By, Jennifer Lipman
1 min read
ByJennifer Lipman, Jennifer Lipman
A Bollywood film about Hitler which members of the Indian Jewish community dubbed as "ignorant" when it was announced has been panned by critics.
Gandhi To Hitler, a Bollywood take on the correspondence between the Indian and Nazi leaders and the end of the Third Reich was the subject of controversy when the project was announced last year.
Anupam Kher, the actor due to play the Nazi leader, eventually dropped out after facing criticism.
The film was released in India on Friday, but news site DNA India told filmgoers to avoid it "at all costs". The reviewer said that director Rakesh Ranjan Kumar had presented a "botched up and ineffective" account of history.
"I'm still figuring why every character, including Hitler, is played by an Indian," wrote the reviewer.
"The wigs will remind you of your own hair, which by now will have been subjected to pulling and tearing by you or your cinema hall neighbour.
"It is rancid, futile and unnecessary to the past, present and future of sanity, let alone to cinema."
Another reviewer for NDTV.com said the film should be consigned to the dustbins of hsitroy. "It has the feel of a Z-grade quickie," he said.
The Daily Bhaskar gave the film one star out of five. "The locations look extremely suspicious as he has tried to merge Himalayas and Punjab to seem like European locations," said the review.
"The ascent looks extremely fake and romantic scenes are extremely silly and unintentionally funny."
One reviewer was more concise. "The worst film of 2011," said Janhvi Patel.
Watch the trailer here