New York Times Review - Rachel Salz
When Amitabh Bachchan, Bollywood’s perennial Mr. Big, gets a meaty role, he digs into it with such gusto that everyone around him starts to look a bit underfed.
In “Teen Patti” Mr. Bachchan has a grand time playing Venkat, an underappreciated math professor in Mumbai whose probability studies lead him to a gambler’s dream: winning at will in a game of chance, here the Indian card game teen patti.
Venkat is a purist, satisfied with cracking the code, but his students persuade him to put his theory to the test. Surprise: winning oodles of cash leads to disharmony, blackmail and worse.
The director of “Teen Patti,” Leena Yadav, can’t quite control Mr. Bachchan, which is good. Though he occasionally looks tired, his scenery chewing provides the movie with some of the heat that its card games fail to generate.
But Ms. Yadav, attempting something more than a typical Hindi movie, can’t quite control her story either. The students are broadly sketched (greed is their dominant trait) or one-note, making the revelations at the end dead on arrival.
And like many artists drawn to gambling themes, she can’t resist clunky philosophizing about life, chance and certainty. She even brings in Ben Kingsley, playing a magician and mathematician (they’re the same, he says), to give voice to some of her profundities.
Content aside, Mr. Kingsley and Mr. Bachchan’s scenes together have real charm. They’re like two old pros from different leagues tossing a ball around: loose, smooth, in no doubt of their power.
Taking a Gamble
1 comments:
Taran Adarsh 2.5/5
On the whole, TEEN PATTI is a fresh concept, made well, but limits itself to the intelligentsia and big city audiences mainly
The earth provides enough to satisfy every man's need, but not every man's greed. That's so true! Let's face it, money is the root of all evil. When we have more, it is never enough. This is exactly what Leena Yadav's TEEN PATTI tells you.
TEEN PATTI is not only about gambling on table, but all those gambles that we take in our life. Bearing an uncanny resemblance to the Hollywood film 21, TEEN PATTI is akin to a roller coaster ride; if there are highs, expect the lows too.
Write your own movie review of Teen Patti Leena Yadav's take on greed and deception has some defining moments, but the fact is that the writing lacks clarity. Let me explain. Probability is a very interesting theory in mathematics. But the problem is, is it easy to comprehend for the average viewer? Frankly, despite Leena's best efforts, only a handful of viewers will be able to comprehend the goings on and the theory of probability.
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