Ghajini (2008 film)

Ghajini
Theatrical poster for Ghajini
Directed by	A. R. Murugadoss
Written by	A. R. Murugadoss
Produced by	Allu Aravind
Starring	Aamir Khan Asin Thottumkal Jiah Khan Pradeep Rawat Riyaz Khan
Cinematography	Ravi K. Chandran
Music by	A. R. Rahman
Distributed by	Studio 18 Adlabs
Release dates	December 25, 2008
Running time	181 mins
Country	India
Language	Hindi
Budget	$9,000,000
Box office	$69,000,000

Ghajini (Template:Lang-hi) is a 2008 Bollywood film directed by A. R. Murugadoss and produced under the Geetha Arts banner by Allu Aravind. The film, is a remake of the Tamil film, of the same name, which was also by Murugadoss. It stars Aamir Khan and Asin Thottumkal in the lead roles while Jiah Khan, Pradeep Rawat and Riyaz Khan essay supporting roles.

The movie is an action-thriller, with strong romantic elements, that explores the life of a rich businessman who suffers from anterograde amnesia following a violent encounter in which his love interest, model Kalpana was killed. He tries to avenge the killing with the aid of Polaroid Instant camera photographs and permanent tattoos on his torso. The character of Aamir Khan will also feature in a 3-D game titled Ghajini the game, which is based on the movie.

Synopsis

The film opens with Sunita, who wants to investigate the curious case of Sanjay Singhania, a (former) notable city businessman, who is reported to be suffering from anterograde amnesia inspite of being denied by her professor. Sanjay is introduced as he brutally murders another man and takes the picture of the corpse. It is revealed that Sanjay has a strange form of anterograde amnesia where his memory is wiped out every 15 minutes. Sanjay uses a system of photographs, notes, and tattoos on his body to recover his memory after each cycle. Every morning, Sanjay is reminded (by a tattoo on his body) that "Kalpana was killed", and it is revealed that Sanjay is ultimately out to avenge Kalpana, and that he is systematically killing the people who were responsible for Kalpana's death. His main target, evidenced by several notes and tattoos, is "Ghajini". It is eventually revealed that Ghajini is a notable social personality in the city.

Mumbai Police Inpsector Fawaz is on the case of the serial murders. He tracks Sanjay down to his flat and attacks and disables him. Through a 2005 diary found in the room, Fawaz learns Sanjay Singhania is the scion of a reputed business house that owns the Air Voice mobile telephone company. In the course of his business, Sanjay sends his men to meet Kalpana, a struggling actor/model, about putting up an Air Voice billboard above her apartment. The owner of Kalpana's modeling/advertising firm misinterprets this as a romantic advance, and encourages Kalpana to accept the overture. Kalpana begins to play out the charade as Sanjay's girlfriend. Sanjay eventually meets Kalpana, but tells her that he is Sachin, a simple fellow from a small town. Kalpana lands him some small modeling gigs. They eventually fall in love, and on the New Year's eve, Sanjay asks her to marry him. She asks for some time to consider his proposal. Sanjay decides that if she accepts, he will reveal his true identity; and if she declines, he will quietly back off with no harm done.

When Fawaz is about to read the 2006 diary, Sanjay suddenly breaks out of the chair he was tied to,and attacks Fawaz. He was on the verge of killing Fawaz with a fire extinguisher, when he was interrupted by the arrival of his manager and doctor. He later tracks down Ghajini to a college function where Ghajini is the guest of honor. Sanjay snaps some pictures of Ghajini and decides to kill him. He meets Sunita at the function who manages to recognize and befriend him. Later that evening, Sanjay attacks and kills one of Ghajini's goons in the parking lot. The dying goon informs Ghajini that Sanjay is out to kill Ghajini. Ghajini is baffled about the identity of the person and decides to eliminate all his enemies.

In the meantime, Sunita visits Sanjay's flat and finds Fawaz, beaten and bound. She also finds that Ghajini is Sanjay's target. Fawaz informs her that Sanjay is a known serial murderer. Sunita finds the two diaries and frees Fawaz. Sanjay arrives suddenly and in the ensuing chase, Fawaz is fatally hit by a bus, and Sunita barely escapes the crazed Sanjay. Believing Ghajini is in danger, she informs him that it is Sanjay who is after him. With this named target, Ghajini arrives at Sanjay's flat and destroys all the photographs and notes, and tattooes over Sanjay's existing tattoos. Satisfied that he has neutralized Sanjay by wiping out any trace that connects back to him, Ghajini leaves.

Meanwhile, back in her dorm, Sunita reads the 2006 diary ,which revealed that Kalpana had accepted Sanjay's proposal and ends abruptly. Sunita investigates further, and discovers that at some point in 2006, Kalpana had rescued 25 girls from a prostitution racket. The girls named Ghajini as the ringleader of the racket. In retaliation, he murdered two of these girls, and went in search of Kalpana. Ghajini and his goons managed to break into Kalpana's apartment and waits for her return. Coincidentally, Sanjay also arrivesd there to meet Kalpana. Ghajini kills Kalpana and hits Sanjay in the head leading to his memory loss.

Sunita, now aware of the truth, finds Sanjay and tells him the truth. Arriving at Ghajini's lair in downtown Mumbai, Sanjay systematically and brutally kills all of Ghajini's henchmen and chases down Ghajini. He is about to kill Ghajini when his memory loss cycle kicks in. Ghajini takes this opportunity to stab Sanjay. He begins to taunt Sanjay with the grisly tale of how he murdered Kalpana. Sanjay, angered by this devastating memory takes out the sharp pole in his stomach and throws it at Ghajini,which knocks him to the floor. Sanjay overpowers Ghajini after a short fight and kills him in the same way Kalpana was killed.

The film ends with Sanjay, still suffering from the amnesia, volunteering at an orphange. Sunita gives him a small gift (a memorabilia containing both of their footprint literally) to remind him of his fond association with Kalpana.

Cast

• Aamir Khan as Sanjay Singhania. Sanjay Singhania is a rich business man; the owner of a mobile phone service provider company. Sanjay falls in love with Kalpana, who later is murdered. In the same incident, Sanjay develops amnesia following a firm blow to his head by an iron rod. After undergoing rehabilitation, Sanjay Singhania becomes obsessed with avenging the murder of his girlfriend and to combat his disability, he has tattoos spread over his torso to help him remember what his intentions are.

• Asin Thottumkal as Kalpana. Kalpana is a model in televison advertisements by profession and gains publicity by proclaiming herself to be the girlfriend of the successful entrepreneur, Sanjay Singhania. She later unknowingly falls in love with Sanjay, mistaking him to be another person. Kalpana, showcased as a kind-hearted person, becomes involved with Ghajini and his henchmen after foiling their plot to sell girls into prostitution . Kalpana is killed in front of Sanjay by Ghajini, and subsequently so creating the theme of avengement, which forms the crux of the plot.

• Jiah Khan as Sunita. Sunita played a curious medical college student, who even though not given permission tries to study the case of Sanjay Singhania and his amnesiac problem. She appears throughout the film as she attempts to unravel Sanjay's mysteries and past life and goes places to find more information about the psychiatric patient she wants to meet. Despite initial friction between Sanjay and herself, she then helps Sanjay overcome Ghajini.

• Pradeep Rawat as Ghajini Dharmatma. Ghajini plays the main antagonist who brutally murders Kalpana for insulting him and ruining his plans.

• Riyaz Khan as Fawaz. Fawwaz plays the supporting role of a police inspector who investigates the murders by Sanjay Singhania. He also learns about some of Sanjay's past life.

Release

Box office

Ghajini was released with around 1500 prints, of which 213 were released overseas. The movie had around 650 paid previews which fetched it around INR 70 million. The domestic distribution rights of Ghajini were sold for INR 530 million and home video rights, overseas rights and satellite rights for another 690 million. Ghajini has collected US$36 million worldwide by 18th January 2009. In an affidavit to Madras High Court on January 28, the producers stated that the collections for the first 23 days is INR 1 billion in addition to an overseas collection of $ 1.5 million

Critical reception

The film has received mainly positive reviews from critics. Sonia Chopra of Sify gave the movie 4.5 stars and recommended watching it "For the four As—Aamir, Asin, AR Murgadoss and AR Rahman". Rajeev Masand of CNN IBN gave the movie 3 stars writing: "Ghajini isn't a particularly good film, but entertainment it delivers by the bucketful". Martin D'Souza of Bollywood Trade News Network gave the movie 3.5 stars, noting the flaws in screen play, while praising the action. Taran Adarsh remarked that the movie "is a winner all the way" and gave it 4.5 stars. Nikhat Kazmi of Times of India praised the performance by Aamir Khan as its high point, and awarded 3.5 stars. Zee News described Aamir's performance as his best till date. Sukanya Verma of Rediff gave the movie 3.5 stars. Bollywood Movies review gave it a 4 star for good screenplay, directing and good acting by Aamir Khan and Asin Thottumkal.

However, there were some negative reviews too. Gaurav Malani of Indiatimes gave the movie 2 stars, criticising the length of the movie and praising the performance of the cast. Some critics criticized Tamil style action and fight scenes. Raja sen of Rediff rated the movie 2.5/5 stars criticising the performance of Asin and concluding "overwhelming feeling is one of regret". Noyon Jyoti Parasara of AOL India says, "Most comparisons often point out that a remake is not as worthy. Ghajini however succeeds when it is compared to the Tamil version directed by the same director."

On IMDB, Ghajini currently has a 7.1 out of 10 stars.

Music

Untitled

The film has six songs composed by A. R. Rahman, with lyrics by Prasoon Joshi. While Harris Jayaraj scored the Tamil version, Rahman started from scratch for the remake.

Reception

The album has received mixed to positive reviews from critics and fans, many of whom felt that as an A.R Rahman soundtrack, it was a bit of a let down. Still, BollywoodHungama.com gave an extremely positive review saying, "The music of Ghajini is all set to make waves way into 2009 after the Christmas release of the film. When 'best of the best' list would be compiled at the year end, it would be hard to ignore Ghajini." Rediff gave it the highest possible rating of five stars with the reviewer praising Rahman saying, "This could just be one of his finest albums ever. Not just are the tracks great, but each one segues into the next with perfect unpredictability."

Tracks

Song	Singer(s)	Duration	Notes
Guzarish	Javed Ali, Sonu Nigam	5:29	Picturised on Aamir Khan and Asin
Aye Bachchoo	Suzanne D'Mello	3:48	Picturised on Asin
Kaise Mujhe	Benny Dayal & Shreya Ghoshal	5:46	Picturised on Aamir Khan and Asin
Behka	Karthik	5:13	Picturised on Aamir Khan and Asin
Latoo	Shreya Ghoshal	4:30	Picturised on Jiah Khan
Kaise Mujhe (Instrumental)	Instrumental	4:01

Mobile Content

Indiagames Ghajini is a Mobile Games and applications based on the film. Indiagames has developed 4 games and 1 application based on the title on the Mobile Platform. It has different types of games in it like Ultimate Workout, Memory Revival, Brain Trek, Brain Trek and a number of Mini Games

See also

• List of highest-grossing Bollywood films
• Ghajini (2005 film)

External links

• Ghajini (2008) at IMDb
• Template:Gomolo title
• Template:Amg title
• Official Website of Ghajini
• Xenomorphic - Pete Draper - Creator of the Ghajini CGI
• [1] - Ghajini Songs Kese Mujay
• Indiagames Official game website