Justice for Jessica?

We Indians have a very short memory. I am too tempted to say short term memory loss. We are in the habit of forgetting most of the news that don’t concern us howsoever traumatic or disgusting it might be whether its the numerous scams knocking the top headlines of our newspapers and media channels every day or the hideous rapes and murders that now have become part and parlance of Delhi power politics. And precisely for this reason, we need more movies like “No one killed Jessica”.

‘No one killed Jessica’ is a story on the (in)famous Jessica Lal murder case that stormed our news channels for several years. She was shot dead just because she refused to serve a glass of drink after the pub closed. The murderer 'Manu' was acquitted and only after tremendous media and people pressure, the case was reopened and he was given a life-term sentence. (By the way, the story is still not fully over as the accused was out on bail some months back only to be put behind bars again when he was seeing enjoying himself in a pub and the media created a storm)

The movie per se is not very well directed with the first half excruciatingly slow and a bit confused as well. We are not sure what the director is more concerned about: Is it the status of hi-class societies, the rise of India post Pokhran, Kargil war or just the over-pitched performance of Rani. But the second half picks up and to some extent compensates for the first half. The direction is modestly above average and at some places the movie actually fails to arouse the sentiments of people. This is one movie that should have boiled our bloods but many places people are left laughing at the fillers (like the accused's mother repeating the same dialogue... mere monu ko kuchh nahin hona chahiye). The acting was also not that great with Vidya under acting and Rani over acting. The music is good with the track "dilli" matching the sentiments of the movie.

The place where movie scores is its underlying premise. Its a story worth telling less we forget the injustices meted out to people affected by this case. The long unbearable court proceedings. Imagine a court case that lasts 7 years and still “justice is denied” inspite of 300 witnesses including politicians, police people and social activists. Her own boyfriend who turns hostile midway into the case.

Its a story that should remind us that there are many more such “Jessicas”, “Mattoos”, “Ruchikas”, “Nainas” who have all gone through the same fate where power, politics, law and corruption are all above common man’s plight and his (in most cases 'her') fight for justice. It should once again question the insane and now obsolete laws written during 1800s at the time when "India" didn’t even exist.

As I said, the movie itself might not be very well made but still every Indian should watch the same.

Mirch – an assorted mix of 4 erotic tales

In the last few years, there is a growing trend within Bollywood to try out something different. These so-called experiments while were critically acclaimed have been usually a disappointment at the box office. There has been Road,movie, The great Indian Butterfly, Pankh, No Smoking etc. Though there have been notable exceptions of the likes of Peepli Live, LSD, Dev.D. What has worked with these exceptions is the heady cocktail of art and commercial cinema. The scripts have been brilliant supported by very sharp editing and direction. Needless to say the actors performed very well. Not sure of the box office success, but Mirch can be safely put in this second category.

Its an eclectic mix of 4 stories, totally unrelated but with a common theme of sex or if I must enhance the underlying theme is the empowerment of female sexuality. All the stories have the female lead committing adultery and very successfully and wittily coming out of it without the husband even realizing what hit him. The first two are set in the medieval period and the last two post interval set in modern times.

There is no connection between the stories though at some point, the director tries to bring in the narration in the form of 5th story to connect pieces together which according to me doesn’t work.
What makes “Mirch” work is obviously the “mirch” in the stories... They are exotic, they are spicy, they are raw and they are sensuous. But at no point they are obscene. There is nothing cheap or vulgar in it. In fact the way each story ends makes the movie an erotic comedy. I don’t recollect any other Bollywood movie attempting comedy in such a way (may be Dil Kabaddi but that failed to connect). There have been unrelated stories earlier like Darna Mana Hai, Dus Kahaniyan or more recently and comparable LSD but this is certainly above them. It actually tickles you.

To keep pace with this “mirch”, the lead female characters had to be equally spicy and who better than Konkona and Raima Sen to play the characters. They both are so exotic and moulded in their characters that they overshadow all others. Only Ila Arun, Boman Irani and Rajpal Yadav could compete with them in some way. Boman anyways can play all Indian nationalities with equal ease whether it was a Sardar in Munna Bhai or a typical Gujarati in this.

The other characters like Arunodoy Singh (common factor in first 3 stories and the narration), Sushant Singh, Shahana Goswamy and Shreyas Talpade are not much of a match for Konkona and Raima.

At the end, this is a typical urban multiplex or a home video movie. The box office figures should not be considered while judging the performance of such a movie. It’s an experiment and must be appreciated for the different genre it is creating in Indian cinema.

Band Baaja Baraat – Low on Budget; High on Entertainment

To make the title short B3 is a typical “Dilli” film be it its locales, dialogues, styling, roughness or should I say crudeness sometimes. The debutant director Maneesh Sharma has captured the inherent flavour of Delhi really well and that’s what keeps the movie going from the very first scene.

Its the story of Bittu Sharma and Shruti Kakkar – contrast personalities who come together to start their own business – the business of wedding planning which if I may quote the lead actor in the movie is “inflation” and “reception” proof (Recession but said in Haryanvi). The movie revolves around their growth in business as well as in their closeness. To develop a story, obviously they develop cracks in their relationships but all is well in the end.

The strong point of the movie is its spontaneity. The dialogues are sharp and the actors even sharper. Anushka matures with this movie as she is supposed to be the known face but the new comer Rannveer has also acted quite well. Rannveer is not going to be the typical hero material but might be able to carve a niche for himself considering the confidence he displays in his very first movie (not sure if he is the son / nephew / friend etc of anyone in the industry to have deserved such a good break).

The direction and the editing is slick. The movie seems to be made on a very small budget as there are no known actors not even side-kicks, no foreign locations to shoot for and no jazzy sets unless you discount some of the wedding arrangements which are quite “sho-sha” keeping pace with “Dilliness”.

The first half is better than the second half as it builds up the story. The second half does get a bit emotional and typical Bollywoodish but the overall package still works out fine. The music might not be great if you go with Yashraj expectations but couple of songs like Tarqueebein and Ainvayee Ainvayee will be on the charts for some weeks to go.

Overall its a lively movie and after a very long time, a decent movie from the Yash Raj studios.

CommonWealth Games ... Let it be a failure

CommonWealth Games – One of the most dreaded words in India these days… There is hardly a day when the front page of the newspapers are not screaming some new corruption sprouting up. By the way the scam figures has more number of zeros than an average Indian can count (What was it last… 36000 Crores.. phew can we even imagine this much wealth)

Don’t worry… My intention is not to write one more article comparing the cost of tissue papers, LCD TVs or treadmills. I think by this time, everyone knows how costly these things can be… I am more concerned by some of the recent statements / appeals in our national dailies by the likes of Sheila Dixit, Manmohan Singh or even Subroto Roy of Sahara Group. In this emotional appeal, all these esteemed individuals first acknowledge that there has been some amount of misappropriation of funds (“Some … should we replace some’s definition in dictionaries now”) and then appeals to our national sentiments not to wash dirty linen in public. Their point is that this continuous negative publicity of the games is embarrassing the nation and projects a wrong image of the nation. Wow…so finally we realize this… but where was this realization or embarrassment when crores and crores of money was carefully siphoned off.

They further add: We should carefully keep our mouth shut till the games get over and then all these scams will be probed and guilty parties will be brought to books. Till then all these guilty individuals can continue to do their tasks of ensuring a successful games (well we all know what further they can do in the meantime?).

Doesn’t this happen always? This national sentiment card works everytime… doesn’t it? So let me tell you what will happen? The games will get over (Hopefully by some God’s miracle they might even be a success). After that the same politicians and the Kalmadi parties will boast of the success and toast to the nation. We Indians will bask at the glory and these same individuals will become a national hero. Some might even get some national awards (Khel Ratna, Rajiv ratna, Bharat ratna which would be on top of the enough 'ratnas' they anyways accumulated on the run upto it). No questions asked…. No answers expected… the media will move onto the next corruption / scam… game over… Didn’t Peepli Live projected this in the best satire possible?

I strongly feel for once… let the Games be a flop… a Huge FLOP let it be a big embarrassment for the nation… may be then the real justice might happen… may be then some heads will be chopped off… may be next time when such a thing is attempted, people will question the initial budgets forecasted and the process of expensing them… may be then a proper committee will be formed with people who understand what it means…

Let it be a failure once and only then we might learn from it.

Once upon a time in Mumbai

Let me first appreciate the marketing efforts gone behind this movie. Absolutely spot – on ...Full marks to Balaji banner for that. The trailer, the hoardings, the continuous advertorials in BT penned by Shobha de. The best thing about the movie marketing was it not just created a buzz but a kind of curiosity that pulls the audience to theaters.

Having said that, once the hype is generated, its important the content of the movie is strong enough to live upto the expectation and create a ripple effect else it just becomes an opening weekend wonder (which in today’s times is quite common). And I believe this movie has been fairly successful in surpassing that.

The movie is definitely worth watching. While the pace of the movie is slow and could have been made slicker, what makes the movie click is the cinematography, style of the old eras, dialogues and most importantly Ajay Devgn’s acting. While all characters have performed well, this movie keeps going primarily because of Ajay. After a long gap where he built his expertise in comedy, Ajay is back with some intense performance. Its interesting to see him repeating his Company role with much more variety. Kangana looks the diva which she is supposed to play (Good to see her in a role where she is not a psycho or a suicidal maniac). She and Prachi Desai are beautiful and easily slip into their small roles. Emran and Randeep are average. As per the roles, Emraan and Ajay should have been equals but he is left totally overshadowed and just cant match his counterpart.

The dialogues are the soul of the movie which have been carefully written to the flavor of the era of mafias and smugglers (70-80s). Some of the one-liners are just too good. Ajay anyways has been expert in such “shayrana” dialogue delivery.

All the songs are hummable. I especially loved the song “Tum jo aaye Zindagi mein” on Kangana. Beautifully choreographed… (She resembles Mumtaz in the song). The background score is superp and apt in the context of the movie. Even when the movie ends, you are bound to come out with the background score on your mind… The item song (Remix of Monica… my Darling) on Gauhar will also be a Repeat Hit.

Though the movie is based on the days of smuggling and dons, somehow it focuses more on emotions hence loses out on the pace and jazziness especially in the first half. Overall… Milan Luthria has come up with a nice movie.

LSD - An experimental movie with 3 short stories with the 3 title ingredients...

Firstly, before I start, let me make this clear this is NOT a sleazy movie. Please don’t go by the name or the trailers or even the posters (though you would hardly find any). It’s a bit strange that the director has chosen such kind of promotion.

Moving on to the movie, these days, apart from the likes of Johars, Barjatyas, Chopras, Ghais, there is an emergence of a new breed of directors. The breeds who have created products like No Smoking, and Dev.D. Such directors are not scared of the outcomes or the Friday openings or the weekend figures. They just want to test their creativity and indirectly the maturity of the audiences. Love, Sex aur Dhokha (or LSD to be short) is one such movie which is taking this breed to a new extreme. Its very clear such experimental movies will be difficult to be digested by a wider audience. These are not just for urban multiplex audiences but within that also for a truly niche segment.

What makes it even more interesting is LSD comes from a director who has earlier given “Full-on” entertainers like “Khosla ka Ghosla” and “Oye lucky lucky oye”.

To come to the point, LSD is different (in fact really different). Whether its good or bad, interesting or boring, likable or dull depends on the audience and also the mood with which you watch the movie. The product might be a bit ahead of its times offering a glimpse of tomorrow’s cinema but considering the onslaught of mms scandals, sting operations these days, you might just say it’s on time.
The direction / treatment also explains why no established faces were taken. The director wanted the audiences to get a feel as if they are watching some scandalous video at Youtube within the close confinements of their homes. (In fact, this is one movie whose DVD version might work better)

Overall, you can give it a try (purely at your own risk). This movie will be remembered for the way it has been shot and the way its subject / characters have been handled. At the end, whether you like or dislike this movie, you certainly will carry home an opinion on it.

Though in the beginning, I mentioned its not sleazy but respect the "A" certificate of the movie and would suggest not to watch with your full family not because it has any obscenity or vulgarity but purely because of the treatment of the movie.

By the way, the movie also passes on a relevant message. In today’s times of omnipresent cameras (be it CCTV, spy pen, mobile or digitial), you are always being watched. SO be cautious next time.

Atithi...tum kab Jaoge?... Its different

This time, I got a chance to read other reviews before I wrote this blog… Interestingly, not many critics have liked the movie…
I believe in today’s times, its difficult to digest a movie which doesn’t have any crude language, no abusive words, no remix nos, no foreign locales or jazzy colorful sets, where the script doesn’t demand any item numbers or kissing scenes, where the actress doesn’t walk in exposing clothes or a bikini line just for the heck of it, where the humor is not forced into the dialogues by including some bad PJs or sick jokes or getting some third party "so-called" comedians into the movie.

Yes, "Atithi tum kab jaoge" is a movie which doesn’t have any of these. The movie is therefore, a bit dull, a bit boring, and also feels a bit lengthy. But still, in my opinion, the makers deserve credit for creating a cinema which was last attempted in 80s (or was it even earlier) when the likes of Farooq Sheikh, Amol Palekar, Deepti Naval, Utpal Dutt and so on existed.

Ok, to once again correct myself, the movie is no where compared to those masterpieces, be it the subtleties, the acting or the humor but still this movie is a worthy attempt that should not go unnoticed.

The movie is as simple as it can be… A couple (Ajay Devgn and Konkona) is living a fast difficult life in the ever congested (and I am not just talking of roads and traffic) Mumbai. An unsolicited guest (Paresh Rawal) arrives and disrupts their normal routine. He leaves behind a tale of chaos, confusion, and disruption, but also a bit of love, emotions, long-forgotten family values and traditions.

This simple story has somehow been extended into a 2+ hrs drama (with no twists and turns unless of course you consider the end which is definitely worth staying till then) and thats where the film fails to capture the attention of today's multiplex audiences.

The acting is good with 3 established actors. There is never a doubt on any of them. One special point to mention here is Ajay Devgn who has started keeping himself underexposed. He has learnt the art of restraining his act by giving more space to other characters in the movie. I noticed this first in his home production “All the best” where he allows Sanjay Dutt to steal the show. In this movie, he lets Paresh Rawal run the movie and aptly so.

There is not much to write about the music as there are hardly any songs.
Overall, the movie can be watched with your extended family for one of the lazy Sunday outings.