What if I told you that there was a blockbusting film series that was 10 times more incoherent than The Fast and the Furious, with underwater jetskis, international cat burglars who work as clowns during the day, police who fire indiscriminately into traffic from helicopter rope-ladders, and a lead actor who reportedly wore a bowler hat for a *year* before shooting in order to get into character? And it only took a couple weeks for it to become the highest grossing Indian movie of all time (domestically and abroad)...but you've probably never heard of it. This is Dhoom 3.
I saw Dhoom 2 back in 2008 and it instantly became one of my favorite films. They both have high production value and good actors, but every 30 seconds something utterly insane occurs. It begins with a man skydiving onto Queen Elizabeth's train in the middle of the desert (?!) badly disguised himself as her, stealing the British crown and escaping via a sand-snowboard. That is actually a thing that happens within the first 5 minutes of a movie. The next 2 hours are a blur of stupid disguises, incoherent objectives, jetski battles, the former Miss India training to be a ninja-thief, people firing guns while flying through the air, local Mumbai policemen traveling to foreign countries to track down criminals...plus some song and dance numbers. It is insane.
Dhoom 3, which came out in December, is even insaner and is actually set in *Chicago*—where it is clear that large sections of the city must have been shut down in order to film it. It features a villain who boasts about the fact that he is a clown by profession, endless crazy motorcycle chases, another character who is always described as "retarded" despite having absolutely no discernible mental disability other than shyness, action scenes clearly filmed in some of the same locations as the Dark Knight, someone *literally* being tied to railroad tracks, and no fewer than one baffling line of dialogue every 30 seconds. Oh, and everyone in Chicago speaks Hindi. It is nothing less than a full assault on your brain.
These are the perfect HDTGM films: they are SO enjoyable while being completely baffling and ridiculous at every turn. Do this movie! Dhoom 2 is avalable on google play, netflix (dvd), and by, cough, searching for streaming links of it. There are so many clips on YouTube as well. Dhoom 3 is even crazier, but it probably won't be gettable for another month or two. But dear god, it's so worth it.
Here is a clip of the greatest helicopter/rollerblade chase in movie history.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5ZiW3mCuE4
