The movie is watchable ,but far from breathtaking. It has some great moments worth watching , but I can personally skip half of it.There are 6 stories - some of them way too extended and some of them way too neglected. The cast was overall good ,but the performer who really stole the show was Juhi Chawla (in those couple of minutes she had on-screen). She was the only one really acting. She delivered her role very well and made her character pretty believable.It is a miracle she did that with such a poor character story line. Govinda did a great job. Anil Kapoor and Vidya Balan were also good in terms of acting. All the others were simply okay by my opinion.Overall not the best Hindi movie I've seen.

Clocking in at an interminable three hours and twenty minutes, "Salaam-e-Ishq" is a pretty but superficial comic soap opera from India that regales us with six interwoven tales of romantic love (which is at least four tales too many in my estimation).Filmed like a cross between an MTV music video and a Super Bowl beer commercial, the movie is a sprawling mishmash of exotic settings, dazzling colors, sexy showgirls, high-stepping song-and-dance numbers, dream and fantasy sequences, winking character asides, corny dialogue and way-over-the-top comical performances - all pretty much standard-issue stuff when it comes to Bollywood happenings these days. It's an exhausting chore just trying to keep all the characters straight as they dance, prance and preen their way through the incomprehensible storyline.There's plenty for the viewer to feast his eyes on here - not least of all all the drop dead gorgeous women - but he'll need the patience of Job to get him all the way through it.

Salaaaaaaaaaaaaam-e-crap! Oh my goodness, I hope IMDb grants me four hours to tell you how awful this film is! I spent FOUR precious hours of my life enduring this crap-fest! FOUR WHOLE HOURS and then some that I can't get back. Please IMDb, don't cut me off, let me finish this review I'm begging you.Slaaaam-the-crap, is a not even a movie it's a FAUX spoof trying to be the nightmare of a clunker. The story revolves around six couples, their relationships and how love impacts them. But trust me, I am making it seem intelligible. The script, of course you know like most of all the other copied nonsense revolving around Bollywood is a bad knock-off of the equally awful British drama 'Love Actually' or as I like to call it, 'Crap-Actually.' In the Emma Thompson role, we have Juhi Chawla (the best part of the film by the way and the only person who actually ACTED in the whole movie) a mother of two whose husband(played by a very good looking Anil Kapoor, well good looking until his mid-life crisis gets the better of him) does the same thing Alan Rickman's Harry does. Anjana Sukhani plays Anjali the Britney Spears-like character Kapoor's Vinay falls for. It's lucky for Ms. Sukhani that there isn't enough space in this review for me to properly DISS her representation of this bimbo character.Poor Rakhi Sawant has been forever immortalised in this film by Priyanka Chopra who spoofs herself in an attempt to spoof Ms. Sawant. It's obvious that Chopra attended the Naomi Campbell University of Tantrums to play the role anyway. She along with a morbidly stiff and annoying Salman Khan make up couple #2 in the film.Vidya Balan, a recent graduate of the Rani Mukherji School of over-emoting & sucking-up-to-the-audience, tries to sizzle with John Abraham as couple #3 but it's too bad that John does all the work. If you get irritated by their Lovey-Dovey relationship in the beginning of the movie, don't worry they pay for all of that later on.Perhaps to most horrid part of the film was the surprise presence of Salman's brother Sohail Khan in full Rowan Atkinson's Mr. Bean mode along with his bride, trying their best to replicate the porn star roles from the original film. To me, this was more than the intended funny they were trying to get at. These two made up annoying couple #4.Govinda has received rave reviews for his turn in this but he failed to impress me. He along with Shannon Esrechowitz make up couple #5. Esrechowitz plays a British woman named Stephanie who comes to India to find her boyfriend but ends up with Govinda's Raju instead. Raju was just too obnoxiously loud and Stephanie was too self-consciously ridiculous! Maybe she should have spent more time in drama school, I don't know, your guess is as good as mine.Ayesha Takia in full Shaadi Barbie mode tries her best possible to break out of her Priyanka-Chopra-look-alike trance but she is so saccharin sweet that you forgive her even if she doesn't succeed. She plays Gia, a young bride-to-be whose groom has developed cold feet before their wedding day. His name is Siven and he's played by Akshaye Khanna in full Matthew Perry's Chandler from FRIENDS mode. Together they make up couple #6.There, you have your couples and 4 hours of major buttock-ulcer burn to watch their stories unwind. In the end, you're left with more questions than answers and a sour taste in your mouth. Like why was it that when Kameeni (Chopra's) character woke up in a bed in the middle of a field, she had a full face of make-up on? What happened to all the Tralfagar Square pigeons during the scene that followed? Why were both Ashutosh and Tehzeeb flying through traffic on a motorbike without any helmets on? What the heck was Rahul doing at Gia's wedding? Why was Ashutosh flooding Tehzeeb with memories? Did he not know her brain could start bleeding from all the pressure? Why was this film more than 4 hours long? Just to mention a few of my questions.The music was so-so, except for the opening version of the title song and perhaps that song from when Kameeni woke up in the field. The product placements were ridiculous. I mean I actually brought out a pen and paper to start taking notes after a while and trust me I missed some. From your Apple Lap tops to your Bebes, Armanis, Starbucks, Filmfare Magazine, Motorola Razors, Pantene, Coca Cola etc. etc. Then you've got your unnecessary movie spoofs and shout outs: from your Veer-Zaara, to your K3G, Chupke Chupke, Kal Ho Na Ho, Chalte Chalte, Dhoom, Mohabbattein, Fanaa, this and that and the third! Just to mention a few. And don't even get me started on Karan Johar Kiss-up and the Diss-up of Yash Chopra. Plus, crown it all up, they copied the ending to 'TITANIC' which made it all the more tacky! It was all much too much and resulted in a very very very very super long and crappy movie! Salaam-e-crap! Crap's sweet salute!

I was somewhat apprehensive about Nikhil's ability to make the 5 stories hang together and flow and boy did he do that and then some! This is the work of a director at the top of his game, at the peak of his creative prowess. This is the ultimate directors movie( and to some extent the editor) and Nikhil deserves major props for taking something that had huge potential for disaster and creating something extraordinarily interesting.. He has created the ultimate Bollywood Masala potboiler but in a non cheesy manner,taken the rules of bollywood convention and turned them upside the head, to create something fresh yet familiar -complemented by the self referential humor and self reflexive editing . Nuff said about the director!!The editing was key to the success of this movie and except for about 20 minutes in the middle,I didn't find the movie dragged at all.It was great how each segment lasted for not more than 5 minutes at a time. The pacing was perfect and the climax was raucous, rousing and irresistible and definitely left one with an emotional high .The actors acted their guts out (which was to be expected from good actors like Anil, Juhi, Govinda, Akshaye, Ayesha and Vidya), but John and Priyanka did a good job too,and Sallu was Sallu- which was perfect for the role he was playing:) I loved all the individual story lines and the extent to which the director was able to develop them so that they felt complete.If I had to choose a favorite ,it has to be the Govinda story.His Delhi cabdriver was one of the most lovable characters in the movie. The language barriers between him and the American gal and how they overcame it was extremely fun and poignant at the same time and they were given great lines to speak .This section was extremely well written.Priyanka was a surprise package, I loved the back-story of her character ( seemed a little inspired by Mallika Sherawat) and the unpredictable way her storyline with Sallu proceeded. She did a great job contrasting the "diva" scenes ( necessarily overdone) with the scenes where her real self is revealed ( to Rahul). The one scene where she is supposedly crying for the cameras when Rahul "dies" was heartbreaking , because she was tapping into the " tragedy queen" thing while at the same time grieving the loss of the love of her life. Sallu was camp-ilicious in his trade mark fashion and looked good enough to eat! His mannered or "fake" acting was needed for the role since he was playing a mysterious poseur and nobody really knew what he was all about.Anil and Juhi did well in the standard "mid life crisis" storyline. This was probably the least interesting subplot because it has been done to death before, nonetheless the 3 main players brought this story to life .Ayesha and Akshaye's pre-marriage commitment blues story line was well done too and funny.I loved Akshaye, despite his facial contortions .The John Vidya story was very interesting in that it tackled a very sensitive subject( inter faith romance) but the woman's accident proneness was getting a little out of hand! Thankfully the director spared us the agony of her getting "cured" by a second bang on the head - a favorite bollywood convention from the 70's .This is a segment which could have been shortened a bit. The scenes with Ashutosh's Dad were unnecessary and there was way too much crying on the part of John which got repetitive.The Sohail-Isha storyline was strictly for laughs , aimed at the B and C centers but it was funny as hell! I enjoyed the songs and dances much more on screen with the visual reference than just listening to them cold.Overall this is one of the best movies I have seen in a while.You will laugh! You will cry! You will come to terms !!:) A whopping 9/10!!