Entertainment
What is Madhuri Dixit doing in ‘Total Dhamaal’?
While the ‘boys’ in Indra Kumar’s rumbustious ode to rowdyism and toxic masculinity, “Total Dhamaal” are out to have fun, what is the mythical Madhuri Dixit doing with them? She is as out of place here as a riff of gospel music in a rave party.
So what gives?
Not much of a choice, really since her comeback in 2007 was a bit of damper. The Yash Raj film about an NRI returning to her roots and Indian classical dancing in “Aaja Nachle” was specially designed for her.
The film flopped and Madhuri hastily returned to her home in the US. But the itch to face the camera never leaves a movie star, unless she is Rajshri, Vyjanthimala or Suchitra Sen, the only three actresses I know who never looked back once they retired. For the rest, whether it was Mumtaz (and her disastrous comeback in Pahlaj Nihalani’s “Aandhiyan”) or Urmila Matondkar (her even more disastrous item number in last year’s “Black Mail”), they all want to return.
Jaya Bachchan and Sridevi made a spectacular comeback in “Silsila” and “English Vinglish”, respectively. Dimple Kapadia returned to the camera after years of marriage and motherhood in “Sagar”.
If only Madhuri Dixit were that lucky! After her failed attempt at a comeback in “Aaja Nachle” she again made a comeback in Abhishek Choubey’s “Dedh Ishqiya”. This time the critics were happy and the audience was tantalised as her character had shades of lesbianism in it.
However “Dedh Ishqiya” was not a blockbuster and it did not open the floodgates for Madhuri’s second innings. During the same year, Madhuri was seen in another female-hero avatar in “Gulabi Gang” which flopped resoundingly. No more was seen of Madhuri on screen for the next five years. During this period she was constantly in the news for various activities on television and the internet.
But as far her movie career is concerned Madhuri seems to have hit a permanent roadblock. In 2018 she did her first Marathi film, “Bucket List” which seemed inspired by Sridevi’s “English Vinglish” and Vidya Balan’s “Tumhari Sulu”. “Bucket List” was not the success it was meant to be.
To see her prance in a trance in “Total Dhamaal” to an imaginary comic rhythm is like watching Deepika Padukone play the lead in “Gully Boy”. It is not becoming for an actress of Madhuri’s dignity and grace to be hopping and skipping in the Big Boyz Burlesque Club.
Surely there are far better vehicles for an actress of Madhuri’s stature? Why must she be doing a role that seems to have been written for the Marathi actress Ashwini Kalsekar? Why can’t Bollywood come up with a role befitting her iconic status? She has Karan Johar’s “Kalank” coming up for consideration in April where she plays a dancer in a period film.
This could be the vehicle that Madhuri and her fans have been waiting for ever since she quit acting after her role as “Chandramukhi” in Devdas.
Otherwise if she insists on doing inane stuff like “Total Dhamaal” the song “Maar daala” may acquire an entirely unforeseen relevance.
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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