Ranveer Singh stars in Gully Boy
Ranveer Singh stars in Gully Boy
Ranveer Singh stars in Gully Boy
Ranveer Singh stars in Gully Boy

Film review: Gully Boy is a wonderful underdog story about India’s nascent hip-hop culture


Kumar Shyam
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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

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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

1987

1954

1921

1888

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