Break ke Baad

originally posted on www.passionforcinema.com

We saw in Vinnaithandi Varruvaya (VTV) and Imtiaz Ali’s films that at most of the times the obstacles in a relationship are very much internal as opposed to what we are led to believe by most of our mainstream cinema. We are fed by our films that the hurdles between two lovers and the happily-ever-after are either fate, misunderstanding (where both parties are cluelessly innocent), parents or a third person (forming a triangle). While if you look around you it is more often than not indecision, insecurities, volatile interest in the partner, ever reducing attention span, high running libido or sometimes just plain boredom. Break Ke Baad doesn’target these specifically but it does something very refreshing for a mainstream Hindi rom-coms, it internalizes all the struggles one faces in relationships.

Films like Blue Valentine( and Everyone Else, a german film which I highly recommend for those who have seen Blue Valentine)take this particular aspect to the most brutal/honest part of its spectrum, where one partner, to bare it in all its primitive simplicity, looses interest and respect for the other partner. Plain and simple. There seems to be no other reason to dump a husband and the father (who actually helps the mother by taking responsibility of a child who may not be his). Pardon my digression into Blue Valentine, but this is a film which is weighing on my consciousness right from the time I watched it. It cut really close to me, so close that I can’t even get myself to recount the last scenes of the movie. Which is why I will now immediately lose myself in a hopeful, may be a fantasy, world of Break ke Baad, in which all characters get a chance to wise-up and make up for their minor digressions.  They understand their misgivings in retrospect and act on them. They ask for forgiveness as easily as they forgive. It is a movie where our judgment may get better of us and bias ourselves against the movie. 

From whatever reviews I’ve read I can only conclude that Deepika’s character doesn’t earn any brownie points for her behavior which, if you take a step back and observe, is actually being very harsh on her.  It would be actually fairer if I talk on this with more context  and in a more organic way. 

We have a very simple and identifiable premise of a cribby stuck-in-banal-job guy dating a high-flyer ambitious I-wanna-live-my-life kinda a girl. If we look around at such scenarios in real life, and importantly at a juncture when the female makes a breakthrough and achieves somewhat higher ‘social-standing’, we know what is in store for that particular couple. Break ke Baad offers a take on this premise in a rather naïve yet honest way. It catches up with the couple before the female takes a (or rather acts on a plan to) high jump.  The roles are defined between them. The guy is supposed to be grounded and realistic one, while the female being an impulsive and instinctive wild girl. They both very well acknowledge their roles and seem to be relishing them. They infact also acknowledge the practical convenience of their roles and how without either one it will all collapse. The female brings in the excitement while the male sets the speed limits. One of the best scenes of the movie comes during this part when the female very cutely tells the guy that tomorrow if I waiver and take off, it is your responsibility to tether me down and lash two tight slaps to bring me back to ground. Now if you see, this guy is barely holding onto her, always on the edge thinking what if tomorrow she leaves me? He is plain insecure. The female here finally decides to move to another country for better opportunities. Amidst much gung-ho she eventually moves to Australia. After couple of weeks of phone chat, one day by accident another guy picks up the phone at the female’s end. Our guy panics and in a snap reaches her place in Australia un-announced. Pissed off by her boy-friends ridiculousness she there and then dumps him saying that its over. But our guy taken over by a bout of self-righteousness stemming from their earlier understanding of him being the ‘mature’ one, doesn’t budge from there in hope of once again bringing her down from her supposed flight of fancy and rekindling their ‘love and understanding’.  This is the interval point. I want to ask all those who hated Break ke baad, one question, isn’t this interesting? I mean isn’t this setup really interesting.

Danish Aslam (the director and writer) said in his interview, “I could relate to the first draft a lot more but after Renuka came on board and as the script evolved, I feel Aaliya is becoming a lot like Renuka. She even talks the way Renuka does!”

If you observe, the basic structure of the script is to put the guy in a righteous position and then make him win at the end by making the female realize that she had gone a self-centered trip. Reading Danish’s interview I was sure that if not for Renuka Kunzru (the co-writer with Danish Aslam), the movie would have felt very aloof from its female lead and would have become a rather skewed rom-com. Renuka lends credibility to the female which helps to get more important issues at fore.

Now coming to the latter half. If you even are getting somewhat closer to Aaliya’s character, you will notice that the characters in the 2^nd half are just imposing their own insecurities on her, in a very annoying self-righteous way.  She has absolutely no insecurities and is just doing what she wants in the moment. Her mother tries to throw her on a guilt trip by some solid emotional black-mailing (which all our mothers are expert at). Her boyfriend is not ready to accept a life without her. I’m not saying both don’t have a point, but they are just acting on some misguided, highly biased impulses. She is traumatized from both the sides. But she holds her own, does what she wants to do. Though she finally asks forgiveness from her mother, but till then her mother has also realized her own prejudiced stance and everybody wisens up a bit.

Till this point I have nothing but praises for the movie. But then the way the movie goes about solving the whole issue with her and her boyfriend is a bit been-there-done-that,  though no less truer. The true part of it is that there is no way to rekindle romance after such a break-up, unless the guy earns respect in the eyes of the female.  How to do that filmy style, make the hero a runaway successful chef! It is shown all too easy. Once the guy is on his feet, the female’s interest is piqued. And then we have no looking back. This completion arc is somewhat muddled (may be that is the point). I’ll have to watch the film once again to properly understand this arc, but instinctively it just felt a bit convenient and not worthy of the issues put forth in the initial setup.  I would be lying if I said the end was oh-so-predictable. The reason the end surprised me was because I was expecting something unusual (given the VTV hangover) but it ended being the usual. I felt sudden joy when the film decided to go the happily-ever after way after the misleading twist. Maybe I badly wanted the guy and the female to get together. 

Many of you would feel that you and me have watched a completely different film altogether. I myself am surprised at the mass hate this film generated when it released. Chuck the whole relationship and righteousness blah-blah, but how can one at least not enjoy the casual refreshing conversations in the movie. Some scenes, like the one in the terrace, the one under the table are so cutesy without being overly cheesy. I loved that. I could understand where the guy was coming from, and thanks to Renuka Kunzru I got sufficient insights into Aaliya to fall in love with the character despite her selfish whims.

Another aspect of such films is that there is no sense of direction in the second half, things just see-saw from one moment to the other. Love Aaj Kal and VTV had a very similar second half, when both the lovers are just not able to take a decision and stick to it till the end. Their stances keep on swaying till the end. In this aspect Break Ke Baad doesn’t really break new grounds. It takes the safer and cleaner way, though there are some confusing scenes around the Dhoop Ke Makaan song. I would have really liked some more friction. But that is just what I want. What the entire movie did for me was way more that what I had expected (After all how good can a Imran-Deepika movie be? Right?) And I was just very happy at the end of all of it to just sing praises and make everyone watch this film (which didn’t really happen).

A traditional verdict is as follows,

Ups:                  Refreshing dialogue, refreshing premise and refreshing casualness.

Downs:             (I had predicted Imraan. But no he stands his ground) Convenient wrap-up.

Cast:                Deepika Padukone’s best act till date. It is HER movie all the way, but still Imraan in his own innocuous way ably supports her.

Direction:         Danish Aslam brings the right amount of natural camaraderie between the leads and creates a multiplex palatable (KJO esque) setting minus the irksome broad strokes.

Share The Best Hindi Films of the Decade: Part-1

Originally posted on www.passionforcinema.com on December 31, 2009

To accommodate as many as possible, I couldn’t help but come up with different categories, because I wanted to have Kya Kool Hai Hum too somewhere in the list. To come up with films right from 2000 I have referred Wikipedia’s list of Bollywood films released each year. I hope I haven’t missed any. You would surely find some odd entries here and there based on my personal taste. But my decade’s best is mostly keeping both my likes and the general rating among cinephiles and general audience. No personal tweaks there.

Runner-ups

This category formed when I ran out of category names. The films mentioned in here are a mix of personal favorites and films which are exceptional in parts but don’t crack it as a whole.

(The films are ordered according to their year of release)

Monsoon Wedding
If for nothing else, just for the celebration dance on Aaja Nachle followed by Sukhwinder’s song of the decade, Kawa Kawa.

Saathiya
The end was a bummer, but till then it was disturbingly real.

Khakee
If this is an original screenplay, I’m impressed. And even if not, Amitabh Bacchan’s taking-a-nap-on-stage scene and the explosive monologue at the police station, makes this Rajkumar Santoshi’s best since his Sunny days.

D
I fell in love with Randeep Hooda after this film. His performance fit perfectly as a prequel to the epic Malik character in Company. Some dialogues and scenes are for the keeps. “Main dhande ke liye marne ko tayyar hoon… kya tu sirf muje maarne ke liye marne ko tayyar hai?”

My Brother Nikhil
I cry buckets each and every time I see this film. The main reason being I have a very Juhi Chawlaesque elder sister. Get it?

Gangster
It’s a solid drama. Superbly shot, with a killer soundtrack. Shiney Ahuja’s arrest scene is gut-wrenching. The twist at the end was superb too but then the Emraan Hashmi’s over the top abusive encounter with Kangana at the end killed it for me.

Yun Hota toh kya hota
I simply loved the film. When I saw the film for the first time I had no clue about the stories linked with 9/11. So the end was completely heart wrenching.

Pyaar ke side effects
It took quite a long for apna bollywood to come up with a pitch perfect crisp romantic comedy.

Namastey London
Extremely satisfying hindi pickchur with an underdog hero and a diva like heroine. Easily Akshay’s best during his stint as a superstar.

Cheeni Kum
A crackling first half precedes an over the top farce in the second half. Amitabh and Tabu hit off with each other in a delightful tête-à-tête throughout the film.

Life in a Metro
A very enjoyable urbane filmy hyperlinked narrative laced by a killer Pritam soundtrack. Irfan and Konkana pair up to deliver the most delightful scenes. And Sharman with his brooding honesty won my heart.

The Blue Umbrella
Only if I had watched it on a big screen, I would have promoted it to the higher categories. Pankaj Kapur picks up the pahaadi accent so amazingly that I couldn’t stop myself from smiling every time he said something.

Aamir
It’s fast and it’s gritty. Puts you into the character’s shoes and suffocates you in the bylanes of Mumbai. I found the end moments stretched beyond a point. All the pressure and the anxiety vanished. If the end had worked for me, Aamir would have been way up my list.

Oye Lucky Lucky Oye
Something was amiss in this film. There was some vague disconnect which I couldn’t point out. But anyways, the first 20 minutes by themselves deserve to be in the list.

Firaaq
It was a really well made film, but it only rose occasionally to shattering levels. Maybe it was supposed to be that way. I appreciated the film to great lengths but it didn’t really shake me or shatter me.

Little Zizzou
Oh! A delightful warm and fuzzy Parsi movie. I watched it twice and enjoyed it thoroughly.


Guilty Pleasures

These are not actually ‘good’ films but I have a good time with them even today.

Nayak: The real hero
The Sanskrit chant which plays every time the CM kicks ass, is what I refer to as epic goosebump inducing background score. Anil Kapoor is very convincing as the morally upright socially responsible citizen. Shankar’s hindi debut is high on so-bad-its-good quotient too.

Rehna hai tere dil mein
I used to worship this as a teenager but then have grown out of it, but still each and every scene brings out the old memories and a smile.

Zameen
This was the time when I was an Abhishek fan. I still remember coming home after a first day last show of Zameen and shouting excitedly to my Mom “Abhishek has got his first hit!” People cheered throughout the whole movie. But alas I was wrong, it didn’t manage great business except for some territories.

Kya Kool Hai Hum
This is an absolute hooter of a film. Raunchiness levels hit through the roofs in this film. It is filled with gross double meaning PJs, but till today it gives me the kicks.


Best of Kickass

These are the films which brought back the kickass grit in bollywood this decade. These films feature greyer characters along with plain badass villians. Its not always good vs bad, but even if it is that, these films grind the good to torturous levels thus amplifying the payoff at the end.

Kaante
Sanjay Gupta has style. Period.
And a special mention for Milap Zhaveri for those acidic, kickass dialogues. Some were translated but some were, “sawaal yeh nahi ki bar mein kitni daaru hai, sawaal yeh hai ki tu kitni pee sakta hai.” I hope this isn’t a translated one too!

Ek Hasina thi
Saif Ali Khan’s best role on par with Langda tyaagi. He has some villianish bone for sure. The soundtrack was never recorded. The title sequence song ‘chaha bhanwar’ was astoundingly atmospheric.

Gangajal
The interval scene, where the cops pour acid in eyes of the imprisoned, is one of my favorite scenes. The whole build up where Mukesh Tiwari gets into a verbal duel with the goon and then simmering with anger goes out and brings the acid from his car battery, is purely exhilarating. It gave me the chills.

Apaharan
This film has tremendous repeat value. Its badass and fast paced. Nana Patekar and Ajay Devgan deliver powerhouse performances. Yashpal Sharma as always provides a pitch perfect haraami performance, to give us a superb interval payoff.


The Specials

These films are in general small in budget, indie films. Their achievement may not be as major as the decade’s best but still they are special in their own way. They are the little gems close to my heart.

Waisa Bhi Hota Hai Part 2
This was one of the decade’s earlier new wave films, with a soundtrack more famous than the film itself. Nonetheless it was filled with tongue-in-cheek humor and an adman’s crazy imagination.

Socha Na Tha
What a whiff of fresh air! The casualness with which things went forward in the film was refreshing. Not many people saw this when it came out, but those who did couldn’t stop raving.

Home Delivery
I met Sujoy Ghosh at the Hangover premiere in Mumbai. I told him that unlike many I love his Home Delivery. He started laughing. He said ‘Don’t let others hear this, or they will laugh!” The film had a very distinct rhythm to its proceedings, and the Mahima Choudhary scenes are hilarious. And this may be the only movie which leads upto Diwali at the end.

1971
I missed it on a big screen and I regret it. And I can’t figure out why the producer’s didn’t promote it, because it was a perfect crowd pleaser along with being superbly detailed and acted.

Dil Dosti Etc.
Campus is sooper fun. Why don’t more movies explore the campus, in a more real way like Dil Dosti etc. Shreyas Talpade surprisingly pulled off a Bihari role effortlessly. And the women in the film were hot. Period.

Ek Chaalis ki Last Local
Wild and entertaining. It also has a superb repeat value. A voice over was never so much fun in a hindi pickchur.

Johnny Gaddar
Sriram Raghavan reverses the whodunit gloriously. Instead of the audience, the characters in the film are clueless about the killer, which made the film extremely fun to watch.

Manorama: Six feet under
Abhay Deol biking through a Yana-Gupta-pouring-water-on-her-body mirage. Can one setup the environment, the premise, the characters more deftly?

Upcoming categories

Invoking mass Hysteria
Memorable theatre going experiences
How can I forget these?
Decade’s Best

Aamir shows us the real Hirani

Originally posted on www.passionforcinema.com on December 28, 2009

Where is the honesty? Where is the spontaneity? 3 idiots reeked of manipulations and design to the core. It was so thoroughly designed to deliver punches in each and every scene that it seized to be spontaneous the moment it started. Nothing really wrong with it, as people are having a jolly good time seeing it and taking lessons from it. As long as you don’t see the designs and the manipulations Aal eez well! But if one digs a scratch deeper and tries to see the hands behind the film, each and every scene feels contrived, made just to press the audience’s buttons at every step. Not even a single scene passes without telling you how to feel. Not even a single scene plays out naturally giving us insight into a human being. Zero organic writing. And as I unmasked Hirani along the film, I could see him mouthing the Akshay Kumar’s password in Ajnabee ‘Everything is Planned’. Bad one! But couldn’t resist :-P

Then I asked myself, why Munnabhai films didn’t feel that way. They were also precisely designed, delivering punches at each and every step. What was it about those films that despite of it’s hard-core Hirani treatment, felt honest and spontaneous. Why did I sigh ‘Bas karo bhashan’ in 3 idiots and didn’t mind even a single advice in Munnabhai. Lage raho was actually super preachy, but I could still sense a very good heart at the heart of the films. Whose heart was it? After seeing 3 idiots I can vouch that it wasn’t Hirani’s. He surely is supremely witty, but the heart wasn’t his. My sister helped me with this. She said “Outside Munnabhai films also, we all have an image of Sanjay Dutt. An image of a guy with a heart of gold. How much ever bad he does, one always feels he is essentially a nice guy at heart.” Yea!! That was it!! Munnabhai was Sanjay Dutt, by heart and soul. His character was extension of his off-screen persona. And this worked brilliantly for the film. The honesty and spontaneity was injected in the Munnabhai films by apna Sanju baba and Circuit too to quite an extent. These guys were actually living the characters and thus the films felt ekdum dil se. No amount of designs could overshadow or overpower Munnabhai’s honesty when he tells Dr Suman “Main tumko love karta hai…. Kya karu..woh ho gaya na..”

Now juxtapose that with the ‘heart-of-gold’ Rancho. Aamir Khan makes a mess of it. Hirani calculates Rancho as an inquisitive, naïve, mischievous, maverick and has-figured-out-life kinda guy. But Mr. Hirani, where is his heart? Just see the design of Hirani, to create sympathy for Rancho. After establishing Rancho as a genius, a know-it-all guy, he then unravels his past to reveal that he is actually a servant’s son, a poor guy. And I don’t know whether this design worked for the viewers or no. For me Rancho always remained a theoretical character. I enjoyed his antics but never connected or warmed up to him. He was just a script manifestation never actually fleshing out in front of me. The film overshadows this deficit by its punch-filled scenes and dialogues not once relying on the audience connect with Rancho.

I am a die hard Aamir Khan fan. He must be putting great amount of efftorts to flesh out a character but not once before 3 idiots did I see that effort on screen. He unfailingly delivers effortless performances each and every time. Even when he stepped out of the car as ACP Rathod, he was ACP rathod. He was DJ in RDB. What the hell, I even loved him in Mangal Paandey. His heart is always in the character. Every performance comes fore as a natural performance, though he must be taking great amount of efforts off-screen. That is Aamir Khan. But here each and every twitch of his body feels like an effort to look a college going guy. Each and every expression of his feels like an effort to look inquisitive or childishly mischievous. Though the moment he starts talking we all forget those efforts and are with the film. That is the beauty of Hirani and Abhijat Joshi’s writing. Bombard viewers with witty dialogues, so they are not off the hook. But in retrospective 3 idiots doesn’t work. I’m pretty much sure it doesn’t have the Munnabhai repeat value, but will give it a try once before it leaves the theatres. Because, I actually didn’t mind the movie that much. 3 hours whizzed past without major concerns.

Coming back to Aamir Khan, whenever he goes in the preachy mode I was reminded of Nikumbh sir from Taare Zameen Par. Why? Rancho is not that experienced, has not undergone that great tribulations to actually realize what he preaches. He acts just as the film’s mouthpiece. His preaches never came out of that character, it came from the writer to the audience. And that is precisely why I sighed ‘Bas Karo yeh bhashan’. Compare that to Munnabhai. Despite of the preaching throughout, one never cringed or was offended. Be it overly simplistic or totally outlandish, the preachings came from an honest heart of Munna, and that is why we took the preachings lightly in our stride during the movie. All the advice came from Munnabhai’s day to day suffering and realizations.

Aamir, may be is not cut for Hirani world. He felt as a miscast. I feel great pain in saying that Rancho was a role which Aamir couldn’t carry off effortlessly. It was painful to watch him make stupid faces while running in the hospital with a Mithai ka dabba, or seeing him with his hands in the pocket trying to walk like an innocent first year guy. I guess Aamir should stay away from Hirani, and Hirani should stay away from audience for a while, because I’m sure the audience will grow tired of his format if he strikes any sooner than 2 years.

Paanch: Flash of Brilliance

Originally posted on www.passionforcinema.com on December 20, 2009

I choose the word Flash very carefully because Paanch at the end of the day is just a flash of Anurag Kashyap’s nascent brilliance. In fact, there are a slew of those flashes throughout the movie, but somehow they remain disjointed and don’t add up to form anything awesome. Though the film is restlessly volatile throughout, it doesn’t quite deliver that final punch in the gut, and instead chooses to deliver intelligent filmy thrills.

Paanch starts of as a crime tale told in interrogation flashbacks. The underground mood is setup very deftly in the flashbacks, which introduces us to the Paanch. They are a bunch of weed-smoking binge-drinking college going guys whom every one of us has met at some point of time in the college years; the guys with a care-a-damn exterior and with a fuck you attitude all over their body language. And such a group is always incomplete without a butt-of-the-jokes guy. Someone has to endure all the ridicule and is also expected to take it all in the right spirit. The fuck you guys need him to feed their already expanded egos. They exercise their power, their attitudes relentlessly on the guy. The problem with the fuck you guys is they are so used to putting up the I’m fearless and ruthless image that whenever that image is breached their defense mechanism sets in motion and hell breaks loose.

Luke (Kay Kay Menon) is that archetypical fuck you guy and Pondy (Vijay Maurya) is the butt-of-the-jokes guy. And Luke is not just another guy with an image problem. He is THE guy with an image problem. His defense mechanism drives him to sheer lunatic levels. He bullies the other guys to intimidating levels. And if anyone of them tries to oppose or counter bully him, violence grips Luke and he breaks loose. With him in the room the atmosphere is always volatile. When a certain caper goes wrong, things get ugly and in a blood boiling moment Luke murders a guy. This event triggers further mishaps and the five of them quickly spiral down into an abyss of guilt and helplessness.

So as you can see Paanch has a very potent premise and in fact a perfect setting for Anurag Kashyap to revel in with his kinda characters and dialogues. The film starts off choppily but slowly gathers momentum and rises occasionally to gut-wrenching levels. Half the credit here goes to Kay Kay’s mind-numbing performance. And again half the credit of that performance goes to Anurag Kashyap. The performance is monstrous. It chews the scenery as well as the people around. Every other character complements it in their own humble way. The two places where the bunch frequently hangs out; their house of course and a garage where they jam together; are lit and shot superbly to lend a very queasy claustrophobic feel to the proceedings.

Something horribly wrong happens with the last ½ an hour. *SPOILER START* Suddenly the movie shifts gear and enters into a Usual Suspects kinda mode. *SPOILER END* The story suddenly feels contrived (maybe it is supposed to) and the entire unsettling feeling, which had build up due to the larger part of the film, vanishes. This certain change of gears felt very jarring, clearly robbing the film of the grim and grit. *SPOILER START* The characters suddenly loose their identifiable vulnerabilities and become Joker like schemers. *SPOILER END*

The performance and character which stood out for me apart from Kay Kay was of Aditya Shrivastava. His character is essentially someone like us who, though is smack in the middle of the proceedings, is observing things around with a steadfast yet laidback presence. He too is completely baffled by Luke’s lunacy. And the moment, when he stands up against Luke towards the latter part of the movie, is purely exhilarating.

Main Khuda was very amateurly shot. It looked like a home video. I’m not saying it should have been shot with a huge stage and laser lights ala Rock On. The song is special. It deserved something better. The subway idea was good, but somehow I couldn’t feel that on-the-streets thrill. Maybe because of the unreal lighting used or the thanda sad bhaade ka crowd. The energy was missing. The last part of the song delivers the sorta punch I expected from the whole song. The part when Kay Kay and Aditya Shrivastava get teary eyed followed by Kay Kay and crowd crooning the song alternately ‘Saans lo. Dum bharo. Chillakar Sabse Kaho…Sar jhuka khuda hoon main. Aasmanon pe khada hoon main…Main Khudaaaa…’ That pumped me up big time. That’s how I thought the whole song should have been shot. Anyways the song entered my system again after all those years, and I’m desperate to download or even buy a CD if available.

Without Kay Kay’s performance, Paanch could have easily had a ‘Love sex Betrayal’ caption and passed of as an above average fare. But Luke compels me to rate the film much higher than the choppy screenplay and a flat out bad finale allows it to be. It is after all an Anurag Kashyap film. His mastery of individual scenes doesn’t transcend to the film as a whole. I had similar issues with Gulaal. His films somehow don’t have the fluidity or the poetry of events which Vishal Bharadwaj’s films have in abundance. They seem to be a collection of great scenes. Great scene-cut-great scene-cut and so on. Black Friday was no doubt an exception. But Paanch, Dev D and Gulaal, all of them show this same weakness. But anyways like all his films Paanch has Kashyap’s distinctive intensity driving things forward, and for that alone, it deserves a theatrical release and thus a much wider audience.

Taking Woodstock: Mother of all feel good movies

Originally posted on www.passionforcinema.com on December 11, 2009

Do you remember the dizziness that you experienced when suddenly your life was barraged by limitless happiness in just a matter of few days? The things which you never imagine would happen to you were actually happening along with the things you desperately wanted to happen. All the oft used phrases like ‘bhagwaan deta hai toh chappar phaadke’ or ‘Love makes my world will go round’ are literally applicable for that duration. The events take you by such a surprise that you don’t have even a moment to sit back and soak in the moment and tell yourself “Today, I’m happy!” You are not actually with yourself; you are actually, as often said, living the moment without any awareness of yourself. You are flowing with things happening around you. Now that, I would term as pure ECSTASY.

Woodstock festival, was indeed pure ecstacy for the hundreds of thousands of ‘hippies’ from around America. And Taking Woodstock captures this with so much heart and goodness, that it was overwhelming to see the event unfold and experience the era, without seeing a single stage performance at the Woodstock. That is what the film also does; it doesn’t even show a single live performance. The whole festival is seen from the eyes of Elliot Tiber, owner of the motel where many of the hippies crashed before and during the festival. His depressing mortgage-blues filled life suddenly transforms into a thrill ride of his life. And this is why the movie succeeds like it does. It focuses on this specific character and builds the whole event around it. Roger Ebert says, more the film is specific, more effective it is. I’m just imagining how less effective a multi POV narrative would be in this case. The film could easily have taken the route of narrating multiple stories with the common thread being the festival. But it doesn’t and that is why it is so damn thrilling along with being just enjoyable.

The things which we so often say about movies, like ‘this certain movie transported me to that era’ or ‘that certain film put me into the character shoes’, are not just applicable to this film, the film actually sets towering benchmarks for the above statements. I’m slowly realizing that this post is shaping as a big hyperbole. But I can confidently vouch that everything written is true, if you see it from my eyes ;)

Elliot Tiber is quite a dynamic person when it comes to his local town affairs. With help of his parents, he runs the motel. His mother is an uptight rude old lady, while his father is a kinda laid back, given-up-on-life old man. When Elliot reads in the paper that the Woodstock festival guys were driven away from Wallkill, New York, his enterprising mind immediately jumps on the idea of inviting the festival guys to hold their festival in his town White Lake, New York. After quite a few hurdles, the Woodstock Venture finally books Elliot’s entire Motel and an expansive farmland few miles from the motel to setup the festival. The sudden cash inflow rejuvenates Elliot and his parents. This is actually just the beginning of the journey of Elliot’s character.

I believe, true happiness is in motion. It is in being in motion, working towards something, creating something. It is in the time when you are not aware of yourself and completely lost in your activity. It is in the restlessness and anxiety of whether your target will be achieved or not. It is in the intoxication of the weed which you smoke to run away from those anxieties. It is in the work that you grudgingly do the next day, with a major hangover still in your head. It is in that break you take from work to just calm yourself down. It is in the time which zooms past you without you being aware of it. In short I believe happiness is in the time when you are busy creating your dream.

Then when you witness your dream, created in front of you, you feel the satisfaction and immense pride in yourself. When all the anxiety is done with; you are awake the whole night enjoying the achievement, and then you watch the early morning sky which changes with every minute towards the sunrise, with country music playing on the radio. That is bliss. That early morning is what everyone strives for. The aftermath is what all of us term as happiness, at that moment. But in retrospect, you won’t remember the early morning. You will always cherish the busy days. And then recalling those days, you’ll say to yourself, “I was so happy then!” So let me revise my opinion, true happiness is always felt in retrospective. The best retrospective being the immediate retrospective, that early morning.

And that is why when we see the closing frames of the movie, of the rag pickers cleaning the messed up farmland after the festival, we feel that early morning calm with the thrill in your immediate memories. It may not be the quintessential peak of the crescendo, but its more like a flat crescendo, you are at the top but your feet are still grounded.

Note: Taking Woodstock has an amazingly shot intoxication scene, when Elliot meets couple of hippies who give him some drug and invite him into their van (as above). It is one of the best I’ve seen in my limited movie watching. Till yesterday it was the Pulp fiction montage of Vincent shooting heroin in his veins intercut with a close up of Vincent driving his car. The slow infusion of blood in the syringe, his drugged eyes and the music made it helluva intoxicating for the viewer.

Bring Back the Bard puhleez!!!

Originally posted on www.passionforcinema.com on December 10, 2009

One question I would like to ask Vishal Bharadwaj. “What’s the big rush sirjee?”
Kaminey felt like such a rush job. It is in so much hurry that most of the scenes become a hodge-podge series of shots which desperately scream at you “Look I’m so snappy. Look I’m so trippy. Look I’m so smart and look I’m faster than you. Dare you blink!”
Of course it is one helluva ride, but the ride doesn’t give a damn whether you are with it or trying to cling onto any thread you see. The ride wants to any freakin how reach its destination within a given deadline.

*SPOILER ALERT START*

Consider the ending shots. The shootout is over. Charlie is hit. In the next shot we see a bullet being removed. Immediately cut to, twins CU – Guddu CU – Priyanka CU, cut to Charlie betting in the crowd with a board of Mikhail and Co, cut to Fofhie. THE END.
These above images just rush through as if its job is just to inform. “What’s the big rush sirjee?”

*SPOILER ALERT END*

Surprisingly, though my initial words seem harsh towards Kaminey, my immediate reaction was far from negative. I really liked the 2nd half, except few things at the end. But when I started discussing it with my sister, the haze of ‘why didn’t Kaminey crack it’ slowly started to clear and I became more confident about my problems with the film.

I rarely come across Bharadwaj Rangan’s reviews in my daily surfing, but for Kaminey, I made it a point to read his opinion. And he gets one insight dead right.
“Kaminey is best experienced as a minor movie with major, character-driven set pieces. But there are times you are left with the niggling feeling that Bhardwaj is attempting to inflate this minor material into a major movie. “
Kaminey tries to give weight to the otherwise mean, quirky and frivolous characters. Along with this it also tries to bring some gravitas into a Guy Ritchie-esque plot. It tries to evoke a sense of traumatic childhood, brother vs brother, kameena panti, right and wrong, ambitions and love. And this is exactly where it messes up. The dynamics between the brothers rest on a clichéd (I never thought I would use this word for Kaminey) and a contrived guilt laden flashback. The love angle works better as a plot propeller rather than evoking any emotions (ala True Romance. The love angle was so freakin intense). And what was the big deal about the kameeneys. Were they that Kameeney? Have we not seen more kameeneys in our bollywood. Take for example Sayaji Shinde from Shool. And now compare it with Bhope Bhau. Bhope bhau could be termed as more entertaining, but who would you term a proper Kameena. Bhope bhau acted more like a chindi politician playing chindi power games. Tashi was just going around with his business. Lele Lobo were the becharaas stuck in a situation. What was the most Kameena thing these guys did in the movie?

So, my point is, why make a big deal about the whole thing, why play the profoundly worded title song amidst this chaos, “Why so serious sirjee?” If the screenplay were treated a bit more farcically, a bit lighter handedly this would have become a far more potent film.

My final problem with the film would be the shaky and headache inducing cinematography + editing. Tassaduq Hussain and Meghna Sen do complete disservice to the screenplay. Now I know why Mr. Anurag Kashyap referred to Kaminey as a Guy Ritchie meets Paul Greengrass. And for Kaminey there shouldn’t have been any Greengrass influence. This ain’t a Bourne Ultimatum or a United 93. Then why shake the hell out of the viewer. Why all the fast cuts and the constant barraging of ‘cool’ looking out-of-focus shots. Please keep the camera still and let us soak in the crackling chemistry between the characters. “Sirjee, you don’t need these gimmicks to be cool. Your raapchik dialogues and the quasi edgy direction are enough sirjee!” The need for more cool and calm editing is accentuated by the presence of the non-spoonfeeding screenplay. The screenplay doesn’t divulge all details and keep many things hanging around trusting (sometimes over trusting) the audiences sensory, cerebral and emotional receptors. In such cases the character dynamics have to be soaked in by the viewers so as not to be hindered by the lack of details. And this needs still shots to maintain the overall clarity of the going ons.

Okay, enough of bitching. Actually all this bitching is more of a natural retaliation to the insurmountable praise it’s been receiving. Even my most trusted people like Raja Sen and Rajeev Masand couldn’t find a fault in the film. I respect them so much for their Bollywood reviews that I sometimes doubt my own reasoning. But to hell with the critiquing and lets delve into why Kaminey is a screamer in its own right.

The screenplay (barring the above mentioned issues) is indeed imaginative and many a times rib tickingly audacious. When characters run into each other there is always an inherent tension and they end up in a crackling showdown. Watch out for Mikhail vs Bhope bhau. Each character is supposedly the Dude in his vicinity and that results into a strong underlying energy throughout. And the actors make a feast out of it. Not a single one looking outta place. Shahid Kapoor delivers a visceral performance as Charlie and also oozes sincerirty as Guddu. Priyanka plays her bit with mast bindass honesty. Her feisty and earthy marathi rendering made me go weak down the knees. Enough has been said about the rest of the cast. I would just like to add that each one commands his screen space in presence of others and come up with jhakaas performances.

Kaminey surely takes hindi cinema a notch up with its narrative and plot structuring, but doesn’t reach in the vicinity of cinematic class. It mish-mashes genres rather unspectacularly. (IMO Mithya did that spectaculary) But anyways the energy, which is maintained on high levels throughout, ensure that not a dull moment is delivered. And finally it has upped my respect for Mr Tarantino ten fold.

Radio: An incomprehensible howler!!

Originally posted on www.passionforcinema.com on December 04, 2009

Shanaya (Shehnaaz Treasurywala) is in luv with Vivan (Himesh Baba). Her sister asks her “Kya dekha tumne usme?” Guffaws echoed in the theater. She replies, “He is a very simple guy and has a kinda vulnerability!” Bingo. Vulnerability is the word. I finally got word to describe Himesh Baba’s impenetrable expressions, which kept baffling me until then. Himesh Baba was vulnerable. He could be the first Indian actor to depict vulnerability so effortlessly. I knew Radio couldn’t be a simple love story with simple emotions, conflicts and resolutions. But still my snobbish pre-notions about bollywood were not ready to accept the complications of Radio. Snobs like me go ga-ga over subtle acting in European cinema, but when it comes to hindi cinema we are overpowered by our notions and biases and bash every performance. But here Himesh Baba delivers a slap in our face with the baap of all subtle performances. I challenge you to decipher even a single expression of his without getting confused. See, that is the point of the film, it is about confused characters. And that confusion transcends to the audience, who are literally put in the character’s shoes. Sooper!!!

If you thought Kaminey was fast paced, confusing and left threads hanging with help of its non spoon-feeding script, wait until you watch Radio. It is unbelievably confusing and fast paced, and you’ll have to up your ante to keep pace with the movie. “Are you watching closely?” Radio ensures that your grey cells work overtime and as a result delivers a cerebral experience. And it also tests your Class-quotient thoroughly. If you thought the relationships in Love Aaj Kal were too urban or too casual, Radio will give you a clear picture of where you stand on the urban relationships knowledge scale. I think Radio may just be out of your league.

Ishaan Trivedi’s screenplay is for the keeps. He takes cue from Tarantino on fractured narrative and use of music with visuals, and gives it a desi spin to deliver a choppy, disjointed and exhilarating romantic comedy. If Tarantino would have dabbled hands in the rom com genre, he would made something like Radio. It’s smart and senseless at the same time.

0Radio, in parts is so classy for hindi mainstream that people will be left scratching their head. Things which were never considered in hindi pickchur, things like compatibility, closure, defense mechanism, denial mode, fuck buddies and so on, are sprinkled so casually in the screenplay that I am in awe of the casualness of the movie in handling such complicated concepts and issues. Radio is indeed hip and cool. And is also a lesson in the progressive modern life fundas and lingo.

Technically Radio falls in the Romantic musical genre. Songs, which are all chartbusters, overpower the visuals so emphatically that you are lost in the beats of the songs and wonder what the hell are the visuals about. I’m telling you Radio is not an easy watch. It’s a difficult watch, very much like any festival film. It gets bizarre in places. It is inaccessible at places. himesh-reshammiya-in-radio-1I’m sure the voice over was added in the film as an afterthought, just to aid the lowest common denominator in the audience with the going ons. Without the voiceover, it is an incomprehensible and impenetrable character portrait of Himesh Baba and the two girls who are madly into him.

Note: Guys, please refrain from taking your girlfriend to the film. You will burn with envy when she will swoon for Himesh Baba.