Kites

About the film

Kites is a 2010 Indian romantic action film directed by Anurag Basu, with the story written and produced by Rakesh Roshan. The film stars Hrithik Roshan, Bárbara Mori, Kangana Ranaut, and Kabir Bedi.

Presented in English as Kites: The Remix by Brett Ratner, the film was released in India and in North America on 21 May 2010. Its 208-theater opening in North America made it the largest Bollywood release up to that time. It was also the first Bollywood film to reach the weekend top ten, though My Name is Khan had a larger first-weekend North American gross. Despite a strong opening, the film only managed to collect ₹47 crore (US$10.28 million) net in its lifetime run following a critical loss. Domestically, one of the major criticisms aimed at the film was towards the multilingual narrative that featured the majority of dialogue in Spanish and English, while it was advertised as a Hindi-language film in India.

Plot

Jay Ray is a dance teacher in Las Vegas, Nevada. As a side hustle, he marries immigrant women to get them green cards in exchange for money. When Gina, the rich daughter of a powerful Anglo-Indian casino owner, Bob Grover, falls for him, Jay goes along to marry into money. He discovers that his future brother-in-law, the vicious, homicidal Tony, is about to marry a Mexican woman named Natasha, whom Jay knows as Linda, the last of the immigrant women he married. On the night before "Natasha" and Tony's wedding, Linda and Jay humorously agree to a "divorce". A jealous, gun-wielding Tony arrives at her apartment while Jay is there. After he hits her, Linda impulsively knocks him out with a heavy object while he tussles with Jay. Linda and Jay go on the run toward Mexico, with Tony and the police in pursuit. They are helped by a friend of Jay, Robin. Robin gives them fake passports and IDs so that they can escape and build the life they want.

In the following week, Jay and Linda get married in Mexico. On the day of their wedding, they come back to their house. There, Robin comes to give them the passports and is unexpectedly shot by Tony and his men. Linda and Jay escape, but Jay is shot in the process. During a car chase, Linda stops the car by a train, puts Jay aboard it, and drives off. Back in the present, Jay meets with Jamaal, one of Bob's employees, and is ambushed. Jamaal is killed, but not before telling Jay of Linda's whereabouts. Jay kills off all of Tony's men and then kills Tony by smashing his face into the car door and he is then shot by Gina. He drives off to the location where Jamaal said Linda was last seen. It is shown that after Jay was put aboard the train, Linda was ambushed on a cliff and sent Jay a text message saying, "I am going...Sorry, forget me." She drives off of the cliff, killing herself by drowning. Jay cries and then smiles, jumping off the cliff as well. Finally, he is reunited with Linda under the ocean, and they embrace in death.

Production

Deepika Padukone was approached to star opposite Hrithik Roshan, although she turned down the offer for undisclosed reasons.

Kites's worldwide distribution rights were sold for ₹1.5 billion (US$32.8 million) to Reliance big pictures in 2010 (except Mumbai). The satellite rights were bought by Sony TV group, while the music rights were bought by T-series/Big music.

Music

Kites music album was composed by Rajesh Roshan, with lyrics penned by Nasir Faraaz and Asif Ali Beg. The songs "Dil Kyon Yeh Mera" and "Zindagi Do Pal Ki" (both sung by KK) became a rage while other songs were also successful. Variety Magazine said the music "ranges from hip-hop to Enya-esque ululating."

Release

Kites was on 3000 screens in India, and across 30 countries and 500 screens globally, according to distributor Reliance BIG Entertainment. It opened on 208 screens in North America, making it the largest Bollywood release there to that time.

To help promote the film, mini "music videos" were released online, each about one minute long and featuring a song from the soundtrack set against scenes from the film. The clothing brand Provogue, which features Hrithik Roshan as its brand ambassador, launched a Kites clothing range. A photo shoot for the campaign was shot in the Maldives, featuring Hrithik Roshan and Bárbara Mori.

While the Hindi version of Kites with most dialogue in Spanish was released on 21 May 2010 in India, the international version was released one week later, on 28 May 2010. The film was scheduled to be released in over 60 countries.

Reception

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 70% of 27 critics' reviews are positive. The website's consensus reads: "Thoroughly overwrought in true Bollywood fashion, Kites is deeply flawed —and too effervescently charming to resist."

Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 62 out of 100, based on 13 critics, indicating "generally favorable" reviews.

The film generally received mixed reviews in India. The chemistry of the lead actors and the cinematography were specifically praised by Indian critics like Anupama Chopra and Raja Sen. Rajeev Masand of IBN said "Thrilling action set-pieces, a super-fluid dance number to show off Hrithik's killer moves, and repeated glimpses at the toned bodies of both lead stars. It's almost enough to forgive the uniformly bad acting of all supporting cast". Anupama Chopra of NDTV said "the film doesn't become more than the sum of its parts because the second half is flat and in places, outright foolish". Shubhra Gupta of Indian Express calls it "really old wine in a sort-of new bottle".

Key details