Saturday, March 14, 2009
Gulaal+Zizou+1
Gulaal
The death of a young boy in a ragging incident is all over the news right now—and this dark world of uncontrolled machismo is what Anurag Kashyap enters once again in his Gulaal.
It’s an ugly, irredeemable world, and the first hour or so of the film is stunning—visually too-- Kashyap hold on the cinematic medium cannot be faulted. He is confident enough to be quirky— the lead character lives in an abandoned bar in the middle of nowhere, complete with neon signs. A loony character is a John Lennon fan, and has for a companion a mute with body paint conveying ‘ardhnarishwar’ -- half man-half woman.
Here, a bespectacled nerd Dilip (Raj Singh Chaudhary), first brutally ragged, is then thrown into the pit of college politics by the authoritative Dukkey Bana (Kay Kay Menon), who wants to create an army of Rajputs to redress the wrongs done to the community by the post-Independent democratic governments. His foes are a cynical princeling Ransa (Abhimanyu Singh—a revelation), and the former Raja’s illegitimate kids – Karan (Aditya Shrivastav) and Kiran (Ayesha Mohan)
Kashyap convincingly establishes this lawless milieu, where people are casually killed (a cop, too) and nobody bats an eyelid; a college professor (Jesse Randhawa) is stripped and humiliated and does even report it; when Dilip is found severely battered, his father says, it could have been worse. After this the film goes all over the place, with characters floating around without apparent purpose (the professor, or Dukkey’s wife, for instance), and after the tantalizing premise of a Rajput revolt, there isn’t even a payoff for the audience. Unless, of course Kashyap thought of a sequel.
Dukkey Bana’s motives are a bit hazy—it’s not like Bihar’s Ranvir Sena that came up to fight the gains of the lower castes from reservations. All the college level politics is to skim off money coming in for a ‘festival’, which seems like an anti-climax. Even more of a letdown is the typical ‘all fall down’ kind of ending that comes from the writer-director not knowing what to do with the complicated web he has woven, so random violence is the easy way out.
The male actors are marvellous— Abhimanyu Singh, Kay Kay Menon, Aditya Shrivastav, Deepak Dobriyal (as Bana’s henchman) and Piyush Mishra, as the loony – he has also written and composed the excellent songs; the parody of Yeh duniya agar mil bhi jaaye to kya hai (which Kashyap credits as his inspiration for this film) is award-worthy. The same can’t be said of the female characters – including the supposedly courageous Kiran, who in one ridiculous scene berates Dilip, whom she has seduced, of making her pregnant! There is Mahi Gill as a nautch girl and Jesse Randhawa, who just hovers around in a daze.
In its attempt to probe a provincial dark hole that parts of North Indian have become, Gulaal is a braver film than Kashyap’s recent Dev D. But at best, is remain vaguely disturbing when it could have been powerfully provocative.
Little Zizou
Sooni Taraporevala may just have made the definitive film on the Parsis—and any Mumbai-ite who knows a Parsi family will appreciate the affection and care with which she has captured her beloved and rapidly dwindling community.
The film, part real, part whimsy and beautifully observed is mainly about two families; on one side is the patriarchal Cyrus II Khodaiji (Sohrab Ardeshir), who is hated by his sons, football fan Xerxes (Jahan Bativala) and graphic artist Artaxerxes (Imaad Shah). On the other side is the Presswala family, the father (Boman Irani) runs a community newspaper, his wife Roxanne (Zenobia Shroff) keeps an eye on her two daughters Liana (Iyana Bativala) and Zenobia (Dilshad Patel) and mothers little Xerxes too.
As a war breaks out between the conservative Khodaiji shouting for racial purity, and the liberal Presswala, Artaxerxes and his buddies are trying to create the cockpit of a jet for a flight simulator, in an old abandoned building. Painted in delicate strokes around them are other Parsi characters like Roxanne’s mother (Mahabanoo Mody Kotwal) keeping her crumbing hotel going in Udwada, Khodaiji’s subservient assistant (Shernaz Patel), the half Italian Tito (Thnow Francorsi) or the confused militant (Kurush Deboo)
Such is Taraporevala’s labour of love, that Parsis like Shiamak Davar, Gary Lawyer, Cyrus Broacha, Farid Currim and the half-Parsi John Abraham make friendly appearances and she gets to capture the old world beauty of Parsi homes.
Little Zizou is charming with its delicate humour, compassion for the community and concern for its future. The performances are wonderful and little Jahan Bativala is an absolute natural. The film may not be commercial, but it is a must-watch for lovers of good cinema.
Jai Veeru
Just how dated in content and look Jai Veeru is, can be seen even more clearly when compared to the week’s other releases – the far superior Little Zizou and Gulaal.
Punit Sira’s film, a sorry remake of a bad Hollywood film Bulletproof (1996) just has nothing going for it, when everybody else is trying to break the formula. Jai Veeru is just so 80s and totally without any surprises.
Veeru (Kunal Khemu), petty crook and car thief befriends Jai (Fardeen Khan), and eventually introduces him to his boss, gangster Tejpal (Arbaaz Khan). Turns out Jai is an undercover cop, and in trying to apprehend Tejpal, he gets shot and Veeru escapes to Bangkok, with Tejpal’s “black book.” In this day and age, a gangster keeps all his contacts in a diary placed for all to see in the backseat of his car, and watches with a puzzled expression as Veeru drives off with it. After Jai recovers from the bullet in his head, he goes after Veeru, chased in turn by Tejpal’s men.
There are two leading ladies too, who turn up when a song-and-dance break is needed, though the heroes get better costumes and more hairstyle changes than the girls.
The combined acting talent of Khan and Khemu is not enough even to keep such a dumb film going, and a villain who speaks chaste Hindi and has a haircut when he is supposed to be kidnapping a girl simply can’t be taken seriously!
The death of a young boy in a ragging incident is all over the news right now—and this dark world of uncontrolled machismo is what Anurag Kashyap enters once again in his Gulaal.
It’s an ugly, irredeemable world, and the first hour or so of the film is stunning—visually too-- Kashyap hold on the cinematic medium cannot be faulted. He is confident enough to be quirky— the lead character lives in an abandoned bar in the middle of nowhere, complete with neon signs. A loony character is a John Lennon fan, and has for a companion a mute with body paint conveying ‘ardhnarishwar’ -- half man-half woman.
Here, a bespectacled nerd Dilip (Raj Singh Chaudhary), first brutally ragged, is then thrown into the pit of college politics by the authoritative Dukkey Bana (Kay Kay Menon), who wants to create an army of Rajputs to redress the wrongs done to the community by the post-Independent democratic governments. His foes are a cynical princeling Ransa (Abhimanyu Singh—a revelation), and the former Raja’s illegitimate kids – Karan (Aditya Shrivastav) and Kiran (Ayesha Mohan)
Kashyap convincingly establishes this lawless milieu, where people are casually killed (a cop, too) and nobody bats an eyelid; a college professor (Jesse Randhawa) is stripped and humiliated and does even report it; when Dilip is found severely battered, his father says, it could have been worse. After this the film goes all over the place, with characters floating around without apparent purpose (the professor, or Dukkey’s wife, for instance), and after the tantalizing premise of a Rajput revolt, there isn’t even a payoff for the audience. Unless, of course Kashyap thought of a sequel.
Dukkey Bana’s motives are a bit hazy—it’s not like Bihar’s Ranvir Sena that came up to fight the gains of the lower castes from reservations. All the college level politics is to skim off money coming in for a ‘festival’, which seems like an anti-climax. Even more of a letdown is the typical ‘all fall down’ kind of ending that comes from the writer-director not knowing what to do with the complicated web he has woven, so random violence is the easy way out.
The male actors are marvellous— Abhimanyu Singh, Kay Kay Menon, Aditya Shrivastav, Deepak Dobriyal (as Bana’s henchman) and Piyush Mishra, as the loony – he has also written and composed the excellent songs; the parody of Yeh duniya agar mil bhi jaaye to kya hai (which Kashyap credits as his inspiration for this film) is award-worthy. The same can’t be said of the female characters – including the supposedly courageous Kiran, who in one ridiculous scene berates Dilip, whom she has seduced, of making her pregnant! There is Mahi Gill as a nautch girl and Jesse Randhawa, who just hovers around in a daze.
In its attempt to probe a provincial dark hole that parts of North Indian have become, Gulaal is a braver film than Kashyap’s recent Dev D. But at best, is remain vaguely disturbing when it could have been powerfully provocative.
Little Zizou
Sooni Taraporevala may just have made the definitive film on the Parsis—and any Mumbai-ite who knows a Parsi family will appreciate the affection and care with which she has captured her beloved and rapidly dwindling community.
The film, part real, part whimsy and beautifully observed is mainly about two families; on one side is the patriarchal Cyrus II Khodaiji (Sohrab Ardeshir), who is hated by his sons, football fan Xerxes (Jahan Bativala) and graphic artist Artaxerxes (Imaad Shah). On the other side is the Presswala family, the father (Boman Irani) runs a community newspaper, his wife Roxanne (Zenobia Shroff) keeps an eye on her two daughters Liana (Iyana Bativala) and Zenobia (Dilshad Patel) and mothers little Xerxes too.
As a war breaks out between the conservative Khodaiji shouting for racial purity, and the liberal Presswala, Artaxerxes and his buddies are trying to create the cockpit of a jet for a flight simulator, in an old abandoned building. Painted in delicate strokes around them are other Parsi characters like Roxanne’s mother (Mahabanoo Mody Kotwal) keeping her crumbing hotel going in Udwada, Khodaiji’s subservient assistant (Shernaz Patel), the half Italian Tito (Thnow Francorsi) or the confused militant (Kurush Deboo)
Such is Taraporevala’s labour of love, that Parsis like Shiamak Davar, Gary Lawyer, Cyrus Broacha, Farid Currim and the half-Parsi John Abraham make friendly appearances and she gets to capture the old world beauty of Parsi homes.
Little Zizou is charming with its delicate humour, compassion for the community and concern for its future. The performances are wonderful and little Jahan Bativala is an absolute natural. The film may not be commercial, but it is a must-watch for lovers of good cinema.
Jai Veeru
Just how dated in content and look Jai Veeru is, can be seen even more clearly when compared to the week’s other releases – the far superior Little Zizou and Gulaal.
Punit Sira’s film, a sorry remake of a bad Hollywood film Bulletproof (1996) just has nothing going for it, when everybody else is trying to break the formula. Jai Veeru is just so 80s and totally without any surprises.
Veeru (Kunal Khemu), petty crook and car thief befriends Jai (Fardeen Khan), and eventually introduces him to his boss, gangster Tejpal (Arbaaz Khan). Turns out Jai is an undercover cop, and in trying to apprehend Tejpal, he gets shot and Veeru escapes to Bangkok, with Tejpal’s “black book.” In this day and age, a gangster keeps all his contacts in a diary placed for all to see in the backseat of his car, and watches with a puzzled expression as Veeru drives off with it. After Jai recovers from the bullet in his head, he goes after Veeru, chased in turn by Tejpal’s men.
There are two leading ladies too, who turn up when a song-and-dance break is needed, though the heroes get better costumes and more hairstyle changes than the girls.
The combined acting talent of Khan and Khemu is not enough even to keep such a dumb film going, and a villain who speaks chaste Hindi and has a haircut when he is supposed to be kidnapping a girl simply can’t be taken seriously!
Labels: Cinemaah
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