Gully Boy
Director: Zoya Akhtar
Producer: Excel Entertainment & Tiger Baby
Cast: Ranveer Singh, Alia Bhatt, Kalki Koechlin, Siddhant Chaturvedi
Rating: 4/5 stars
Ek Number, Bhidu! That is the Mumbai slang for "top-class" – and it is exactly the way to describe Gully Boy, a wonderful underdog story, which shines a light on India's nascent hip-hop culture.
Directed by Zoya Akhtar, Gully Boy serves as a loose profile of two real-life rappers: Vivian Fernandes, or Divine, and Naved Shaikh, aka Naezy The Baa. There are splendid performances from Ranveer Singh and Siddhant Chaturvedi, who play Murad Sheikh and Shrikant, two young hip-hop hopefuls. Alia Bhat, Vijay Raaz and Vijay Varma offer sturdy notes of support in the chorus.
Akhtar directs the movie without altering too many details of the real lives of the rappers. She imbues them with ingenuity, and yet effortlessly depicts their respective grim personal battles.
Murad (Singh) is the son of a driver who must eke out a respectable living. He keeps drifting into odd jobs, though, as he tries to bail out a friend's oppressed mother from a father (Raaz) who remarries. As a reluctant participant in car burglaries with half-brother Moeen (Verma) and yet keen to help children being subjected to drug abuse, his emotional conflicts play out nicely.
While his quiet romance with an obsessive lover Safeena (Bhatt) provides some comic relief, his mind is in turmoil again once Kalki Koechlin becomes a work-related fling. All this while he nurtures his talent with MC Sher (Chaturvedi).
The rap battles and songs, with actual artists such as Emiway Bantai, Kaam Bhari, MC Altaf and others, undoubtedly make for compelling viewing. As the fraternity says, the words are expressions from the heart and to her credit Akhtar has only nurtured them well into the story-telling.
But one of the best scenes is a subdued, well-directed moment when Murad, filling in for his father as a stop-gap driver, gets carried away to the stage at a concert, which his female boss is attending. A security guard tells him to back off as the song Untouchable plays in the background.
Ek number!
The specs
Engine: 3.9-litre twin-turbo V8
Transmission: seven-speed
Power: 620bhp
Torque: 760Nm
Price: Dh898,000
On sale: now
The specs
AT4 Ultimate, as tested
Engine: 6.2-litre V8
Power: 420hp
Torque: 623Nm
Transmission: 10-speed automatic
Price: From Dh330,800 (Elevation: Dh236,400; AT4: Dh286,800; Denali: Dh345,800)
On sale: Now
WHAT IS A BLACK HOLE?
1. Black holes are objects whose gravity is so strong not even light can escape their pull
2. They can be created when massive stars collapse under their own weight
3. Large black holes can also be formed when smaller ones collide and merge
4. The biggest black holes lurk at the centre of many galaxies, including our own
5. Astronomers believe that when the universe was very young, black holes affected how galaxies formed
Ain Dubai in numbers
126: The length in metres of the legs supporting the structure
1 football pitch: The length of each permanent spoke is longer than a professional soccer pitch
16 A380 Airbuses: The equivalent weight of the wheel rim.
9,000 tonnes: The amount of steel used to construct the project.
5 tonnes: The weight of each permanent spoke that is holding the wheel rim in place
192: The amount of cable wires used to create the wheel. They measure a distance of 2,4000km in total, the equivalent of the distance between Dubai and Cairo.
The years Ramadan fell in May
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Biog
Mr Kandhari is legally authorised to conduct marriages in the gurdwara
He has officiated weddings of Sikhs and people of different faiths from Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Russia, the US and Canada
Father of two sons, grandfather of six
Plays golf once a week
Enjoys trying new holiday destinations with his wife and family
Walks for an hour every morning
Completed a Bachelor of Commerce degree in Loyola College, Chennai, India
2019 is a milestone because he completes 50 years in business
Western Region Asia Cup T20 Qualifier
Sun Feb 23 – Thu Feb 27, Al Amerat, Oman
The two finalists advance to the Asia qualifier in Malaysia in August
Group A
Bahrain, Maldives, Oman, Qatar
Group B
UAE, Iran, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia
Gully Boy
Director: Zoya Akhtar
Producer: Excel Entertainment & Tiger Baby
Cast: Ranveer Singh, Alia Bhatt, Kalki Koechlin, Siddhant Chaturvedi
Rating: 4/5 stars