcom, who proceed to add colour (no pun intended) to the routine lives of the inhabitants of the town of Pleasantville. Predictably, there's a parable about evaluating the good old days and taking a fresh look at the new world. The special effects complement the story and the slow transition of the town into full-blown colour is one the best things you can pay to watch. I couldn't help notice the uncomfortable ambiguity in the word "coloured". There are scenes in the film that indicate the resistance of the complacent townspeople to the advent of colour into their lives (and the colour obviously augments their lives and the way they think) and I cannot shake off the allegorical parable about racism. Feel-good, with a message. {read the script}

Vertigo: The restored collector's edition DVD. 'Nuff said. Slow, somnial and lyrical, Hitchcock's most personal film came out in the height of the studio system and sadly suffered from disuse. The restoration brings back the vibrant colours for both viewers and film scholars to drool over: the former over John Fergusson's increasing obsession and the latter over how the sets, colours and costumes complement one of the most disturbing spirals into mental ruin ever depicted on screen.

Bollywood remake for the week (well it's a forthcoming film, but early news reports never hurt anyone)

After their desi ripoff of Consenting Adults that bore the moniker of Ajnabee (where the cat was let out of the box in the previews of the film featuring the song 'Mehbooba Mehbooba'), the brothers Abbas and Mastan proceed to take apart yet another Hollywood assembly-line product with their forthcoming film Humraaz (not to be confused with the Sunil Dutt-Raaj Kumar starrer for which B. R. Chopra became the first recipient of the national award for best director) starring Akshaye Khanna, Amisha Patel and Bobby Deol. The source? A Perfect Murder, the Michael Douglas/Gwyneth Paltrow remake of Hitchcock's 1954 classic Dial M for Murder (or if you want to try being desi, the 1985 Suresh Oberoi-Raj Babbar-Dimple Kapadia starrer Aitbaar from late director Mukul Anand, which came there first!). Nice ground to cover. As an innovative (read: merciful relief from trite mushy pointless Hindi film songs) strategy, the promos of the film are action-only (read: no song snippets or the like). So people who want to find out how audio-visually bad Himesh Reshamiya's songs are can wait for the film to hit the theatres.