DILWALE: Guns and Roses, Jammed and Wilted! [2/5]

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Pretending is ridiculous. I really wonder how could someone disregard this golden rule of comedy and still call himself a master of the same. Rohit Shetty’s DILWALE suffers heavily from this exact syndrome where almost everyone involved with the project pretends to be someone else. Rohit acts [behind the camera, as director] as if he’s none less than Late Mukul Anand. Varun Dhawan makes faces as if he’s his dad’s favorite Govinda. Kajol and Shahrukh pretend comfortably to be in a love-story within a comedy within an action thriller [Now you know why Varun compares it with INCEPTION. Yeah, he did. You heard it right!]. The film itself lives in a make-believe world to be a HUM (1991) in plot-construction and DDLJ (1995) in promotional gimmicks. And pretending is ridiculous, I tell you. So, the only two who don’t fall in the pit are Pankaj Tripathi and Sanjay Mishra; one plays a character [where mosts play their aura] and the other does a spick and span imitation of Jeevan Saab.

DILWALE settles its base in Asian Paints sponsored Buenos Aires, Venice and Charleston parts of Goa. Kids here if not driving modified multihued cars, sure would find themselves in a clash for ‘tera laal mere laal se jyada laal kaise?’. Raj [Shahrukh Khan] with his younger brother Veer [Varun Dhawan] runs a Dilip Chhabria inspired garage-cum-design factory and stays mostly as calm as Aloknath in any Barjatya film. Well, mostly. Soon, you find him throwing professional punches on 10-12 goons in a Shahenshah-like working module at nights to ensure audiences that the guy definitely has a dark past behind. Plot gets thicken when Veer meets Ishita [Kriti Sanon] and Raj discovers that the girl is the younger sister of his ex-flame Meera [Kajol]. The star-crossed lovers have many secrets to unravel including murders, betrayals and mix-ups.

So what if it belongs to an average formula of 90’s; DILWALE had a decent story to start with until Rohit Shetty starts promoting it as a great story. Bringing the best on-screen couple together after so long was alone a big pull for the film but Rohit couldn’t hold himself from polluting the same breezy idea of romance with his colossal caring for flying cars, blasting cars, drifting cars, toppling cars and the very dry and dreary sense of slapstick comedy. Since when and why do the charm of Shahrukh and the flair of Kajol need substantial comic sub-tracks having Boman Irani, Johnny Lever, Varun Sharma and Mukesh Tiwari? The film’s high points are mostly with Kajol where she looked, acted and ruled the screen in same potion of intensity, integrity and beauty she’s been always admired for. DILWALE also fails to recreate the chemistry between Kajol and Shahrukh. Rohit does ensure that they both look their best on-screen but it all comes out as a lifeless still postcard and not as a lively moment to cherish.

On the performances, Shahrukh does exactly what he’s been doing in CHENNAI EXPRESS & HAPPY NEW YEAR. He charms the ladies, woos the fans, promotes brands and guarantees a ‘No risk’ cover for his producers [He himself is the one]. Varun Dhawan becomes pathetic, irritating and unbearable at times. Kriti is good, balanced and doesn’t disappoint. Varun Sharma is wasted, especially in a girlfriend-bashing monologue inspired by Kartik Aryan’s in PYAAR KA PUNCHNAMA. Kajol is the only redeemer here but in those tiresome and trivial 2 hr 34 min of total duration, trust me, even her spark begins to fade.

At last, Rohit Shetty’s DILWALE is another product that highlights the demand and supply rule in Bollywood. Why to waste time and money on hunt for a concrete story if you can easily make hefty lot of money by just arranging some hit formula-bricks, without even considering the right order it should be in. The film sees around 100 brand tie-ups on opening graphic-plates; I missed brands for pain-relief tablets there. Take a pill, before you try to chill in the theatre! [2/5]

BAJIRAO MASTANI: In the League of Potential Classics! [4/5]

It is not 1960. Films don’t get tagged as ‘classics’ these days anymore. They are either judged by the sound of money they made at the box-office or the number of award-logos they managed to put in the opening graphic-slides before the actual film starts. Watching a 197-min long MUGHAL-E-AZAM, today in theatres, can in fact destroy the very idea of a ‘classic’ for a regular guy who’s not much into cinema, and has come out only to please his grandparents. In times of the shorter, darker and more realistic indie films, Sanjay Leela Bhansali shows the guts to bless Indian screens with the legacy that believed in telling stories from the historical past in the most decorous manner. Classics are made like that only. And to the expectations, Bhansali doesn’t falter in any of the art-forms used while making this motion-picture. Magnum-opus BAJIRAO MASTANI is mesmeric in every frame, mind-blowing in every performance and miraculously magical in depicting Bhansali’s perfectly designed yet tortured world of love chained in pain, angst and grief.

The great Maratha Warrior Peshwa Bajirao [Ranveer Singh] is rising as an invincible threat to the Mughal Empire and its supporting forces. He’s a rare and unbeatable combination of power, passion and mental strength. In his mission to build ‘Akhand Bharat’, he lends his help to his neighboring state Bundelkhand and the victory brings him close to the daughter of its king Chhatrasal. Fearless Mastani [Deepika Padukone] being half-Rajput, half-Muslim girl, is now destined to face the extreme dislike, heavy rejections and sharp protests from everyone around Peshwa. If Bajirao’s first wife Kashibai [Priyanka Chopra] uses her silence against the injustice to her love and loyalty, the religious bodies declare it in full vocal. Bajirao may have the honor to never taste a defeat in any of the battles he appears in but this conflict between love, loyalty, religion and political establishments will definitely put him on the spot. Despite being a 3-century old political love-story, BAJIRAO MASTANI speaks on various grounds that are still much in fashion. In one of the few ‘in your face’ scenes, Mastani encounters one religion-protector with, “religions might have chosen one particular color dedicated to represent them. But the colors never go for any religion.” The social elimination of second marriage and love outside marriage gets thrashed heartlessly despite the Peshwa himself being in it.

With BAJIRAO MASTANI, Sanjay Leela Bhansali pays his homage to MUGHAL-E-AZAM and it shows upfront. The plot-development itself vouches for the same. You don’t need a hint to find a reference in Mohe Panghat Pe Nandlal for Shreya Ghoshal’s Mohe Rang Do Lal. Bhansali also doesn’t hesitate to repeat himself in Pinga where both the leading actresses join the stage to recreate Madhuri-Aishwarya’s sensational faceoff in DEVDAS. Albela Sajan from HUM DIL DE CHUKE SANAM also gets a harmonious mention. Film’s extremely melodic numbers establish Bhansali’s another talent to look for [He’s the sole composer for the film]. The canvas of the film is richly done in visual effects, especially the battle-sequences and it succeeds in creating the era, setting and sight the story finds its root in. The excellence in camerawork, art-design and costumes make every frame a reason to celebrate the spirit of cinema.

On the performances, BAJIRAO MASTANI wholly rests and rises on Ranveer Singh’s prolific shoulders. Who can think of a regular looking guy in BAND BAAJA BARAAT taking on one of the most powerful characters in Indian history? And with such finesse? He is graceful, glorious and gifted. Deepika is another talent who’s constantly making fresh impressions with one electrifying performance after other. Her Mastani is tremendously bold, brave and bright. As devoted wife with pastoral looks and approach, Priyanka Chopra is in her finest form. Though her character-graph doesn’t allow her to go overboard beyond a point, she excels in her restricted skin. Tanvi Azmi as the mother and Milind Soman in a supporting role manage to hold your attention and admiration.

At the end, BAJIRAO MASTANI is not a classic. Not now. May be after a decade but not yet. It is 2 hr 38 min long. Most of us will find it dragged. Most of us will consider it outdated. But it successfully holds the fort of being in the league of films that have plenty potential to be referred as a ‘classic’. This is how one should dream his films and film his dreams. The master is at his best! [4/5]

ANGRY INDIAN GODDESSES: Awe my Goddesses! [3/5]

As a cinema-lover largely all ears for the Hindi film Industry’s progressive inclinations for a change, there is always a sense of pride, surprise and triumph floating in my mind while watching celebrated filmmaker Pan Nalin’s bracing, pulsating and unforeseen new film ANGRY INDIAN GODDESSES. Films on male-bonding look so archaic, parched and superfluous now. ANGRY INDIAN GODDESSES marks the amazing arrival of Glocal [An amalgamated term for the new gene with Global & Local both the aspirations and establishments] Indian women in Bollywood. We all have been scrutinizing this cautious and careful movement for quite some time now, through the convinced characterizations and the confident and carefree performances by Deepika, Priyanka and Kangana in their deliberate choice of films but in only bits and pieces.

Here, in ANGRY INDIAN GODDESSES, it all looks like an out in the open protest against the pigeonhole portrayal of Indian female in films. Watching as many as seven sensibly scintillating leading ladies of ANGRY INDIAN GODDESSES smash every formula-fitting approach, erect a brand new attitude and establish a much-needed representation of the new, contemporary and modern breed of the other ‘equally-deserving’ half of the human race, is definitely one of the most satisfying moments Bollywood has seen this year, and in recent times. Had the writer-director been more alert, firm and uncompromising with the plot especially towards the invented end and more in-synced with the convincingly real performances of the ladies; the film would have gone beyond just being a trying path-breaker to a confirmed pacesetter.

The story brings women hailing from varied fields of life, stuck in their own crisis and now finding solace, support and strength in each other’s comradeship under one roof in Goa. Freida (Sarah Jane-Dias) is getting married. She has just left her latest photography assignment for a phony fairness brand. Mad (Anushka Manchanda) is trying her hard to impress the world with her kind of music. Suranjana (Sandhya Mridul) is strict and a street smart business-woman trapped in a land-dispute with an NGO runner, on same lines as the Singur land acquisition controversy. Pammi (Pavleen Gujral) is your typical rich housewife who has sold all her dreams to please the standard well-off family of her husband. Joanna (Amrit Maghera) is an aspiring actress forced to just wear cleavage-showing Cholis and call for help to ensure a tensed situation for Hero’s clap-generating entry in the name of acting. Then there are Lakshmi (Rajshree Deshpande) - the overtly fashionable maid and the simply-dressed yet strong-headed Nargis (Tannishtha Chatterjee)- an unexpected entry with lots of new revelations to take place.

The best from ANGRY INDIAN GODDESSES comes in form of lightening moments where the girls share their experiences with the world outside those walls, where they recall their young-age aspirations to rock and shock the world now resting somewhere beneath the new responsibilities tossed upon them. The natural-‘no camera around’-freely flowing performances make ANGRY INDIAN GODDESSES an amazing journey to watch. In one of the scenes, the girls are shown falling for a bare-chest handsome hunk unknowingly being watched and whistled at as the object of desire. This is not a regular sight in a Bollywood film. In another, the Sanskari housewife friend asks [spoiler alert] her lesbian friends, “woh toh theek hai, par tum log karte kaise ho?” ANGRY INDIAN GODDESSES is packed with such rare pleasures, but only till it doesn’t get up to hold the flag in opposition to all the possible discriminations, crimes and intolerances against women in one film. The film drastically gets derailed from being naturally good to melodramatically substandard. Rape, murder, gender discrimination; you name it you’ll have it tackled here in the most hurried and comfortable manner. Till the time you reach the crowd-pleasing climax, you only wish Pan Nalin had stopped it exactly where he decided to start it. You can’t settle for what you are fighting against.

On the whole, ANGRY INDIAN GODDESSES is amazingly real, relatable and something you don’t see very often on Indian screens. Out of these seven fiery, fearless and ferociously real leading ladies, each one will have her own share of approval and admiration in your heart. The film is not the reason to watch them; they are the reason to watch the film. [3/5]