Film Review: Kahaani (9 March 2012)

The ‘kahaani’ begins with a pregnant Vidya Bagchi – the lead protagonist played by Vidya Balan – landing at the Kolkata International Airport, at a time when the city is gearing up for the Durga Puja celebration. She goes to a police station to report her missing husband, who had come to Kolkata from London – that’s where the couple lives – for some office work. Vidya goes from the pillar to the post; but every potential clue to her husband’s whereabouts eludes her each time. She finds a good pal in Rana, a police sub inspector, played by the sober Parambrata Chatterjee, who realizes that a lady at a mature stage of her pregnancy in an unknown city needs support for her mission.

What follows is quite a spectacular show.

Vidya Balan once again stands out with her out of the world performance. Probably no one else could be even half as good as she is through the length of the film. It is pale predictable ritual then that all her co-stars are reduced to mere supporting actors. It is Vidya’s story and all the other characters revolve around her, and the director’s mastery is in the way he weaves them at the right time at the right place.

The story is genuine, storytelling is magnetic and the script is near flawless with only a few microscopic dots. The audience becomes a prisoner of the director’s scheme of things as he paints the landscape with uncanny surprises. Towards the end, the Durga immersion ceremony is perfectly blended with the film’s climax.

The movie leaves you spellbound when the real ‘kahaani’ unfolds. One of the best synchronized moments is the last scene when a Durga idol slowly sinks into the water, while Amitabh Bachchan renders his voice in the background.

This is exactly the kind of movie we need to rid our Hindi film industry of the curse of shameless remakes and senseless sequels.

I’m going with 4 out of 5 for Sujoy Ghosh’s outstanding thriller drama, Kahaani. Watch it if you love the art of cinema!

Film Review: The Dirty Picture (7 Dec 2011)

Watching The Dirty Picture tempts you to feel you have one of those x-rated films playing out in front of you. But there are some outstanding elements in the film that rescue it from the jaws of that stigma, which is why I’m going with 3 out of 5 for Milan Luthria’s on-screen portrayal of the life and times of Silk Smitha, the south Indian sex-idol from the 1980s.

Rajat Aroraa does not have to toil hard to write the story as it evolves itself into the next chapter. One of the things that however fails the movie is the poor story-telling, which desperately tries to capitalize on the superbly written dialogues. In fact The Dirty Picture can boast of the smartest and the wittiest dialogues that a Bollywood film has offered in a really long time. Vidya Balan, the leading lady and the actual ‘hero’ in the movie, delivers an outstandingly thumping performance. Emraan Hashmi’s character Abraham is no different from his other five films, and his acting style is more than just repetitive, even though he does proper justice to his role as a film director with ‘ethics’. Naseeruddin Shah’s role of a Tamil superstar does not demand any challenging performances, and Tusshar Kapoor’s character is much less important than that of a supporting actor.

The movie attempts to expose the hypocrisy in the so-called gentlemen’s society where men secretly soak in the fantasy of the female body, yet wear the mask of ignorance in the open. In the run up to this, Milan Luthria himself tries to cash in on Vidya Balan’s overly exposing stances!

By the time Silk – after repeatedly being physically exploited which she eventually uses to her professional advantage – discovers true love in Abraham, she has been reduced to a lost glory. She stares at the naked reality of her lust for fame and sky-high vanity in her popularity. In the end, she realizes overdose of nothing lasts forever.

Though Vidya Balan is not in her best shape, she would not disappoint you if all you wanted to see is her. Watch the film for two things: Vidya’s performance and the film’s powerful dialogues.

Film Review: ‘IN TIME’ (12 Oct 2011)

(12 Oct 2011)

What starts with a lot of unique promise falls apart as the story in the Justin Timberlake starrer ‘In Time’ unfolds. I’m going with 3.5 out of 5 for Andrew Niccol’s attempt at telling a story about a world where ‘time’ replaces ‘money’ as the currency. Here’s why.

The film is based on a time and place that sees people not ageing beyond their twenty fifth year, provided they buy themselves time. This is the part of the world where you’re known by how many years you’ve earned yourself after attaining the magical age of 25. The story reveals the inherent human desire to become immortal. Yet the truth is: not everybody can be immortal as you need to ‘earn’ immortality, which means few people would live for thousands of years at the cost of others’ lives. This is where Justin Timberlake, the main protagonist in the film, has a serious objection; more so after he helplessly witnesses his mother’s time out (death).

This is the kind of movie that does not put the actors to the performance-litmus-test. The story-telling is more or less smooth, but is flawed in certain areas. The not-so-well-written script does not do justice to the wonderful concept of the story. As you try to get engrossed, you know for sure that the project could have been handled in a more proficient manner.

While I give a big thumbs up for the story written by Andrew Niccol himself, and for some really intense sequences of events in the movie, I also wish the director was a little more creatively careful.

Go watch the movie in case what turns you on is an exciting story and not necessarily the on-screen translation of the same!

Bengali Movie Review: Baishe Srabon

 (29 Oct 2011)

Srijit Mukherji delivers a stunning masterpiece in the form of Baishe Srabon. What begins with a mysterious murder ends with the final one at the final moment of the film. I’m giving 4.5 out of 5 to this poetic thriller film.

Baise Srabon – which in Bengali means the twenty second day of the month of Srabon – lives through the promise that the story mounts early on. A series of street-killing of innocent people rocks Kolkata, with a seemingly clueless police force chewing their own thumbs. The commonness in the murders is chits of old Bengali poems that the killer leaves by the side of the dead bodies, apparently offering hard-nut clues to the motive and mode of the murders. But as is evident, the police department simply fails to read between the lines.

The overall fertile acting department in this film – even Raima Sen pulls off an above mediocre performance, something not known of her – gets an uppish boost with the entry of a sacked cop, Probir, played by the talented Prosenjit, who is brought in to the case after a string of persuading campaigns.

Gautam Ghosh brilliantly plays an eccentric poet who believes he has some divine connection with Rabindranath Tagore, and also laments the lack of recognition of his poetic talent by publishing houses. The obvious fallout of which is an ever-increasing vengeance in him to go on a killing spree.

The film is smartly studded with adult vocabulary; the timing and cleverness of the dialogue delivery shall make you laugh it out and still feel engrossed and engaged. The songs are not shot around the garden or the trees and only complement the flow of story-telling. All the protagonists in the film stand out with their performances; my favorites are Prosenjit and Gautam Ghosh.

The director stupendously succeeds in taking control of your mind and attention as the story unfolds in its unique fashion, offering you an almost unthinkable twist right after you thought the film was over.

This certainly is one of the films that Bengali cinema can ride on, in redeeming some of its lost pride. Watch it before someone reveals to you who the serial killer was!

Movie Review: RA.One

 (28 Oct 2011)

I watched RA.One in 3D today. It is easily one of the third-classest superhero films that any movie-lover would have seen in a long time! At the risk of being called a brainless emotional film critic, I’m giving 0.5 out of 5 to Anubhav Sinha and Shah Rukh Khan’s super-hyped project of the year, RA.One. Here’s why I don’t call it a mean rating!

The film starts off with the portrayal of an Indian family living overseas. Shah Rukh, a video game developer, is immensely in love with his wife – played by Kareena – and their only son, a young die-hard believer that it’s the villain that is always the cool dude, and not the hero. The father tries relentlessly to design a super-cool video game, in order to win his son’s heart. This is where the film starts; and this is where all the brain in the film ends.

What follows is a series of brainless poorly written sci-fi action sequences, spread over London and Mumbai. The film keeps wanting a desperate script that never really takes off. Even the much talked-about Rajinikanth cameo is so ill-timed and brilliantly under-executed, it has one asking why Rajini couldn’t deserve a more sensible treatment!

Looking at the quality of special effects, one wonders where all the money in the film was spent; was it for the film-making or for the promotional tactics?

Go out and watch the film only and only if you’ve never watched a superhero movie and if you’ve never felt more jobless than now. After all, one can’t be so dumb and brainless as the makers of this failed attempt expect us to be.

However, knowing the recent taste of our movie-goers, this critic won’t be surprised at all if this film becomes a huge box office grocer.