Maximum: No Need to Rush

Of all the films they had to choose this one to fit in Aa ante Amalapuram. Sigh!!Two corrupt encounter specialists, one trying to settle old scores and the other ambitious to get to the top are vying for maximum power to be wielded through their own hands in this cop film. As far as cop films go, this one has an interesting premise but that’s about that. Once the setup is done away with, there is little to look forward to except the denouement. 

The sworn enemies never face each other nor even try to make the other’s life difficult. With all the smugness it can muster, Kabeer Kaushik’s direction but still appears lackadaisical with deliberately slow pacing, painful pauses and shallow dialogue trying too hard but failing to make any sort of impact. The action never really kicks off and there is no pace or sharpness in the narrative. In fact the film does not even have to run for its 106 minute length to let the two kill each other. Real life incidents could have been the reason for this as the director tried to put in more transfers through ranks and mandatory political conspiracy towards the end. The 26/11 backdrop does not have any real shock value too. 

One of the positives the film offers though is the brilliant acting in a underwritten role by Nazeeruddin Shah. He would have done this film a world of good if some of the seething shown in the film was more towards his director for his inability to come up with interesting sequences. Sonu Sood appears earnest and works with whatever he got while Vinay Pathak goes through the motions. Neha Dhupia has that Hey- I’m- gonna- die- in- the- next- scene look, but she is passable and her sarees are a surprise atleast for me. No Sheesha moments certainly. 

This film had potential and it was frustrating to see it unfold in the way it did. Even with all the enthusiasm and class of the cast, the end product misses the mark by quite a distance.

Gangs of Wasseypur: Auteur at Work

We have no reason to believe the naiveté of small town or rural India with filmmakers intent on exposing their darker side. Soham Shah’s Babar a while ago did it for Uttar Pradesh and Ram Gopal Varma’ Rakta Charitra based on true events (another film in two parts coincidentally) takes place in Anantapur (Anand Pur in film) of Andhra Pradesh. Oh it’s not all peace and harmony in the hinterlands anymore. Kashyap goes a step ahead and does away with the legal aspects as there was really no Police in his Wassepur which was no land for the law and order, no place for the weak or uninhibited and no abode for the moral and upright so much so that the conspicuous absence of the common man is thoroughly justified for you may dread his fate. With gory being the way of everyday life; bigotry equated to manhood and altruistic motives, lust driven relationships of mere convenience, Wasseypur is the face of small town India’s Mafia. With the breakneck speed the auteur unfolds a saga of violence and vengeance, paying rich homages along the way to the masters of cinema and demands your attention.

It is most likely that you would miss a lot of information even after Piyush Mishra’s voice-over as there is more and more to consume with the characters coming into the film without any precedent. A total of 370 characters were written for the film as claimed by the makers and if you take a wild guess at the number of them alive at the end, you would be wrong. The narrative pits the bad guys against each other leaving the audiences wonder whom to root for in this ensemble of repulsive characters with only a quirky sense of humor for their aid.  In fact they are downright black and their occasional indulgence is what makes them look greyish.

The fight in the disguise of vengeance was more for gratification of the violent instinct and one-upmanship than for a real cause. The gore continues endless for the entire runtime of the film but it works on a whole banking on its perfect screenplay by Zeishan Quadri (co-written by Anurag, Sachin K Ladia and Akhilesh Jaiswal), Rajeev Ravi’s impassive camera which shows the things as they are without resorting to madcap grotesque angles, Sneha Khanwalkar’s impeccable soundtrack and Anurag Kashyap’s eye for detail and direction.

Each and every played their author-backed roles like their life depended on it and it is difficult to pick the best one of the lot. It is amazing to see them enact the roles without being consumed by the enthusiasm of being a part of an ambitious epic. The acerbic and brash dialogue soaked in liberal use of expletives and chaste local slang is again an endless source of delight, which shows the amount of work that has gone into writing this film.  The production design however is inconsistent appearing at times to be just an afterthought with all the changes in time and the men and women don’t age too well.

It is really difficult to pick the best part in the movie as there are a whole bunch of brilliant parts but when you look at the whole, their collective effect is a bit subdued with the narrative repeating itself occasionally. This is a film that warrants repeat viewing for devouring those little nuances and allusions if not for anything else. The grand finale only sets up for an intriguing second part and going by the brilliant trailer shown towards the end of the film, one can only wait in anticipation of a quick release.

Ferrari Ki Sawari : A Delightful Ride

The pleasure of a morning show is in watching a film without knowing much about it and being ready to be surprised and it gets doubled when you catch a movie like Ferrari Ki Sawari which is a delightful film about the dreams of the bourgeois and their travails in continuing to dream and achieve.

This is a positive film that banks on the inherent goodness in people with no negative characters except that of Paresh Rawal in a cameo which thank fully does not take much screen time. The comedy is situational with everyone facing situations that require them to act out of character and as such this is a screenwriter’s delight. The writing is the real hero here as there was never a dull moment in the narrative as it progressively puts the protagonists into engaging conflicts and resolves them with finesse only to let them face more. Even the sub plots are written into the film rather than around it and every pay off when it comes was satisfying. This is a film that should win the highest accolades for screenwriting.

The ensemble cast ensures that the acting is top notch all the way with Boman and the kid walking away with honors. Sharman Joshi plays the middle class head clerk with a smile perpetually etched on his face with conviction and the actress who played the cantankerous woman who promises a Ferrari to a local politician was also brilliant in her role.

It is a brave decision on the part of Vidhu Vinod Chopra to make this film, which does not have any female lead, and only an item song with Vidya Balan in a saree but Neeraj Vora’s script is so perfect that more than half the battles were won before they actually had to start shooting. One minor squabble I had with the film was that Boman acts drunk (or was it just me feeling so) through out the film when he actually only eats Moong-Phali watching television.

Rajesh Mapuskar works effectively and skillfully with what he has in hand and he never tried to dramatize nor exaggerate the situations than what was required. The music complements the upbeat mood of the story and the film ends on a high while making you smile, shed a tear or two, and root for the characters in general along the way. What else do you need to know to watch this film this weekend?

And no. Sachin Tendulkar does not debut on screen. 

Movie Review: Shanghai

Dibakar Banerjee just about manages to put a straight face till the end of the film and let his characters use only Hindi to maintain the anonymity of the city where the action in his latest film Shanghai takes place. Indeed, the director who is known for his meticulous detailing in his earlier works brings it to  forte delightfully all the way to its end in this brilliantly acted but ultimately simplistic film. 

Shanghai is quite simply the best acted film I have seen off late where every one of its ensemble cast has perfected their role and live dthem with utmost conviction. Hashmi and Deol breathe life into the roles they play and never put a step that is out of character with either the men they play or the place they come from. The supporting cast was even better in fact with Prosenjit’s majestic presence leading them. However Kalki falls short when compared to the others and Pitobhash should ensure that he doesn’t get typecast however brilliant in this role he might be.

The problem with the film is that it does not seem to have a great story that can stand tall on its detail and the director seems to be rather preoccupied with the acting, subtle nuances of the characters and the Bharat Nagar kitsch in general. He knows just what type of characters inhabit the place and what goes around it. Indeed his knowledge about the place seems so superior that what he chose to show on screen comes out as hugely underwhelming and I’m sure there was more to be found in the archives than what Shanghai had to offer.

Apart from convenient deaths of important players at crucial times, the writing never manages to create an intriguing conflict over the two hour span. The fact that the film was based on a book should have allowed the writers to establish a stronger narrative flow. They have done a great job at indianizing the story (so much so that if we were not told, we would not have guessed it to be an adaptation of a Greek Novel) and seemed to be content with it. 

Towards the end of the film, I was a bit unsatisfied as I walked out of the theatre, because I was never able to connect myself emotionally with all that was happening on screen. Also, all the characters have clear motivations and can be categorized completely as either black or white with little or no greys at all. There are no layers and probably none were written or intended. This is certainly not the best DB has to offer and we are not going to let him get away with this.