FITOOR: Oh, you (Hopeless) beauty! [2.5/5]

Apart from the jingoistic emotions and vigorous political projection attached to it, India has advanced another reason to not lose its possession over Kashmir. Bollywood loves to shake down this heavenly geographical part & pride of India to its maximum, sometimes by planting a great Shakespearean saga of love, power and betrayal under the grime of its atrocious past [Read: Vishal Bhardwaj’s HAIDER] or sometimes just by using its picturesque postcard locations as a canvas to paint someone’s cinematic dream. Abhishek Kapoor’s FITOOR fits the bill for the latter. Along with his man behind the lenses Anay Goswami, Abhishek stuns you with magnetic visuals capturing icy lakes, snow-clad wooden foot-over bridges, crimson-red mansions and some equally wooden-evenly frosty faces in and around too, in identical respect.

Official adaptation of Charles Dickens’ GREAT EXPECTATIONS, FITOOR is a tale of two star-crossed childhood lovers. They look nothing more than puppets in evil hands of fate dancing on someone else’s tune. Impoverished Noor [Aditya Roy Kapoor] finds a manipulative curator in Begum Hazrat [Tabu] and a susceptibly shifting lover in her daughter Firdaus [Katrina Kaif]. Their ways go apart to meet again but destined to demand more from their lives. The obsession fueled by the love and longing is ready to self-destruct all the dreams and hopes one is always lived for.

FITOOR is very much like the actors playing parts in it. It looks as ravishing, radiant and exquisite as Katrina Kaif on any given day. You can look breathlessly at both until they try to communicate with you. Ms Kaif’s weird diction and pronunciation force you to look out for a ‘never there’ remote control that could either fast-forward the scene or just mute her to make you switch to the ‘beauty-admiration’ mode again. Film also starts behaving like Ms Kaif, at times. It speaks, and a lot but expressions do get lost while being translated on screen. Guess what? Ms Kaif goes to London in this film too. Why? To get her admired accent. How many more times Bollywood will bless her with that added explanatory mention for her accent??

It is also on the likes of Aditya Roy Kapoor. He makes his presence felt on screen but does it at such a lifeless pace and with such a static force that you can never call it ‘a moving experience’. A self-destructive youth caught in the ill-fated love; haven’t we seen him before in such pitiable state? But the one where the film never ceases to hold the power to impress and ignite emotions on many levels is the performance of Tabu. This role earlier had the never-aging, ever-young Rekha in it but Tabu owns it now. From the sharp and shrewd lonesome soul to the hysterically remorseful aging beauty, she looked never so exposed. In other, the casting does have some surprising names from Lara Dutta and Aditi Rao Hyderi to ghazal singer Talat Aziz, mostly in favor of the film.

FITOOR doesn’t often satisfy you as a great drama or a gorgeous love-story but with the controlled direction, some amazing musical renditions by Amit Trivedi and a totally outstanding cinematography, it remains one of those unfortunate cinematic efforts that doesn’t get a full support from its lead pair and dies in a tough fight to survive its killing pace. [2.5/5] 

SHAMITABH: The rise and fall and rise of a flawed film!

From the two potent & powerful characters written scrupulously for screen to plenty of interesting ‘Bollywood’ references from real life, there’s a lot to feed your ‘filmy’ appetite in R Balki’s smartly conceived SHAMITABH. Had it also been crispier, less messy & a little modest in its melodramatic approach, it would have been much more than just a worthy mention in the list of movies made in Bollywood, on Bollywood! As of now, let’s just settle the score with ‘a good one-time watch’.

Balki is known to push the envelopes in terms of adopting uncommon ideas for the screen. In SHAMITABH, it is all about two different talents coming together for each other’s good but with their own share of egos and apprehensions making it a difficult ride to step on. A small-town mute with average looks, Danish [Dhanush] is your ‘not-so everyday’ cinema-crazy. As illustrated in the film, he even turns at ‘48 frames per second’ speed [camera technique used for a slow-motion effect]! On the other hand, it is Amitabh Sinha [the legend himself] – a long-struggling actor with rich baritone whose shattered dreams and destructive self-esteem have landed him in a deserted graveyard. Science & technology gives both a golden chance to lend each other a hand in satisfying their urge to become widely accepted & admired. But the question ruins the smooth walk, “Who’s better? Who’s bigger? The voice or the face?”!

SHAMITABH interestingly takes references from real life and weaves it with the screenplay to make it more intriguing. Danush playing a bus-conductor who makes it to the heights of being a superstar can easily be allied with his real life father-in-law and the megastar Rajnikanth’s inspiring life story. Likewise, Amitabh plays his namesake who doesn’t forget to mention that he once was rejected from everywhere for his very same tonal quality Danish needs and approves of.

Balki also doesn’t leave any stone unturned to make viewers spellbound with the elements of surprise at a consistent interval. In a scene, the ever-gorgeous Rekha gives away the best actor trophy to Dhanush and when Dhanush starts thanking everyone from the stage, of course in Amitabh Bachchan’s ever-mesmeric voice; Rekha’s perplexedly stunned expression could tell you all those said-unsaid romantic notions between the two without saying much. One of the most intelligently envisioned and executed cameos I would say!

Dhanush though looks a bit shaky and blatantly too confident for the role of an earnest aspirant. His mute act also works more on the entertaining side and not equally absorbing in showcasing emotional outrage within the character. And who doesn’t remember and rejoice Amitabh Bachchan’s drunken acts from his previous superhits?? You will find the legend here practicing more and more of such acts with the same amount of excellence and exactness. Akshara Haasan impresses as a confident go-getter girl who can give it back to you, no matter how big star you play on screen. She calls a spade a spade, Danush a ‘monkey’ for that matter and she means it. More power to women in Hindi cinema!  

SHAMITABH despite being entertaining in parts, having blessed with applause-worthy performances by the leads and a completely fresh & novel plot, puts your interest off after a while. Bachchan’s monologues gets into repetitive mode and some are really superfluous. A slack chopping hand on editing table ends up lengthening the duration of the film anywhere close to 2 hours 40 minutes. Even the melodramatic climax looks strained enough to recreate the one from Kamal Haasan starrer SADMA. At the end, SHAMITABH has Amitabh written all over, and this one name guarantees and deserves a good one-time watch at any given time! [3/5]