The Greatest Action Scene of all Time and Space.

Recently my friend sent a video clip of a Bollywood movie he described as "The Matrix" meets "Terminator."  Obviously I was intrigued.  What I saw was even better than I expected.  

The clip is the end fight sequence from the movie "Endhiran," which means Robot in Tamil.  Endhiran was the most expensive movie that Bollywood has ever made, think Avatar if the Na'vi had broken into spontaneous song and dance.  To say that Endhiran is a CGI artist's wet dream would be an understatement.  This movie is a CGI artist's three day Viagra-fueled orgy and abject bacchanalia.  The effects in this movie are insane, and not in the "whoa, bro those effects are insane!" sense.  They are insane as in the person who thought them up might be clinically off his rocker, or at the very least smoking a ton of hash. 

The basic plot is that this Indian mad scientist named Dr. Vaseegaran spent his entire life trying to create his perfect likeness... and get this, he succeeds!  Nothing bad could come from playing God could it?  The robot's name is Chitti Babu and at first everything is peaches and tandoori, with Chitti Babu learning about human society.  Aishwarya Rai stars as Dr. Vaseegaran's girlfriend, and the robot helps her cheat on a college exam.  Then the military gets their hands on Chitti Babu and implants a "red chip" into him, making him go bat shit crazy.  

And he's not only crazy, he's also smart.  Chitti Babu creates a hundred robot likeness of himself and proceeds to wreak havoc.  The scene I'm about to deconstruct begins with Dr. Vaseegaran, who has infiltrated the robot's lair in disguise, discovered and about to be killed by Chitti Babu.

0:01 - In case you're wondering why the scene starts with Chitti Babu and his fingers in the good doctor's mouth, it's not because he's giving him an oral exam.  You see, Chitti Babu's fingers are also guns.  But wait!  Just as he's about to cock his trigger/thumb... the military shows up and flashes his eyesight with Vision Bleach.  The Chitti duplicates react like Sean Penn would against a paparazzi flash.  That is to say, pissed off.

0:20 - Chitti tries to use one of his powers - magnetism - to grab the gun out of a soldier's hands.  But the weapons aren't metal!  That's when he goes into "Sphere Mode."  The hundred Chittis go straight Voltron and form into a giant ball to go on the offensive.  Spinning like a murderous gyroscope or a death-bringing Katamari Damacy, the Chittis rain gunfire all over the military!  Then they smash the laboratory wide open and escape.

A trigger-happy Katamari Damacy.

1:21 - Now would be a good time to mention Chitti's awesome lightning bolt sideburns.  That really is the mark of a true bad guy - really sinister facial hair.  Evil Spock had it.  Evil Hulk Hogan (WCW version) had it.  Evil Hitler had it.  Good guys are generally clean shaven, with the exception of Wolverine and Tony Stark (they are more anti-heroes anyway).  

1:52 - Science alert!  The military has managed to get their hands on a downed Chitti clone, and they ferry it to Dr. Vasagaran and Aishwarya Rai in a high-tech, bunkered bus for diagnosis.  He's going to hack into its mainframe and upload a virus or something.  Insert standard computer hacking movie plot here.

You know Dr. Vasagaran is serious because he's rolled the sleeves up on his leather coat.  Which by the way is a great look.  

2:15 - Back to the CGI-fest.  The clones form into a rolling pin and knead the military police force like pizza dough.  The army fires a missile into the clones and think they've successfully killed them.  Key word: think.

Who's got one thumb and is about to be tossed out of a helicopter?  This guy.

In a move ripped right out of Terminator, Chitti utters the Schwarzenneger-esque line "Mind if I come in?" and throws the pilot to the ground.  Chitti reaches the pilot by stacking his clones like a totem pole and elevating himself.

3:35 - Think Chitti can only form simple shapes?  Think again!  Now he assembles into a fucking Cobra snake, complete with hissing sounds!  The clone snake gobbles up soldiers, tanks, police cars, anything in their path.  The snake crunches them up in its belly, then spews its "feces" all over the side of a building.  This is art people.

4:35 - Dr. Vaseegaran has successfully implanted a worm into the clones' mainframes!  Aishwarya Rai looks at him expectantly, like she can't wait to get into his shimmering leather pants.  Also, what is Rai even doing in this movie?  I thought she was supposed to be a Hollywood "It-Girl"?  She even had her own Barbie doll.  Now she's leering at some skunk striped robotics expert while a 100-foot tall robot snake rampages half of Mumbai.  She still has pretty eyes though.

5:00 -The military has trapped the Chitti clones in an electrified fence.  No problem!  Chittis, combine into form of... drill!  The mustachioed military men look on in horror.  At first I thought this shot was just more CGI, like an animator clicked CTRL+V to paste the same guy looking up in disbelief.  No, everyone just has a mustache... except for one guy!  See if you can find him, it's like Where's Waldo.

Hint: It's the guy without a mustache.

6:00 - The Chitti clones have now magneto-morphed into their final, and most imposing, form... the MECHA CHITTI!  Chitti hasn't even broken a sweat, and shows just how unafraid he is by casually leaning up against the side of a building...

Casual cool.

...then giving Dr. Vaseegaran the finger with one of his little clones!  Look closely and you can see the clone is also giving the finger.  I'm sure the director, who goes by the singular name Shankar, had a good chuckle about this in the editing bay. 

F You!

6:58 - The chase is on.  Dr. Vaseegaran and Aishwarya Rai flee in their tricked out bus with Mecha Chitti in hot pursuit.  Dr. Vaseegaran runs a de-magnetizing program on the captured clone... who I thought self-destructed in a previous sequence?  Then he puts the data in some sort of transmitter?  What the fuck is going on here?

7:50 - The most dramatic mouse click in movie history.  So apparently all that science was to shoot a transmitter into Mecha Chitti or something.  Anyway it's happening right now!  You can tell this is a really high tech bus because it has a wireless mouse.  Also, is that an iPod plugged in to the right of Dr. Vaseegaran?  Destroy a Mecha, download some Daler Mehndi... all in a day's work for our hero.

 
8:18 - The Mecha splits apart, and Dr. Vaseegaran thinks he's done it!  Only he forgot one thing... Chitti is equipped with Heelys!  Part shoe, part roller blades, 100% extreme as all hell.  And Chitti's Heelys are blazing fast.

Technology inspired by ten-year-old boys in suburban malls.

 
9:00 - Apparently the high-tech bus also has a giant magnet inside, and Chitti goes flying into it, captured.  Dr. Vaseegaran tickles Chitti's stomach and some sort of control panel pops out.  All of the robots are deactivated.  Sort of an anti-climactic ending to such a grandiosely envisioned scene.  Dr. Vaseegaran removes the villainous "red chip" and thankfully Chitti is deactivated.  Aishwarya Rai is relieved.

Phew.

The video cuts off here, but according to Wikipedia, Chitti's body is moved to a museum where he stays as a warning to students to adhere to Isaac Asimov's Three Laws of Robotics.  One student asks why the robot was deactivated... and Chitti's head comes to life, saying "I started to think."  The end.

I smell sequel!