Manjhi

Rating : 6/10
Release Date : 21st August, 2015
Time : 120 minutes
Director: Ketan Mehta; Writers: Mahendar Jakhar, Ketan Mehta based on a true story; Music : Sandesh Shandilya
Starring : Nawazuddin Siddique, Radhika Apte, Gaurav Dwivedi, Tigmanshu Dhuliya, Prashant Narayannan, Pankaj Tripathi, Ashraf Ul Haque



It’s an incredible story.

A man, Nawaz, in one of the most impoverished districts of India, with no means at his disposal, deciding to create a path through a rocky mountain, to ensure the fate that befell his beloved wife (Radhika), doesn’t happen to anyone else. He takes 22 years to hammer his way through and create a path. Overcoming countless obstacles – weather, lack of support from his father or the villagers, corruption, bureaucracy, the upper caste folk – he persists and succeeds.

However, strangely, I didn’t find the story all that inspiring. There was a touch of madness to his resolve, he lost a lot in terms of his relationships (friends or children) and got made a fool by the scheming bureaucrats and the mukhiya of his village

Nawaz gives a great performance, is very believable and Radhika is very good for the brief while she is there but I couldn’t help feeling that there was nothing new in the film – casteism, politicians bleeding the country dry, impoverishment – we’ve seen it all and (sadly) are almost inured to it…The humour is good – earthy and spicy, the music is very good

This is a story that needed to be told but perhaps it would’ve been better off as a short film, documentary or even a chapter in our school curriculum – making it a feature film made it stretch a bit too far.

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All Is Well

Rating : 4/10
Release Date : 21st August, 2015
Time : 126 minutes
Director, Writer: Umesh Shukla; Music : Sanjoy Chowdhury
Starring : Abhishek Bachchan, Rishi Kapoor, Asin, Supriya Pathak, Mohd Zeeshan Ayyub



This is an ad for the book Secrets masquerading as a movie

It’s also silly, maudlin, reliant on slapstick and ludicrousness and has one of the worst soundtracks in recent memory

Abhishek returns home from Bangkok after ten years to find his dictatorial, stingy father, Rishi Kapoor, deep in debt to the local toughie, Zeeshan Ayub, and his mother, Supriya Pathak, suffering from Alzheimers. Salvation could lie in some jewelry, left in the safe-keeping of his mother’s brother. Or the sale of his Dad’s bakery – which the Dad is fundamentally against. Thus begins a ridiculous, hare-brained ‘adventure’, which also involves Asin (who reads Secrets everyday), and is about to go in for an arranged marriage, but wants to get married to Abhishek, only he is too grumpy / anti-marriage (having seen his parents loveless one) to do so…

Along the way, the father-son bicker and try to resolve their issues, the toughie’s gang stumble and fumble their way around, stupid caricatures of Punjabi families abound, while Asin gives lovelorn looks and sheds silent tears.

The performances are average – the only one who impresses is Zeeshan – and the music is downright terrible. The second half, towards the end, improves a bit and does make a few valid points but it’s lost in the midst of the overall silliness. This is definitely a film that is the complete anti-thesis of its title…

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Queen

Rating : 8/10
Release Date : 7th March, 2014
Time : 146 minutes
Director & Writer : Vikas Bahl; Music : Amit Trivedi
Starring : Kangana Ranaut, Rajkummar Rao, Yogendra Tiku, Chinmaya Agarawal, Tripta Lakhanpal, Lisa Haydon, Mish Boyko, Jeffrey Ho, Joesph Guitobh, Canade Lopez, Nayani Dixit, Sabeeka Imam



A very famous director once told me that one of the best ways to evaluate films is to look for moments in the movie…moments which touch you, you can relate to, which you remember long after the last reel has come to a halt. By that logic, I’m happy to announce that Queen is replete with such endearing moments and if you haven’t seen it in the cinema hall, would recommend you do so immediately.

Kangana, a denizen of Rajouri Garden, Delhi, is relentlessly wooed before being unceremoniously dumped by her fiancée, Rajkumar Rao, just a day before their wedding. Being brought up as typically daughters are in that locality, over-protected, always chaperoned, not really worldy-wise, always letting the men decide for them, she decides she wants to travel on her honeymoon, by herself. And so we get a very innocent, sweet, naïve, not very fluent in English, girl from Rajouri travel to Paris and Amsterdam and discover her true self in the process.

She encounters an eclectic mix of characters on this journey…Lisa Haydon, a half-Indian, gorgeous creature who lives, loves and laughs. Mish Boyko, an artist who paints to get rid of his frustration, Jeffrey Ho, a fun loving Japanese, away from home to escape from sad memories, Joseph Guitobh, who makes beautiful music and of course, Canadea Lopez, who insists Italian food must be eaten as it is, without being Indian-ized.

Memorable moments include Kangana going through a mental check list while getting her mehndi done, Rajkumar’s classic MCP behavior when it comes to her dress, desire to work, drink alcohol etc including his special brahmastara “Mummyji ko pata chal gaya to ?”, the father and son fascination with Lisa and her voluptuous twin assets, the grandmother’s sage advice regarding heartbreak, Kangana’s call to a fictitious boyfriend to try and ‘protect’ herself, her non-stop chatter (in Hindi) regardless of who is around her and overall, watching her gain confidence, without losing her own identity in the process.

After a long while, saw a Hindi film which got the nuances right. It is a over-simplified fable kind of story, but with its heart firmly in the right place. Accompanied by great music, excellent and (for a change) pithy dialogue and superb performances (new found respect for Kangana, who infuses life into this simple girl from Rajouri), this film really made you smile, several times, as the queen waltzes in our hearts

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