Entertainment
‘Singh is Bliing’ – No expectation, no disappointment
Film: “Singh is Bliing”; Director: Prabhudheva, Cast: Akshay Kumar, Kay Kay Menon, Amy Jackson, Lara Dutta, Rati Agnihotri, Pradeep Rawat, Murali Sharma and Kunal Kapoor; Rating: **
“Singh is Bliing”. Indeed it is. The film is flashy, colourful and ostentatious from word go. But that’s all there is to it. There is not much of a story anywhere.
Raftaar Singh (Akshay Kumar) is a good-for-nothing ‘Singh’ living in Bassi Pathanan in Punjab, who, according to his father, leaves every task unfinished, does nothing for a living and eats all day. Thoroughly pampered by his mother (Rati Agnihotri), he simply enjoys life.
As a punishment one day, Raftaar’s father packs him off to Goa to work for a friend of his, Kirpal Singh (Pradeep Rawat).
Along with his two loyal friends, Pappi and Pompi, Raftaar lands up in Goa.
Because, “He may be silly, but is very dependable”, his boss Kirpal Singh assigns Raftaar to take care of Sara (Amy Jackson), a special guest from Romania. She is in Goa to escape Mark (Kay Kay Menon), a ruthless, ambitious, eccentric drug mafia don in Romania, who is keen to marry her.
Raftaar is in a fix as he cannot speak English and Sara knows no Hindi. There steps in a translator Emily (Lara Dutta).
Amidst plenty of action, some out of context songs, oodles of silly humour, beautiful locales, the film progresses, entertaining the audience all the way.
Akshay Kumar is his usual Punjabi, energetic self, playing the quintessential sardaar, with action, romance and comedy woven into his character in abundance. Amy Jackson as Sara manages to look pretty, and yes, pulls off the action scenes convincingly. She is adept at doing what is expected of her.
It is Kay Kay Menon as Mark, who lights up the screen in a brilliant cameo after ages. “Easy is boring man, I like it,” maybe his signature line, but the audience too likes him. With a swagger, attitude and get-up that he carries off with panache, he is a delight to watch.
The surprise element in the film is Lara Dutta, who plays the clever but harried translator for Singh and Sara. Her comic timing is impeccable and she delivers an unabashed, no-holds-barred performance.
Rati Agnihotri seems a gross misfit as the loving and indulgent Punjabi mother. She lacks energy, does not get the accent right and merely walks through her role. Yograj Singh, who plays Raftaar’s father, on the contrary, shines in his limited screen time and brings freshness to his character. Kunal Kapoor, although seen on screen after a long hiatus, adds nothing to the film by way of performance.
Prabhudheva’s direction is nothing to write home about, yet, his stamp on the film is evident in certain scenes.
Dudley’s cinematography does justice equally to the beautiful locales of Punjab, Romania and Goa, making you want to be in those places.
The music is expectedly oozing with Punjabi flavour – bhangra beats et al but fails to charge you, more so because of the absurd and obnoxious lyrics – “Choon Chaan” and “Tung Tung Baaje”.
Overall, “Singh is Bliing” does not disappoint. One steps in expecting mindless humour, entertainment and some fairly good performances and on that front the film delivers. That there would be a spectacular story was never an expectation anyway.
International online casino Casino Days has published a report sharing their internal data on what types and brands of devices are used to play on the platform by users from the South Asian region.
Such aggregate data analyses allow the operator to optimise their website for the brands and models of devices people are actually using.
The insights gained through the research also help Casino Days tailor their services based on the better understanding of their clients and their needs.
Desktops and Tablets Lose the Battle vs Mobile
The primary data samples analysed by Casino Days reveal that mobile connections dominate the market in South Asia and are responsible for a whopping 96.6% of gaming sessions, while computers and tablets have negligible shares of 2.9% and 0.5% respectively.
The authors of the study point out that historically, playing online casino was exclusively done on computers, and attribute thе major shift to mobile that has unfolded over time to the wide spread of cheaper smartphones and mobile data plans in South Asia.
“Some of the reasons behind this massive difference in device type are affordability, technical advantages, as well as cheaper and more obtainable internet plans for mobiles than those for computers,” the researchers comment.
Xiaomi and Vivo Outperform Samsung, Apple Way Down in Rankings
Chinese brands Xiaomi and Vivo were used by 21.9% and 20.79% of Casino Days players from South Asia respectively, and together with the positioned in third place with a 18.1% share South Korean brand Samsung dominate the market among real money gamers in the region.
Cupertino, California-based Apple is way down in seventh with a user share of just 2.29%, overshadowed by Chinese brands Realme (11.43%), OPPO (11.23%), and OnePlus (4.07%).
Huawei is at the very bottom of the chart with a tiny share just below the single percent mark, trailing behind mobile devices by Motorola, Google, and Infinix.
The data on actual phone usage provided by Casino Days, even though limited to the gaming parts of the population of South Asia, paints a different picture from global statistics on smartphone shipments by vendors.
Apple and Samsung have been sharing the worldwide lead for over a decade, while current regional leader Xiaomi secured their third position globally just a couple of years ago.
Striking Android Dominance among South Asian Real Money Gaming Communities
The shifted market share patterns of the world’s top smartphone brands in South Asia observed by the Casino Days research paper reveal a striking dominance of Android devices at the expense of iOS-powered phones.
On the global level, Android enjoys a comfortable lead with a sizable 68.79% share which grows to nearly 79% when we look at the whole continent of Asia. The data on South Asian real money gaming communities suggests that Android’s dominance grows even higher and is north of the 90% mark.
Among the major factors behind these figures, the authors of the study point to the relative affordability of and greater availability of Android devices in the region, especially when manufactured locally in countries like India and Vietnam.
“And, with influencers and tech reviews putting emphasis on Android devices, the choice of mobile phone brand and OS becomes easy; Android has a much wider range of products and caters to the Asian online casino market in ways that Apple can’t due to technical limitations,” the researchers add.
The far better integration achieved by Google Pay compared to its counterpart Apple Pay has also played a crucial role in shaping the existing smartphone market trends.
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