Ashutosh Gorikawar, hire an editor for pete’s sake.

Mr. Director sir, I loved your Swades. I loved your Lagaan.
Jodhaa Akbar, you had potential. But you… you friggin’ crashed out my pent-up energy. I demand you give me back my 4.5 hours of my life.

Don’t you hate when you have so much hype and excitement for a movie but later after its release, you realise that the movie turns out to be a bloody flop?

On the plus side, at least we got to see Hrithik and Aishwarya in the lead after their blockbuster hit, Dhoom 2 (even with the empty plot, testosterone and a controversial kiss between the two). And at least some fanservice for the ladies as seen below.

No but I’m serious. All this scenes in this movie was baloney. I wanted to see some aspects of Emperor Akbar’s life. Not a whole dollop of it. I couldn’t help but skip through many scenes. There’s far too much dialogue to take. One scene after another about politics and war and bunch of baloney. I feel as though I was cheated. If your movie’s tag line spoke about a sixteenth century epic love despite religious differences, please for goodness sakes, deliver on that promise. Sadly, my bum’s endurance isn’t up to par with the Olympic athletes.

For those who don’t know, the actual Mughal emperor, Akbar The Great, married a Rajput princess to ease tension between the two clans and to create an alliance. It was quite controversial at the time as the Muslim Mughals were not supposed to mix with Hindu Rajputs. The Rajputs were already garnering attention from rival clans with their powerful fighting skills (mind you, the Rajputs were excellent warriors from tradition and were more likely to be enlisted in the Royal British Army before India’s Independence in 1947). Akbar was known to be tolerant of the various religions in his kingdom and created his own religious cult called the Din-i-illahi where he would hold many debates among numerous religious scholars until that cult dissipated shortly after his death. There isn’t much known about his wife—Rumour has it that her name was erased from historical records by scholars to prevent shame on their beloved emperor. There’s only one reference naming her as Jodhabhai or Mariam-Uz-Zamani. Other than that, her previous history is unknown. However it was known that she had conditions prior to accepting his marriage: she would not change her religion and would like him to build a temple. Of course, this caused a rift among the members of the court and treated her as an outcast.

So how does Bollywood showcase their epic love to control this fiery princess down? Throuuugh some lovin’, of course. I must admit though, the movie was nicely choreographed and there are some beautiful scenes (like where Aishwarya and Hrithik were in the same room only the curtain separates the two). And the magical chemistry between the two was perfect as expected from their past work together in Dhoom 2.

Still, this movie does not cut the cake for me.

Now after that rant, I highly recommend to douse your eyes with some sizzling videos from Dhoom 2.

Crazy Kiya Re (Literally, “You Make Me Crazy”)