Slow, silent and sensitive

Film: October

Date: 13 April 2018

 Director: Shoojit Sircar

Writer/Screenplay/Dialogues: Juhi Chaturvedi

Cast: Varun Dhawan, Banita Sandhu, Gitanjali Rao

The film opens to the grandeur of a Seven Star Hotel as guests walk into the lobby and inquire about their rooms.

Behind the dazzling lobby and the sparkling wine glasses on the dressed up dinner tables are the overstressed, overworked trainees going through the daily grind of cleaning, swabbing, cutting, chopping, laundering and making beds for the guests.

They work late and long hours and return exhausted to a poky rented apartment shared by many, eat boiled rice with pickle and fall asleep.

On duty, they are forever watched by the cameras and told time and again by the boss that if they are expelled from training for misconduct or poor performance they would have to pay a penalty of rupees 3 lakhs.

This keeps most of them on their toes except the forever distracted Dan/Varun Dhawan who is characteristically negligent and suffers from unexplained misplaced aggression.

A tragedy occurs in the hotel which affects all the trainees and transforms Dan forever.

Director Shoojit Sircar has claimed in all his interviews that October is not a love story but a story about love. This is true…

One can describe October as a story about relationships where strangers bond over a crisis or as a story of changing seasons where fragrant flowers blossom after the dry leaves wither away in autumn.

Or better still, as a story of everyday struggle.  Dan works by day at the hotel and spends the night watching over Shiuli/ Banita Sandhu at nights and you discover that there is a lot in common between the two surroundings – the sound making machines, the systems, and people.

The merits of the film are the characters, the writing, the humor, music and lyrical cinematography. The demerits are the slow pace, a deliberately delayed narrative and a predictable end.

In his 13-year-old career, director Shoojit Sircar has addressed rare issues and broken many rules. His Yahaan 2005 was about Kashmir, Vicky Donor / 2012 about infertility, Madraas Café / 2013 about Sri Lanka, Piku / 2015 about a hypochondriac single father and Pink / 2017 about rape!

In October Sircar treads a comparatively simplistic terrain devoid of intrigue or complexity and like always extracts strong performances from the team, Banita Sandhu and Gitanjali Rao as Shiuli’s Amma.

Varun Dhawan emerges as a dependable actor be it Badlapur or Judwaa 2 and embraces Dan with a rare curiosity and an innocence that touches our hearts.

October is not everyone’s idea of entertainment, but for those seeking quietude and the fragrance of flowers, this is a soothing experience.

I rate October with 3.5 stars.

Bhawana Somaaya

Shikhandi is perhaps one of the earliest transgender characters known in history/mythology. She appears in the Mahabharata and plays a crucial part in winning the battle of Kurukshetra for the Pandavas. Shikhandi was meant to be born male to avenge an insult in her past life as Amba b ut the bigger karmic game unfolds when she is reborn female, raised male, has a sex change on her wedding night when she runs away to the forest (thanks to a Yaksha), and finally fulfills her destiny – to be the cause of Bhishma’s death.

A comic, tongue-in-cheek, retelling of the story of Shikhandi, mixing traditional Indian storytelling and contemporary English verse, and questioning gender, sexuality, maleness, femaleness and everything in between, the play was runner-up at the Sultan Padamsee Playwriting Awards 2016.

Written and directed by Faezeh Jalali the play stars MeherAcharia-Dar, Mahnaz Damania, Vikrant Dhote, Karan Desai, Nikhil Murali, Srishti Srivastava, Nakul Bhalla/Tushar Pandey and Kartavya Anthwaal Sharma/ Abhishek Chauhan and  is restricted to  adult audience.

@bhawanasomaaya

All of us know about how Varun Dhawan met Shoojit Sircar in his tracksuit and landed the role of role of Dan in October.  What attracted Shoojit was his ruffled hair and clumsy ways of dropping a tea glass and trying in vain to pick up the pieces. Shoojit clicked a video of the same and sent it to his writer Juhi and producer with a text that he had found his Dan.

Those who work with Shoojit know that he believes in extensive preparation and Varun Dhawan was not spared of the rehearsals. Dhawan plays a Hotel Management Student in the film and endured a vigorous workshop entailing all the chores of a trainee which includes washing toilets, cleaning dishes, vacuuming and cooking so that he picked the right mannerisms required for the character.

Since most of the shooting took place in a real 5-star hotel lodging foreign guests Varun was often mistaken for a  staff and asked to run errands for the guest and he did often unaware that Shoojit Sircar was hiding somewhere with his camera and shooting these authentic moments.

@bhawanasomaaya

Amitabh Bachchan and Rishi Kapoor have been paired several times together but never have they played father and son. In 102 Not Out based on playwright Saumya Joshi’s well known Gujarati play by the same name and directed by Umesh Shukla Bachchan has encountered the most unusual experiences one of which includes riding a rickshaw.

The unit was worried how they would be able to control the crowd but the shoot was completed without any obstruction. 102 Not Out is being touted as the most unusual love story between a father and his son and will release in the theatres in May.

@bhawanasomaaya

It was an evening to remember because everyone interested in cricket and Saurav Ganguly former India captain, brilliant batsman and entertainer par excellence was present for the book release and Dada as he is fondly addressed by all did not let them down.

The bonus was the presence of Sachin Tendulkar who did the honors of launching the book and to make the evening all the more interesting Sachin Tendulkar combined with Rohit Sharma engaged Sourav Ganguly in an engaging conversation.

Poolside Lawns of Taj Lands End, Bandra has seen many book launches but this one was truly special.

@bhawanasomaaya