Friday, May 07, 2004
Charas
An Indian cop from London is sent to India to look for a missing British biologist, who has vanished somewhere in the mountains.
Dev Anand (Jimmy Shergill) comes to India incognito—though everyone knows of his mission—runs into a vagabond guide Ashraf (Uday Chopra) and goes up to the mountains. Here, a mysterious, blonde-haired drug don called Policeman (Irrfan) calls the shots.
On the way, they run into an assortment of strange characters like a hitch-hiking schoolteacher Naina (Hrishtaa Bhatt), an ice-cream slurping junkie (Namrata Shirodkar), drug carriers and a cute kid doling out apples.
After getting the protagonists to this pretty Shangrila-like place, writer-director Tigmannshu Dhulia loses his way. The film goes in every which direction, trying to pack in everything – male-bonding, Hindu-Muslim friendship, Italian Mafia, police-crime nexus, political machinations, Afghan warlords, romance, mysticism… the works.
The point of view changes abruptly from the search for the biologist to Ashraf’s past and his angst at being dismissed as a ‘gaddar’ due to his religion.
Dev is accused of being a Pakistani spy (why?), Afghan militants land up at Policeman’s hideout to wreak havoc and the junkie turns out to be a journalist who steals Dev’s camera and gets her expose on the drug Mafia – a half-baked job which, nevertheless, sends panic down the drug route. Now, everyone has to congregate at Policeman’s ‘adda’ for a hasty climax.
Watching Charas you get the strange feeling that lot has happened, but nothing has really moved. You are still none the wiser about the characters – who, for instance is, Naina? How did Policeman set up such an intricate worldwide network in so little time, when he never seems to step out of his forest den? Do journalists usually get scoops by going to bed with strangers?
Jimmy Shergill and Uday Chopra are earnest, but the film gives them no scope for performance. Irrfan is good in his ‘flashback’ portion, as an international drug don with tentacles everywhere, he looks too ineffectual.
In his “Fiction based on Actual Facts” Dhulia may have tried to pack in information like a magazine article packed with snippets and quotes – in a film this approach does not work. Charas remains at the level of a good attempt and botched execution.
Dev Anand (Jimmy Shergill) comes to India incognito—though everyone knows of his mission—runs into a vagabond guide Ashraf (Uday Chopra) and goes up to the mountains. Here, a mysterious, blonde-haired drug don called Policeman (Irrfan) calls the shots.
On the way, they run into an assortment of strange characters like a hitch-hiking schoolteacher Naina (Hrishtaa Bhatt), an ice-cream slurping junkie (Namrata Shirodkar), drug carriers and a cute kid doling out apples.
After getting the protagonists to this pretty Shangrila-like place, writer-director Tigmannshu Dhulia loses his way. The film goes in every which direction, trying to pack in everything – male-bonding, Hindu-Muslim friendship, Italian Mafia, police-crime nexus, political machinations, Afghan warlords, romance, mysticism… the works.
The point of view changes abruptly from the search for the biologist to Ashraf’s past and his angst at being dismissed as a ‘gaddar’ due to his religion.
Dev is accused of being a Pakistani spy (why?), Afghan militants land up at Policeman’s hideout to wreak havoc and the junkie turns out to be a journalist who steals Dev’s camera and gets her expose on the drug Mafia – a half-baked job which, nevertheless, sends panic down the drug route. Now, everyone has to congregate at Policeman’s ‘adda’ for a hasty climax.
Watching Charas you get the strange feeling that lot has happened, but nothing has really moved. You are still none the wiser about the characters – who, for instance is, Naina? How did Policeman set up such an intricate worldwide network in so little time, when he never seems to step out of his forest den? Do journalists usually get scoops by going to bed with strangers?
Jimmy Shergill and Uday Chopra are earnest, but the film gives them no scope for performance. Irrfan is good in his ‘flashback’ portion, as an international drug don with tentacles everywhere, he looks too ineffectual.
In his “Fiction based on Actual Facts” Dhulia may have tried to pack in information like a magazine article packed with snippets and quotes – in a film this approach does not work. Charas remains at the level of a good attempt and botched execution.
Labels: Cinemaah
Sheen
Most mainstream films have used the ‘thrill’ element of the Kashmir terrorism issue, and glossed over the human rights aspect. So Ashok Pandit must be lauded for taking up the tragedy of the Kashmiri Pandits, forced to leave their homes and live in subhuman refugee camps.
However, for one who is close to the cause, and a spokesperson for Kashmiri Pandits, the director has made a very superficial film, at the centre of which is a wishy-washy love story.
Bursts of rhetoric and a few scenes of violence don’t bring the audience any closer to the problems of the victims. To make it worse, Pandit has included the usual song-and-dance numbers, which don’t add any commercial prospects to the film, but take away from the gravity of the issue.
Sheen (Sheen), daughter of schoolteacher Pandit Amarnath (Raj Babbar) is in love with Mannu (Tarun Arora) and waiting to get married, when terrorists strike and their lives are destroyed. When Sheen’s younger brother is killed, the family leaves for a refugee camp, where they are treated callously.
Mannu is kidnapped by the militant leader Shaukat (Anup Soni), who used to be his best friend. Strange that Shaukat kills or rapes everyone in sight, but stands quietly and listens to lectures delivered by Sheen and Mannu. For no apparent reason, he also leaves Mannu alive, for a reunion with Sheen.
At the camp, Sheen suddenly becomes a ‘leader’ and her father is chosen to go to Geneva to address a seminar of displaced people and bring the plight of the Kashmiri people to a global platform.
All that is fine, but what is one to make of a scene where a group of human rights activists decide that the Pandits are safe by standing at one spot and talking to one man? Or the complete avoidance of the role of the army in Kashmir? Or the terrible, intended ‘feel good’ scene in which Shaukat’s sister is raped by his own cohorts.
The characters speak in long theatrical monologues and the performances are uniformly bad. The music is mediocre the choreography terrible.
From Ashok Pandit, who has first hand experience of the issue, one expected a serious, no holds barred expose, not just another commercial film. This was he fails both ways—he is not able to make the audience empathize with the victims (the leading lady’s make-up, jewellery and wardrobe is in place even in a refugee camp!), nor is he able to entertain.
However, for one who is close to the cause, and a spokesperson for Kashmiri Pandits, the director has made a very superficial film, at the centre of which is a wishy-washy love story.
Bursts of rhetoric and a few scenes of violence don’t bring the audience any closer to the problems of the victims. To make it worse, Pandit has included the usual song-and-dance numbers, which don’t add any commercial prospects to the film, but take away from the gravity of the issue.
Sheen (Sheen), daughter of schoolteacher Pandit Amarnath (Raj Babbar) is in love with Mannu (Tarun Arora) and waiting to get married, when terrorists strike and their lives are destroyed. When Sheen’s younger brother is killed, the family leaves for a refugee camp, where they are treated callously.
Mannu is kidnapped by the militant leader Shaukat (Anup Soni), who used to be his best friend. Strange that Shaukat kills or rapes everyone in sight, but stands quietly and listens to lectures delivered by Sheen and Mannu. For no apparent reason, he also leaves Mannu alive, for a reunion with Sheen.
At the camp, Sheen suddenly becomes a ‘leader’ and her father is chosen to go to Geneva to address a seminar of displaced people and bring the plight of the Kashmiri people to a global platform.
All that is fine, but what is one to make of a scene where a group of human rights activists decide that the Pandits are safe by standing at one spot and talking to one man? Or the complete avoidance of the role of the army in Kashmir? Or the terrible, intended ‘feel good’ scene in which Shaukat’s sister is raped by his own cohorts.
The characters speak in long theatrical monologues and the performances are uniformly bad. The music is mediocre the choreography terrible.
From Ashok Pandit, who has first hand experience of the issue, one expected a serious, no holds barred expose, not just another commercial film. This was he fails both ways—he is not able to make the audience empathize with the victims (the leading lady’s make-up, jewellery and wardrobe is in place even in a refugee camp!), nor is he able to entertain.
Labels: Cinemaah
