40 out of 50 people found the following review helpful:

Awful!

Huw Thomas from Cornwall, England, 19th March, 2006

It's not often that a film is so bad I can't be bothered to watch it. I like Bollywood but this was painful. Sholay is a mutant combination of 70s spaghetti Western and tacky 'buddy movie' with naff songs... so far just about bearable but then comes the prison scene and suddenly we're into Benny Hill territory and my pain threshold had been reached! This might have seemed okay 30 years ago but there are much better Bollywood films to watch than this drivel.

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20 out of 20 people found the following review helpful:

Still the best movie!!!!!!

Prem Srivastav from Hertfordshire, England, 13th August, 2007

This is still the best movie, even after a quarter of a century, to be watched by the whole family. It has comedy, action, romance, tragedy, drama, songs, music, memorable dialogues and picturesqe scenes all rolled into one. It grips you right from the beginning and keeps you glued to your TV screen (though it would be best to watch on a big screen) till the end. All this keeps you capitivated throughout the film, due to excellent acting skills and a gripping story line.

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9 out of 11 people found the following review helpful:

Sholay

A Customer from london, 9th September, 2003

Probably the greatest Indian action adventure film ever made. Worth watching just for the legendary Amitabh Bachhan in his prime.

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8 out of 8 people found the following review helpful:

What a film

hindustani from CAMBRIDGESHIRE, 5th December, 2003

One of the best Indian films ever made and worth watching every time. Every actor and actress has put their heart in to this film and of course director has just gone over the budget but he made sure that it is worth watching.

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*** May contain spoilers ***

GENRE BOUNCING SEVENTIES BOLLYWOOD

RobertMakin from , 8th January, 2010

I've never really been a been a big fan of Bollywood and found it a bit too kitsch. Then again my knowledge of Indian cinema is very limited and I'm always open to suggestion. Sholay on the other hand was beyond all expectations. It is long and I had to watch in two sittings, but it's definitely one of the most entertaining films I've seen for a long time. I'm not sure whether it's a common thing in Bollywood cinema, but whoever directed Sholay certainly intended to cover all the angles and tick all the boxes. With a revenge tale at it's core it gleefully bounces from one genre to the next. What begins as a gritty, violent, seventies crime caper suddenly becomes a romantic musical, until it eventually turns into the Hindi version of Porridge via a Spaghetti Western, Kung-Fu domestic drama, buddy movie. But despite it's sporadic approach to plot structure it's action scenes and musical sequences are pretty astounding. In fact one of Sholay's main attributes has to be it's infectious soundtrack: an amazing fusion of Bollywood funk and fuzzed up, seventies pop which I have yet to track down. The prison section of the film does drag on a bit, but if you're looking for three hours of highly cinematic, stylish, weird cult world cinema then I wholly recommend Sholay. Plus any film that starts with a gun fight on a train and ends with an armless man fighting his nemesis with customized hobnail boots gets a thumbs up from me.

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sholay or 'the 2 samurai'?

viewfromPhil from , 22nd July, 2009

The flim got off to a pretty slow start and was trying too hard at times to be light hearted and funny (in what is supposed to be an all action movie?). Also the director seemed to take a very long time to explain the background relationship between the two heroes and the, retired, police inspector/ village head. All this 'faffing' around makes the film a liitle overlong ....thank god I watched it at home with breaks for making cups of tea and the requisite 'comfort breaks'...I can well understand why Indian movies need an intermission in the middle of the film... a bum -numbing 3 hours long!!! All this would suggest that I hated the film?....Not in the least of it.....I really enjoyed it and it would have got a higher rating if the director had just found a way too cut the preamble by 30-40 minutes without completly confusing his audience as to who is who and why. If you like the 7 Samurai or the Magnificent 7 you should like this, especially in that the heoes don't always 'kick ass' and occasionally lose the odd battle......without giving too much of the storyline away. If you like Amitabh's films or Bollywood action movies then this is an oldy but goldy..........a must watch.

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1 out of 1 people found the following review helpful:

Are you missing the point?

A Customer from London, 7th November, 2008

There are so many reasons why this movie is a masterpiece. Performances from Amitabh Bachchan, Hema Malini, Dharmendra, Jaya Bhaduri, Sanjeev Kumar and of course, the never-forgotten Amjad Khan, were all just incredible, and showcased the breadth of acting talent available at the time. The themes in the movie are broad but familiar- friendship, family, love, honour, bravery- there is a lot going on from scene to scene. The music and songs (sung by Lata and Rafi at their peak) are absolutely top-class and each song is a classic in it's own right. The direction and set pieces, which might appear unremarkable by today's standards, broke new ground in India in the 70s. I find it a little strange that there are negative reviews for a film that was and still is hailed by the public as the greatest movie that bollywood has ever produced. You've surely missed the point if you're comparing this to today's dross. Sholay can be described as an Indian spaghetti-Western, but it set the benchmark for Bollywood action up to the present day, as Star Wars did for sci-fi movies in the West. You either get this or you don't, but nobody in their right mind would say that it's an irrelevant movie. It's likely you'll watch this and still not understand why Sholay is such an emotional experience to hundreds of millions of people worldwide, why all of them can quote the lines (yes, everyone!), and how it could propel actors like Amitabh and Amjad Khan into instant legend status. Nevertheless, if there's only one Bollywood action movie you will watch in your lifetime, then this is the one.

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Classic Bollywood cult movie

A Customer from London, 11th October, 2008

Having seen this Big B movie for the first time I wanted to know what the fuss was about. There are so many Hollywood films here. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and the famous film with Yul Brynner and Steve McQueen(can't remember the name) and the seven cowboys who rescue a mexican village -taken from Japanese film Seven Samurai. However in this film, there are only two!!! rescuing the village . It is all about unbelievable really. However Bachchan is very good at being cool. So plot apart, I can see why it was so popular-taken the time 1975.

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