Koi . . . Mil Gaya
 
    
Director: Rakesh Roshan
Year:  2003
Music: Rajesh Roshan
Duration: 171 minutes
Rating: 5.0
Aka - I Have Found Someone

Sci-fi and super hero films have never been the stock and trade of Bollywood. Neither really was horror until the past 10 years or so other than the Ramsay Brothers. There must be cultural reasons for this but I have no idea what they are. Religious perhaps? In fact, this was the first Bollywood film to have aliens. That seems unbelievable. But true. It is the first film in a trilogy and in the second one the super hero genre is broached. The title of that one is Krrish. It being their first alien film and I would guess one of their first sci-fi films - I can't think of any off hand - they basically steal two films from Hollywood and squash them together. Really blatantly. That doesn't make it a bad film because they borrowed from the best but I just found it odd that they did so with apparently no shame.



This is Charly (1968) if you recall that one with Cliff Robertson merged into E.T. with just a touch of Close Encounters. And of course lots of song and dance! Charly and E.T. didn't have that did they! I have actually never seen E.T. but now I feel I have. Charly was one of the more depressing films I ever saw when I was a teen and I still think about it sometimes. But this is Bollywood. It stars Hrithik Roshan who at the time of this film had only been in the business for three years but already had a bunch of big hits underneath his hat. He was hotter than Jupiter. Very good looking and actually a good dancer - no Fred Astaire but for Bollywood men he was a dancing fool. Other than his talent he also had those Bollywood connections that are so vital - his debut got more press than an India-Pakistan cricket match. That is because the film was directed by his father Rakesh Roshan who has been a successful composer and director for years. But unlike many of the sons and daughters of Bollywood Royalty, Hrithik deserves his stardom.



In the film Rakesh Roshan plays Hrithik's father, Sanjay. He is a scientist trying to communicate with life on other planets. The signal he sends out is suspiciously like the notes in Close Encounter. He could not even try a Bollywood song - how about the first notes of Dum Maro Dum from Hare Rama Hare Krishna? After years of trying one night he gets an RSVP. He doesn't realize that he sent out an invite and when they arrive in a spaceship he is driving and gets so distracted that he drives off the road and crashes killing himself and throwing his wife (the incomparable Rekha - one name only needed) out of the car landing on her stomach and damaging the brain of the baby inside. This is Rohit who grows up but his mental capacity doesn't. By the time he becomes Hrithik he is six feet tall with a the brain of a child.



Nisha (the adorable Preity Zinta with dimples so deep they could have been used as trenches in WWI) makes amends for something she did to Rohit not realizing his condition and they become buddies. Which gets downright creepy when the film treats it sort of like a romance and they hang out all the time and dance together. You want to yell out, woman step away. Then Rohit starts sending out the notes to space and the aliens come back and leave one behind by mistake. Rohit, Preity and their friends - all children - call him Jadoo (magic) and keep him secret and when the army comes looking for him and shooting at him (did that happen in E.T?) Rohit gets on his bike and rides away. Oh and in the meantime Jadoo has fixed Rohit - not only fixed him mentally but given him enormous strength and an ability to jump like a wuxia warrior. But he tells Rohit that if he leaves Rohit will lose all his new abilities.



There are a bunch of other sub-plots like a group of bullies always antagonizing him and I thought Rohit where is your Gatling gun - oh that was a different movie I guess. A ridiculous basketball game in which Jadoo gives everyone powers to jump 20 feet high. Not bringing any suspicions on them of course. Appearing also is Johnny Lever who is much less annoying than usual and the old baddie Prem Chopra who has mellowed out with age. This was a big hit but it is too long till we get to Hrithik being Hrithik and much of the Hrithik as a ten-year old mind is cute but goes on and on. Hrithik is great at being both Rohit's and Preity is like a cold fresh glass of milk. I had forgotten how great she is. The music did nothing for me sad to say.