Dev D (2009)

Once upon a time, Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay wrote a tale about an alcoholic lover, his married beloved, and a golden-hearted courtesan. This story was told onscreen several times, the last version by Sanjay Leela Bhansali surpassing the previous ones in its opulence and sophistication. And thus was it entrenched in public memory.

Until a strange fellow - with a familiarly handsome face and a famous surname but a career that couldn't have been less removed from either - decided to turn it upside down.

The discreet couplings and dazzling brocade were stripped away; the story relocated from Bengal to Punjab; the lover became a repulsive chauvinist and his woman a fiesty virago with occasional flashes of subservience towards him. The elegant courtesan was now a doyenne of phone sex with her past indiscretions recorded on MMS for the world to see. The victorias gave way to BMWs, and some coke 'n' hash was thrown in for good measure.

And thus did Abhay Deol recomission Devdas, steered by Anurag Kashyap through a tempest of sex, drugs and rock'n'roleplay.



The story begins with a brief look at childhood sweethearts Dev (Devender Singh Dhillon, or Dev D, played by Deol) and Paro aka Parminder (newcomer Mahi Gill) in Chandigarh. Even at that tender age, Paro shows she's no pushover, but a fiesty Punjabi kudi to the bone. She brings paranthas for Dev and then snaps at him when he asks her why she didn't bring pickle!

Cut to the present, with Dev and Paro now having a sexual relationship on the internet (as far as possible.) At his request, Paro even sends him a topless picture of herself. What's more, she takes it on film, and goes all the way to Delhi to have them developed. The only thing that annoys her about the gawking stares of the men at the studio is that they behave like they've never seen breasts. The only explanation for such boldness is that this is a woman who isn't merely aware of her sexuality, but revels in it - a far cry from Chattopadhyay's heroine.

When Dev comes back to Chandigarh for his brother's wedding, Paro is thrilled to see the man she wants to marry, but that does not stop him from having a fling with another young woman he meets at the wedding. However, when he hears that Paro is not a virgin, he calls her a slut - embodying the double standards employed by the average Indian male. (Kudos to Abhay and Anurag for unapologetically showing this fact!) They break up and Paro marries somebody else. Unable to handle this blow to his ego, Dev, who intermittently runs his father's factory but prefers to have run-ins with scotch instead, drinks himself senseless and is sent to Delhi to avoid embarrassing his family further.



Meanwhile, Delhi girl Lenny is now a high-class call girl who goes by the name of Chanda. We learn that she was abandoned by her parents at 17 after an MMS surfaces of her performing fellatio on her boyfriend, which leads to her father committing suicide. After spending some time in her grandmother's native village, she escapes to Delhi and is taken under the wing of a brothel owner after her former friends turn their backs on her. She slowly rebuilds her life with the help of Chunni the pimp, and even goes to school and college, moonlighting as a multilingual phone sex operator and servicing select clients. She meets Dev and slowly falls for him. In the meantime he tries to unsuccessfully get Paro to come back to him, but she turns him down. Unable to take it, he drinks to a point where he runs over a group of pedestrians in his BMW.

It seems like the end for Dev, but it is only the beginning. His dad dies fortituously at the time of the accident, and thus he gets a light sentence as it looks like he had been drunk out of grief; back in Delhi, through a series of providential escapes and support from a local mo-mo seller, he eventually reunites with Chanda and gets a chance to start over.


The movie drags a bit in the second half, and the events of the ending are a little too coincidental to be convincing, but the movie is a refreshingly different take on a classic love story. The complete reversal of the characters is much more believable and the film is visually arresting. The dark treatment with flashes of riotous colour makes for effective atmosphere and a special mention must be made of the camera movements in the drug scenes. There are plenty of laughs in places as well, which do not stick out as comic relief, but are actually part of the narrative.

Abhay Deol is the epitome of the male chauvinist pig and succeeds in evoking disgust, but little else. It is hard to feel sorry for his character, but given his penchant for such offbeat roles, he is definitely an actor to watch out for. As the concept of Dev D is his, he also deserves praise for coming up with a different twist on Devdas.

Mahi Gill shows plenty of spunk and talent as the fiesty Paro, and fellow debutant Kalki Koechlin is good as Lenny. While it remains to be seen whether there are takers for the latter's unusual looks, her linguistic skills will surely prove to be an asset.


Last but not the least, top props to Anurag Kashyap for breaking out of the mould for not being afraid to cast his leading man as a reviled cad and his female protagonists as strong characters who are more than just mere decorations, even when they are prostitutes. He does not hesitate to bring out the hypocrisy of the Indian patriarchal mindset, as shown by Dev D himself, who thinks nothing of having a sexual affair with another girl but calls Paro a slut when he hears that she might not be a virgin. It comes full circle when Chanda calls him out on his duplicity and brands him a slut, and he can't retaliate, for she is a prostitute - a person who is as publicly despised as she is secretly sought out.


A favourite scene of mine, in terms of content, is when Chanda tells Dev about her MMS scandal (which is inspired by a real-life MMS scandal in 2003, involving two fifteen-year-old students of DPS Delhi.) She tells him that though her name and face were never made public, everyone knew it was her and ridiculed her. There is only one way this was possible: everyone downloaded the MMS and saw it, including Lenny's own father. As she states in the film, "the whole country got off on that video, and I'M the slut." Here Anurag makes an excellent point about our society - it brands the participants of the act as sluts, but conveniently chooses to ignore that by having downloaded the MMS and watched it, it is just as guilty , dep perverted.

Their movies are not without it's flaws, but love them or hate them, in a world where most women characters continue to be merely decorative and 40-year-actors romp with 20-year-olds on-screen, directors like Kashyap are a breath of fresh air.

Luck By Chance (2009)

Maybe it's because I'm a filmmaker-in-waiting, or I was (uncharacteristically) PMSing, but either way, I found Zoya Akhtar's well-crafted directorial debut to be very moving. I especially liked the starting credits, where she takes us through the labourious processes that take place behind the facade of glitter and dancing lights that is our cinema. I took delight in every frame of that introduction,; it was like watching scenes from my native village.

The story revolves around Delhi boy Vikram (Farhan Akhtar) and Kanpur native Sona (Konkona Sen), both of whom are looking to make a break in the industry. Vikram lives with his aunt, while Sona lives in the same apartment block as Vikram's friends (one a wannabe director and the other a theatre actor), which paves the way for their friendship and eventually love. Vikram attends a film school while Sona does bit roles in films and TV shows, all the while waiting for producer Chaudary (Alyy Khan) to offer her a role he's been promising her for ages. As they await their breaks, they offer each other moral support.



Meanwhile Producer Romy Rolly (Rishi Kapoor) has just flagged off a new film which marks the debut of Nikki Walia (Isha Sharvani), the daughter of yesterday star Nina (Dimple Kapadia) and is being directed by Rolly's brother, failed actor-turned-director Ranjit. However, the leading man, superstar Zaffar Khan (Hrithik Roshan) pulls out of the film, and Rolly is forced to look for a new leading man. Enter Vikram, who steals everyone's hearts, especially that of the cantankerous Nina - and her daughter.

Eventually Sona discovers that the lead role Chaudary had been promising her for so long does not exist anymore. She is heartbroken, and Vikram lends her his support - for the last time. His newfound star status changes him and his dynamics everybody around him as the shooting progresses. These developments make up the rest of the film.

The characters are all in shades of grey - sweet to people in their faces and backstabbing them later. Yet, that is perhaps how it should be, for in a place where people can replaced at the slightest hint of trouble is a merciless one. For a newcomer, duality is probably the only way to stay close to the top. The stories of these people who are trapped in their own dreams are poignant.

This is best illustrated in the scene where Nikki goes to Vikram's bedroom (a favourite scene of mine for other reasons too, which I'll come to later.) She flirts with him outrageously, and he moves from shock to acceptance to control, knowing that turning down Nikki might jeopardize his big break, and turns the situation to his advantage almost involuntarily.


Konkona shines as usual as a starry-eyed small-town girl; her independence and perseverance is endearing. Also, she shares a surprisingly brilliant chemistry with Farhan; he, in turn, does a great job as Vikram, a man with charisma and cunning in equal doses. Same goes for Hrithik Roshan as Zaffar Khan - he succeeds in bringing these dualities to the fore in the limited screen time he has. Rishi Kapoor sparkles while Sanjay Kapoor makes a decent comeback. Juhi Chawla as Rolly's sweet but nagging wife is also very good. No wonder she's one of the few superstars who's still getting plum roles. Maybe there IS justice, after all.




One thing I liked very much about the film is that romances, live-in relationships, extra-marital affairs and exploitation are not portrayed openly; yet they make their presence felt in the movie thanks to Zoya's talent. The very first scene between Sona and Chaudhary has underlying tones of the casting couch, but portrayed solely through their eyes rather than visual and dialogue. The relationship between Vikram and Sona, including the live-in/sexual aspect, is depicted entirely through hugs, close physical proximity, sharing of feelings and other physically affectionate gestures that bring out their closeness beautifully. Konkona and Farhan, and Zoya deserve full credit for portraying this man-woman relationship as more than just a sexual union.

Another scene - and my favourite in the whole film - was the scene between Vikram and Nikki in the former's bedroom. The heavily curtained bedroom and the strategic amber lighting create a strange atmosphere, one that sets the tone for carnal indescretion and yet is somewhat claustrophobic. In this one scene, one can actually see Vikram's personality change; from being bemused at Nikki's childish sense of entitlement, to shock and helplessness at her openly flirtatious advances, to a growing awareness of her sensuality and finally realisation that yielding to her is the chance to get into the big league. For her part, Nikki drops her "mama's girl" mask to reveal a side that she keeps hidden even from her mother. Clearly, the spoiled little star kid is not that innocent; she knows the power of her sensuality and uses it successfully. Zoya does a good job of playing out an important shift of the film and its characters in this one room.


There are plenty of cameos - Aamir Khan, Shah Rukh Khan, Abhishek Bachchan, et al, and - surprise! - Anurag Kashyap as the hapless writer for Ranjit Rolly's film. In a scene that cleverly pokes fun at his "kind" of cinema, he passionately narrates a particularly Kafka-esque suicide attempt and is dismissively asked by Ranjit if he intends to send the film for a film festival instead!

The screenplay is fairly tight and the music moves the story along without being too distracting. There is sufficient depiction of the luxuried life of movie stars as well as the struggles of those who aspire to be them. This film must be watched at least once, if only for the fact that it acknowledges the invisible people behind the sets, costumes, lights etc. who disappear into the razzle-dazzle.

There is no solid ending. Instead, the story follows the ensuing rift between Sona and Vikram, the sudden catapult of Vikram into fame, the tabloid gossip that follows soon after, and tapers out into an ending where the characters are still a work in progress. It seems a little abrupt but perhaps it's for the best; after all, in the real world there are happy journeys, but no happy endings; and sometimes no ending at all.

quatrain #1

Been there, done that.
And what did I find?
No price is too fat
For an unchained mind.

2008: The Year of The Greenhorn

For a change, the barrage of new faces this year actually had some talent to back them up. Some of them, in no particular order:

Farhan Akhtar in Rock On: Not only was Abhishek Kapoor's directorial debut one of the most genuinely heartfelt attempts this year, he surprised all by casting the director of Dil Chahta Hai, who in turn surprised us with a display of pretty credible acting talent. His voice wasn't great, but since when was rock more about vocals than screaming guitars? (Aside, Rock On's music didn't really hit the mark - there was still the unmistakeable Bollywood touch in the lyrics and some of the music.) His next outing is in sis Zoya Akhtar's Luck By Chance, starring the amazing Konkona Sen, which sounds promising.

Oh, and he looks really good with his shirt off. Rawr.

(At this point, there's no way I can get his wife to chop off my hair instead of my head.)


Prachi Desai in Rock On: I am not a fan of soaps, especially Ms. Kkkapoor's saas-bahu cringe-inducers, so I had no idea she existed. Well, turns out she breathes life into her character as well. Good job, and hopefully good riddance to the mad, mad TV world.


Shahana Goswami in Rock On: Talk about Alpha Females - WHOA.This woman was by far the best actor in that film. Her character was force to reckon with - independent and intimidating but still vulnerable and hurting. Buenos.


Rajeev Khandelwal in Aamir - Another one of those gorgeous hunks who were previously lost to us because of ridiculous TV scripts. A smashing debut in what can safely be called one of the best films of the year that makes us want more.

(Aside, there was another yummy TV guy, Eijaz Ahmed, in Meerabai Not Out. I say YAY for the recession, reality shows and flop serial scripts if it means a steady supply of sexy boys to 70 mm.)



Folks to watch out for in 2009:

Deepika Padukone: Doe eyes, check. Dazzling smile, check. Dimples you can serve ice-cream in, and we're ready to go! This "Dreamy Girl" was the best thing in Om Shanti Om (SRK who?) but her act alongside Ranbir Kapoor in Bachna Ae Haseeno was a downer. Let's hope she does a Kung-Fu Panda in Chandni Chowk To China.

(EDIT: The movie released in the time-lag between the writing and the publishing, and as it turns out, Padukone is not the Dragon Warrior. She's still impossibly cute, though, so I'll be benevolent and leave her on this list.)


Abhay Deol: Three things.
a. Dimples.
b. He looks like his uncle, who was one of the best-looking men of his time (and Jaya Bachchan's dream man in Guddi, no less.)
c. He's a Deol who can ACT. Manorama Six Feet Under, and now the whimsical Oye Lucky, Lucky Oye! I just hope his upcoming drunken act in Dev D won't turn out to be a rip-off of his uncle's act famous "BASANTI!!!" act.

(Okay, Dharamji did put in a number of good performances, but that was pre-Sholay.)


Folks who made a comeback:

Shreyas Talpade in Welcome to Sajjanpur: After being relegated to a side role in Om Shanti Om, he made a splendid comeback with this film, sharing a sparkling chemistry with Amrita Rao and other co-stars.


Aamir Khan: First a smashing directorial debut that made us cry throughout, then a home production starring his nephew which became a surprise hit, then his scary eight-packs in Ghajini at age 42... Aamir Khan shows every time that he's the ambush expert, with a deadly arsenal of focus, acting skills and oodles of talent. And he's a pro at marketing, as well.


Arjun Rampal in Rock On: Okay, he isn't good enough yet, but this role worked for him. Anyway, he's still the hottest papa in Cine-maa (though Farhan is catching up) and his Freddie Mercury mustache and flowing hair was the je ne sais quoi that made us all want to be screaming groupies. Proving that sometimes, mooch nahin to kooch nahin.


Jimmy Shergill in A Wednesday: The usually mild-mannered Shergill scored with this one. I loved him in Yahaan, and this was another good performance. His "angry young man" act had us all rooting for more, especially in these terrorism-infested times.


Madhuri Dixit in Aaja Nachle: The script, though tailor-made for her, was a bit of a letdown, but the Dhak Dhak girl still has her weapons intact: the million-watt smile, astonishingly svelte figure and probably the best dancing skills of anyone in Hindi cinema.


Folks who let us down:

Kamal Hassan in Dasavatharam: Honestly, this was a film that could have been - the script was technically taut enough and fairly interesting, and the film was well-paced. What completely ruined it was Hassan's ridiculous move of playing not one, not two, but TEN roles in the film, including George "Dubya" Bush! It did nothing for the film; in fact, the excessive layers of prosthetic make-up completely robbed Hassan's face of all expression, which is a tragedy considering his phenomenal acting talent. I cry for every one of his performances because they're so moving - but this time I almost cried out of sheer despair. Really, Kamal sir, stop with the excessive narcissism and stop taking the ulaganayakan title so literally.


To end things on a positive note, here's a final YAY for:

Aging actors/ actresses getting good roles: Yay for elderly actors like Naseeruddin Shah, whose spine-chilling baritone and smooth, effortless acting made A Wednesday a pleasure to watch. They can kick their younger comrades' asses any day.

Yay for the ever-bubbly and ever-gorgeous Juhi Chawla, who has left her contemporaries behind and is still rocking with meaty roles every year. (I forgive her for that crappy Bhootnath.) You go girl!


Rocking scripts: FINALLY, Indian cinema has come of age. Rather, it's the audiences who have matured. They're now smart enough to know that the presence of a star cannot guarantee a good film.


This is only for Hindi films, which I am more familiar with - I'm sure a similar trend was observed in regional cinema as well. It's paving the way for more skilled jobs in the industry, more talent, and better quality entertainment.

The recession has made this winter especially biting, but spring seems to have arrived in the world of Indian Cinema.

Review: Welcome to Sajjanpur (2008)

When asked whether his latest film, set in a village, would find any takers, veteran filmmaker Shyam Benegal replied, "There are always takers for my films."

And he was bang on target!

 

Welcome to Sajjanpur is a delightful comedy set in the fictitious hamlet of Sajjanpur, somewhere in the UP-Bihar belt. The protagonist, Mahadev (Shreyas Talpade in his element) is one of the few people in the village who is educated, and thus makes a living writing letters on behalf of the village folk – though he dreams to be a best-selling novelist. The villagers are all fantastic characters, each one more engaging than the next: a snake charmer who manages to lose his father in the Kumbh Mela; a corrupt local politician who wants to be sarpanch; a pretty potter Kamala (Amrita Rao) who is Mahadev's childhood sweetheart; an ex-Army jawan and his widowed daughter-in-law who is fancied by the village compounder; Munnibhai the eunuch who also wants to be elected as the sarpanch; and a perpetually weepy Ila Arun who is worried about her educated daughter's marriage, because the fiesty girl is a maanglik (born under the influence of Mars) and therefore unlucky!

The film follows the daily lives of Mahadev and the villagers, all leading up to a surprising end. The characters are refreshingly innocent, even when they do things that would be considered wrong – a hallmark of masters like Benegal, whose characters always have shades of grey. Even as Mahadev fancies the much-married Kamala and jealously writes angry letters to her absentee husband accusing him of being neglectful, his intentions are not anything like those of the adulterous characters in Bollywood films like Race. It's mere puppy love, and therefore rather endearing.

(Benegal isn't shy of taking a stab at current issues either – one of the politicians forces Mahadev to write a letter accusing one of their Muslim residents of being an ISI agent. The poor man turns out to be innocent, of course, much to Mahadev's consternation.)

 

The dialogues, which are spoken in the Bhojpuri dialect peculiar to that region, are also hilarious without trying too hard. An example is where Mahadev tells Kamala to bring him her husband's reply as soon as it arrives, and follows it up with a statement that she can visit him even when there is no reply! While this might sound leery in English, the actual lines were very funny. Terrific stuff.

 

However, the film falters a bit towards the end – after going great guns right from frame one, it suddenly seems to lose its punch. While I wouldn't call it a bad ending, the shift in the scene is a bit to sudden to round out the whole story properly. It's hard to appreciate since there seems to be not even a slight indication of the forthcoming twist, which does not do justice to the narrative.

 

But, despite the ending, there is no mistaking Benegal's genius at work. The comedic storyline is nicely interspersed with moments of poignance and tragedy, without them seeming out of place. This is one thing I like in particular – the dialogues are not deliberately funny, but are made so by the performances and the story. This is pure classic comedy, pioneered by the likes of Hrishikesh Mukherjee, and Benegal deserves to be lauded by successfully doing it old-school and coming up trumps.

 

Also noteworthy is that despite being set in a village, this film is not catered to a foreign audience. Far too many movies romanticize "rural" India and make a mockery out of the culture in an attempt to impress foreign audiences who like the "quaint" quality of such films. In Welcome to Sajjanpur, it is very easy for us to identify with the characters even though we may not understand the language or may be unfamiliar with the village setting. There is a little bit of each of us inside the people of Sajjanpur and Benegal has tapped into that perfectly.

The actors have done a brilliant job, especially Talpade and Ravi Kishen as the eunuch. Also, the songs in the film (yes, there are a couple of songs!) are so nicely woven with the narrative that they only add to the story. The songs featured are mainly about Mahadev's love for Kamala, and the visualisation pays homage to classic Hindi cinema, when songs were all about emotions and adding to the story, rather than mindless item numbers featuring garish costumes and foreign locales. There's even a tribute to Martin Scorcese's Aviator (or more accurately, that great Hollywood dream merchant Howard Hughes) where Mahadev and Kamala are in a plane - dressed uncannily like Leonardo DiCaprio and Cate Blanchett, who played Hughes and Katharine Hepburn in the film!

 

Overall, this movie is a must-watch, and if you're a loyal fan of the genre of classy, clean comedies like Chashme Buddoor, Padosan and the like, then you'd better not miss it.

 

Friday Internet Premiere: Sanjayaa

Finally, my completed diploma film makes its online debut here.

Will be back to blogging in a few days!

Update: No Update

Yeah, I've been busy of late. I have a couple of movie reviews written down but they'll have to wait until I finish my OWN film first!

In the meantime, here's a gem from Danielle Corsetto's webcomic, Girls with Slingshots (not for under-18s, sorry.)

Ah, those zombies. Everybody knows one!

While Crossing The Road ...

Look left, right, and left again - NEVER look straight!




What scares me is that the professor could be me one day. Except it'd be some mysterious painting instead of a physics problem. Hehe.

Tip o' the Mad Hat to XKCD.

The Rocky Path To Morality

(Warning: May contain spoilers!)



“DOGVILLE” screamed the big black bold letters in our foyer. I wondered why it needed so much publicity. It was a Nicole Kidman film, after all – people would come to see it. Right?

Wrong.


Once we had all parked ourselves down on the jute chairs of our auditorium, we were literally begged by the presenter to “give the film a chance”. I wondered what was so strange about the film that we were expected to walk out. Now I’ve seen some strange films in my lifetime, so I figured that if I could sit through Buñuel and Dali’s Un Chien Andalou, I could sit through anything. The only film that I watched partially was Pasolini’s Oedipus Rex, because I found it unwatchable. I wondered if Dogville was something like that.

Wrong again.


Turns out, directror Las von Triers is pretty good at creating an atmosphere out of barely anything. As a co-founder of Dogme 95 – that class of filmmakers who refuse to make Hollywood-style big-budget productions with expensive special effects – Triers shot Dogville without any sets and bare minimum props. The film stands out right from frame one, in that it is shot on high-definition video and not film. The barren set with its markings designating the streets and homes is reminiscent of that little map that accompanies plays. The entire idea of bringing theatre on screen seems crazy but Von Triers pulls it off.





The story, told in nine chapters with a prologue, is about a beautiful fugitive, Grace (Kidman) who is on the run from gangsters. She arrives in the isolated village of Dogville, which has only 15 residents. The self-appointed leader of this village is Tom (Paul Bettany), an aspiring writer who is a habitual procrastinator as well. He hides Grace, and when the pursuing gangsters arrive, lie to them about her presence. The boss gives him a number to call if she shows up, and they leave.

Tom holds a meeting with the townspeople, and in return for their harbouring Grace, she agrees to work for them.







She spends time with blind old Jack McKay (who pretends he’s not blind), helps Chuck (Stellan Skarsgård) harvest apples, looks after Chuck’s and Vera’s children and teaches them, nurses the quadriplegic June, and helps the prim Ma Ginger (Lauren Bacall, who still retains “The Look” and that sexy voice) tend her gooseberry bushes. As the days pass, the townspeople begin to like her. A “missing” poster of Grace does not deter them much. She and Tom begin to fall in love, and until the night she joins them in the 4th of July celebrations, things seem to be looking up.

However, the cops arrive just as they’re sitting down to eat, and while Grace is hidden, they replace the “missing” poster with a “wanted for bank robbery” poster. Even though Grace is clearly innocent (she was with them at the time of the robberies) Tom decrees that she must work longer hours for less pay because they are now harbouring a wanted fugitive. Grace is not very happy but agrees.


Now the residents start to show their true colours – all the women are abusive to her and all the men, except Tom, make sexual advances towards her. Little Jason takes perverse pleasure in getting Grace to spank him by threatening her that he’d tell his mother that she did it even if she doesn’t. It goes downhill when Chuck returns home one night and rapes her. He continues to rape her while harvesting apples, and unfortunately they are seen. An angry Vera thinks she has seduced her husband, and takes revenge. She tells Grace that she will break two of the seven porcelain figurines that Grace purchased with her payment, and if she can live up to the Stoicism she taught Vera’s children, she’ll stop. Grace breaks down, and Vera smashes all the seven figurines in pure spite.

Grace decides to flee, and tries to do so with the help of Tom and Ben. Tom steals his father’s money and gives it to her. Ben takes her to town, but backs out when he sees the police. To protect her, he takes rape as payment. Exhausted, Grace falls asleep, and when she wakes up she finds that Ben has brought her back to Dogville. And since Tom cannot admit to stealing his father's money for risk of being expelled, Grace is branded the thief.

She is now bound with a heavy iron collar with a bell, much to her pain and humiliation. She is regularly raped by all the menfolk except Tom. Finally, Tom gets Grace to address the village at the local hall and she calmly recounts the horrors she has suffered at their hands. The villagers are in denial and decree that she must be sent away.


That night, Tom tries to make love to her, but Grace turns him down. Partly furious at the refusal and partly knowing that he is stooping to the same level as the other men, Tom decides to keep to his morals and calls the gangster who had given him the card. Then they lock Grace up in her house.




Soon, the gangsters arrive – and the film ends with an unexpected twist. Turns out, Grace is the daughter of the boss and has run away because she cannot stand his line of work. He tells her she is being arrogant by forgiving the village people their abusiveness thinking she is above all that. Grace mulls over her ordeal and realises this is true, and the townspeople finally earn her wrath. Her mobsters shoot and kill every one of them in cold blood. Grace exacts revenge from Vera in particular by instructing the mobsters to kill Vera’s children first as she watches, and stop if Vera can hold back her tears. Finally, Grace herself kills Tom, the last man standing. The only living thing left in the village is a dog, Moses.





The film is set in 1930s USA, and portrays the changing face of human morality in times of conflict. The minimalist sets and the absence of any walls, with only chalk-like words demarcating the environment, evokes a weird atmosphere that combines the surreal and the phantasmal. The absence of slick editing and the irregular transition of camera angles, not to mention the fact that it’s shot on video, also add to the theatrical effect. But the wonderful thing is that this seemingly bizarre treatment leaves plenty of room for the actors to emote, helped to a great extent by the barren, smoky atmosphere that seems foreboding even in the sunshine.

The most interesting are the characters, daring in their portraiture. The residents of Dogville, except for Tom, appear a little menacing right from the beginning, while Grace is a helpless do-gooder. They are guarded and cautious, and more polite than friendly; Grace appears to want to desperately uphold her moral values. As the film progresses, one watches with extreme discomfort as Grace goes from being a cherished outsider to being abused, raped and humiliated; as the residents’ feelings change from watchful mercy to sadistic dominance. At the very end, Grace is the one wielding the power, yet still tries to cling to her values – but when she remembers her ordeal and sees the villagers in all their shallow pretentiousness, she decides to let go. The law-abiding citizens of Dogville pay a heavy price for exploiting Grace in return for harbouring her; and the wealthy and once-mild-mannered young woman refuses to forgive them despite their poverty and has them butchered.

In the end, they’re all the same - individuals who, when cornered by the wrongdoing of others, are incapable of reaching the standards they set for themselves.

Back2Back Reviews: Om Shanti Om and Saawariya, Part 2

Whatever happened to Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s cinema, where every frame is one of breathtaking beauty? At first glance, it doesn’t seem so odd that Saawariya has neither the silk-and-brocade opulence of Devdas, nor the intense light and shadow of Black. But as the film progresses (all the while creaking at the joints) it starts to look as it everything has been washed out and replaced by dull blacks and greys. Splashes of colour here and there don’t help. The sets are beautiful, no doubt – but the colour palette of blacks and greys with a piping of blue and green, which can be beautiful otherwise, somehow fails to lend poetry to the film.

The set and the characters do not match at all, and it’s hard to appreciate a film when you cannot assign it a certain time frame. While that may be exactly what Bhansali intended, the tale of this nondescript town somewhere in India, whose cobbled bylanes, palatial homes and inhabitants are a curious hodge-podge of Victorian, Mughal and modern day suburbia, does not work. Even the time-period is divided between the 50s and the 21st century and some era in between. There is a street named after RK – obviously Raj Kapoor – and even the grey colour palette and costumes are reminiscent of Awaara and other RK hits.

(My biggest peeve with the film is the director trying to nail its association with Raj Kapoor with a mallet, but I’ll come to that later.)




The story is simple enough – boy comes to town and charms everyone, meets girl and falls in love, girl is engaged to someone else – and is narrated in flashback by a prostitute, Gulab (Rani Mukherjee.) But the protagonists, who are no more than puppets, fail to add anything to the already toy-like ambience. Ranbir Kapoor plays Raj, a wannabe singer who comes to this town and makes it his home; he wins the hearts of Gulab, the other prostitutes and his landlady (Zohra Sehgal) and gets a job singing at the local bar. There seems to be no convincing explanation for development of their interpersonal relationships except for Raj's winsome charm. Then Raj meets Sakina (Sonam Kapoor) and falls in love. Except that Sonam has already given her heart to the brooding, mysterious Imaan (Salman Khan, the only character in the film who seems to have a personality) and looks upon Raj as nothing but a friend. Ultimately, after a lot of cat-and-mouse, Imaan returns home, Sakina returns to him, and Raj goes back to his lonely life.


In addition to the jerky development of the relationships between the characters, the characters themselves are no fun to watch. Both Ranbir and Sonam seem merely two-dimensional. And here’s where I rant about the Raj Kapoor connection – why, why, why can’t Bhansali just stay off the fact that Ranbir Kapoor is a scion of India’s biggest acting dynasty? He’s winsome and talented enough, especially as a dancer, if only the director had just let him be. It’s hard to see Ranbir without comparing him to his father and grandfather, especially when his on-screen character is rather lifeless but tries hard to ape the on-screen Raj Kapoor in every way. His character’s name is Ranbir Raj (Raj Kapoor’s birth name), the street is named RK, he wears his grandfather’s signature bowler hat, his clothes are similar, there’s a scene with Sonam under an umbrella that’s reminiscent of Shree 420 … and as if that is not enough, there’s even a cringe-inducing scene where Ranbir screams his father Rishi Kapoor’s dialogue from Karz to the bar audience: “Tumne kabhi kisi se pyaar kiya?”

(And I would very much like to debate on whether Ranbir Kapoor’s towel-dropping scene was a nod to Mera Naam Joker where Simi Garewal’s character bares her derriere, but I think I’ll skip it.)



Sonam Kapoor as Sakina is suitably beautiful, but like Raj, lifeless. Her character’s bouncing back and forth from being all shy and blushing with Raj to being suddenly breathless and pining over Imaan is too unstable to induce any sympathy. Zohra Sehgal’s crisp theatre-trained British accent and acting experience seems to have gone waste, even though she makes a convincing Anglo-Indian. Rani Mukherjee as Gulab looks the part and shows some spark, but she seems to have been photoshopped in. Perhaps Bhansali was deliberately trying to paint the town chastely in black and white and the prostitutes in a riot of colours, but Gulab and her ilk do not seem to belong to the same time-period at all.

Salman Khan as Imaan, who rather resembles an exotic Tuareg tribesman, with his startling kohl-rimmed green eyes and bulky physique completely obscured in black, is the only one who perfectly matches the sets, melting in and out of the darkness. The rest of it – Mughal architecture, English-style bridge over the river, Kashmir-style canoes and the characters speaking in a modern mix of Hindi and English – just cannot seem to come together, though each element is individually beautiful.


But the film does have its moments. In some scenes, the dark ambience seems to work, and it definitely makes Sakina seem more luminous. Imaan's entry into Sakina's life one black night, as the brooding yet mesmerising stranger who speaks mostly in monosyllables, is well-done and goes with the dreamlike ambience of the town. Ranbir's towel-clad song, after his meeting Sakina for the first time, begins with him standing at the window with towel open and bare to the world, with almost white sunlight streaming in. This short scene is the only one in the entire film that occurs in the morning, and perhaps for that reason alone, seems so alive.

The soundtrack of this film is not really outstanding, but the title track Saawariya and Masha Allah are noteworthy.

The panoramic, dreamlike view of the town, especially in the opening scene and from the clock-tower, with a steam engine chugging away over a bridge, is reminiscent of the land of the Spirits in Hayao Miyazaki’s Spirited Away. Salman Khan said about the film in an interview that if one were to make an animated film, it wouldn’t be as beautiful. Ironically, this particular scene IS animated!

In the end, it’s just a tediously told film and not even as visually gorgeous as Bhansali’s earlier films. Even Black, which was mostly shadow, was spectacular both visually and in terms of acting. Once again, this debacle proves that a film needs genius, not genes, to make it work.