July 15, 2010 (Sampurn Wire): Three distinct films release tomorrow - ‘Lamhaa’, ‘Tere Bin Laden’ and ‘Udaan’. Incidentally, none of the three films are true blue conventional Bollywood outings. They are not romantic affairs, they don’t boast the kind of comedy that Bollywood is known for and also they don’t quite fit into the category of family films. However, at least a couple of them do look interesting here - ‘Lamhaa’ and ‘Tere Bin Laden’. ‘Lamhaa’ boasts of the star power of Sanjay Dutt and Bipasha Basu and the hard hitting promos that promise a quality outing seems to have done the trick.

Of course a quality outing doesn’t necessarily mean big moolah coming in because the issue based subject (militancy in Kashmir) means that a full house is ruled out. Also, it is unlike ‘Mission Kashmir’ where songs and dances along with then-newly-found-sensation Hrithik Roshan had contributed to a great opening. In case of ‘Lamhaa’, anything over 50%-60% occupancy would be good enough to qualify as a positive start. An expensive affair though, ‘Lamhaa’ would have to hold on really well to ensure a good recovery and a tag of being a plus outing. With ‘Khatta Meetha’ arriving a week later, ‘Lamhaa’ would have to rely a lot on its positive reviews, extremely strong word of mouth and of course a fair deal of good luck.

As for ‘Tere Bin Laden’, even a decent start should ensure that it becomes a safe outing at the box office because it is a largely inexpensive affair due to many new faces. On the flipside, a largely unknown cast, a new director and an offbeat theme means that it would turn out to be a gamble after all. However, one has to compliment the makers here for giving the film a good enough platform to at the least make its presence felt. The well designed promos have been running for quite some time now and if this fun film manages to catch the attention of the youth, it could well be the surprise winner of the season.

A film which doesn’t quite seem to be traversing a similar happy path is ‘Udaan’. Though backed by the likes of Anurag Kashyap and UTV, the film hasn’t managed to excite much. The reason could be the dark theme, an unknown cast and promos that don’t quite give a happy feel to the entire outing but the fact remains that ‘Udaan’ doesn’t quite appear to be flying. Arriving along with two other better looking films, it would have to be extra special to make its presence felt.

– Joginder Tuteja/ Sampurn Wire