Partner - Rubbish; Pathetic Copy of “Hitch”

Bollywood director David Dhawan has lifted an entertaining Hollywood romantic comedy Hitch (2005) and turned it into a pathetic, unwatchable nightmare called Partner.

Outstandingly executed, Hitch was an amazingly funny movie featuring strong performances by Will Smith (as the Date Doctor Alex Hitch), Eva Mendes (in the role of gossip columnist Sara Melas) and Kevin James (as Albert Brennaman in love with a heiress).

Gosh, there were so many memorable scenes in Hitch - Will Smith teaching Kevin James the 90-10 Kiss Rule, Kevin James teaching Amber Valletta to whistle at the basket ball match, Kevin James’ weird dancing and so many more.

Partner does not have a single memorable scene in 153 minutes. Just excruciating agony. Zero entertainment value.

Partner provides as much entertainment as an overflowing municipal garbage truck rolling down smaller Indian cities. In short, Partner stinks.

Partner fails at every imaginable level - acting, screenplay, editing, music and above all directing.

Salman Khan and Govinda are no patches on Will Smith and Kevin James respectively. Doing similar roles, Salman Khan and Govinda come across as rank amateurs with their unpolished performances cheating Bollywood fans of any hope of entertainment.

Playing a bumbling, accident-prone finance executive in love with the very rich owner of his company, Kevin James’ electrifying performance was a treat to watch. Cast in a similar role in Partner, Govinda is an unbearable agony to behold.

Most of our Bollywood stars have grown fat on the money and Continue Reading…

Google Hops on Angel Train

Search giant Google has joined the Band of Angels in India as an institutional investor.

Band of Angels is a bunch of Angel investors looking to invest in early stage businesses in the areas of IT products & services, retail, high end BPO, biotech & pharma, Internet, media & entertainment and leading edge technology in telecom & embedded domains.

Other Band of Angels’ institutional members include Lightspeed Venture, Punjab Venture Capital Ltd, SIDBI Ventures and Naukri.

Typically, the Band of Angels looks at investing from $100,000 to about $1 million, and exiting over a three-to-five period through an IPO, M&A or strategic sale.

Google’s move to join the Band of Angels as an institutional investor is in line with the high profile the company has been taking in India.

As the Business Standard reports,

In addition to being an active direct investor in companies, Google has also invested in three early-stage funds — Seed Fund, Erasmic Fund and VentureEast TeNet Fund in India

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