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Raees is inspired by Nayagan

By Uncategorized

Film Review: Raees

Date: 25 January 2017

Producer: Excel Entertainment

Director: Rahul Dholakia

Cast: Shah Rukh Khan, Mahirra Khan, Nawazudin Siddiqu, Ronnit Roy

Rating: 3.5 stars

Set in early 1980’s Gujarat, India Raees is yet another story of a criminal and his meteoric rise to become the single most powerful man in the state.  We have seen the same plot exploited time and again in Hollywood and Indian films glorifying the underworld hero.

Based on the life of Abdul Latif Raees Alam is a courageous, ambitious boy described by his mentor as Gujarati ka baniya dimaag aur miyaan bhai ka daring and Raees Alam takes the compliment seriously. In a time of serious curfew in the city, Raees and his friend hide bottles wrapped in newspaper in their school bag and make deliveries for their boss and when they grow up, they are ready to throw him a challenge.

The shift in equation alters many relationships and ushers new conflict and anxieties for Raees and his supporters but he is a brave heart and ready for the rocky path. Director Rahul Dholakia is strongly influenced by Mani Ratnam’s award winning Nayagan and it is apparent in his shot taking and moral standing of the film.

In Nayagan a young Kamal Haaasan while loading the gold on the boat for his mentor asks, ‘Are we doing the right thing’ to which his mentor responds, ‘All I know is that anything that feeds many hungry mouths cannot be wrong!’

In Raees young Alam asks the same question to his Ammi and her answer is ‘No work is small and there is no religion bigger than your work’.

What works in favor of the film is the period setting, the costumes, the ambiance, the characterizations, and the dialogues. What does not is the length of the film and that it does not have anything new to say.

The first half is racy and promising and you expect twists and turns in the second half but it goes the predictable way.

Pakistani actress Mahirra Khan is a letdown, Shah Rukh Khan has special chemistry with all his heroines but this time the romantic moments leave you cold and untouched. Nawazuddin Siddiqui plays a cop yet again but lends a flavor to his character. He is so fluent in his lines that it almost seems as if he has written the character of Majumdar himself.

Raees is old wine filled in new bottle for Shah Rukh Khan fans and the bonus is that that he has never looked so good or performed better.

25 January, 2017
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Watch Kaabil for Hrithik Roshan

By Films

Film Review: Kaabil

Date: 25 January 2017

Producer: Film Kraft

Director: Sanjay Gupta

Cast: Hrithik Roshan, Yaami Gautam, Ronnit Roy

Rating: 4 stars

Rohan Bhatnagar is a favorite of many in the colony he lives; they admire his confidence to live life against adversities. He makes his own breakfast and travels to the studio where he works as a mimic artiste. A common friend sends him and Supriya, a pianist, on a blind date. Both are very certain that they don’t want to get married but they continue to meet for shopping and dinners and eventually get married.

The film is vibrant and racy till the tragedy occurs and post interval the plot concentrates on vendetta. Intelligently scripted and sensitively shot the unusual love story is a reflection of a thoughtless society, corrupt police and a faulted legislative system. It is both, a story of abuse and a story of triumph.

Director Sanjay Gupta popular for his dark, crime thrillers like Kaante, Shootout at Wadala and recently Jazbaa packages  yet another thriller this time a bright and positive one combined with with a social cause. Hrithik Roshan has in his17 long year career played an emperor/ Jodha Akbar a don/ Dhoom 2 a fugitive/ Fiza and a superman/ Krrish 3. Three of his films portrayed him battling with disability. Koi Mil Gaya was about the mentally challenged, Guzaarish about the physically challenged and Kaabil is about the visually impaired!!

What works in favor of the film is the tight screenplay, dazzling dialogues and Rajesh Roshan’s haunting music. What does not work is the predictable second half and the excessive violence.  The supporting cast comprising police inspector Chaubey and his assistant make an impact. So do Rohit and Ronit Roy as villains, Yaami Gautam is charming but the film ultimately belongs to only Hrithik Roshan. 

Watch him guard his every step before he climbs and walks, watch him count, measure the levels before he gets on the floor. Your heart misses a beat as he wades through city traffic and a crowded mall. It is not how he faces crisis but how he absorbs the persona of Rohan Bhatnagar, the ease with which he folds his stick, sips his coffee turns, reacts to sound, senses peril and yes makes love to his wife, is a performance of details.

Watch Kaabil for the actor of details, Hrithik Roshan and for the over powering message that no matter what the opposition one must not lose courage.

@bhawanasomaaya

25 January, 2017
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Take 7: Fragmented Frames (Day 1018)

By Books

It was an ordinary day and I was checking my mails when I came across Publisher Rohit Gupta of Pustak Mahal asking me for a quick easy read cinema book. Fragmented Frames (2007) is a collection of essays delving on the genesis and growth of cinema, capturing the magic and the madness of show business. It travels you through varied subjects and phases of the dream world and was proudly released by Gulzar saab in Mumbai.

 

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25 January, 2017
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Take 8: Krishna The God who lived as Man (Day 1017)

By Books

A common friend brought me the audio book of Krishnaayan and I heard it for just five minutes and decided that I will do the translation of the book. The author was visiting Mumbai the following week, we met, agreed and I began working on the manuscript but it was not easy because I have not studied Gujarati and the exercise was very tiring. I could have given up but there was a divine force guiding me that did not allow me to discontinue.

Krishna- The God who lived as Man is a transcreation of Kajal Vaidya Oza’s Krishnaayan in Gujarati. It is my only book outside of cinema and there are too many miracles associated with it to be passed off as coincidences. Lord Krishna is the eighth child of his parents; I am the eighth of my parents. It is my eighth book and it is published in the year 2008 and these are sufficient reasons to justify why the book occupies a special place in my heart and will continue to do so forever.

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24 January, 2017
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Take 9: Bachchanalia (Day 1016)

By Books

The 90s decade besides the computer, electronic media and the internet saw the rise of web portals. I was heading a creative time appointed to create a portal exclusively on Amitabh Bachchan and was compiling credits and trivia of all his films. At that time I had imagined I would bring out a regular size book on the actor and call it Bachchan Filmography. A chance meeting with Neville Tulli of Osians was the beginning of a magnificent book Bachchanalia (2009) published a decade after my first The Legend on the actor in 1999. Bachchanalia is a celebration of an actor’s extraordinary body of work spanning 4 decades and 100 plus films.

It was the first time a book event was held at NCPA Theatre combined with a poster gallery and there were people sitting on the steps just to listen to the baritone.

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23 January, 2017
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Take 10: Amitabh The Lexicon (Day 1015)

By Books

One day, I was dinning with my friends and for some reason all of us started communicating in Amitabh Bachchan dialogues. It occurred to me that his body of work is so extensive that it is an alternate culture of the country. Just an exercise I opened the Oxford Dictionary and tried to associate every word with a prop in his film and realized that I could make a book out of it. The effort of traveling the 26 alphabets was terrifying but I decided I’ll be patient. My tenth book and third book on Bachchan Amitabh Lexicon (2011) is a compilation of selective words from the alphabets of the English language associated with different scenes from the actor’s body of work – scenes where he made you cry, laugh and all shook up.  Like he says in his film Namak Halaal “Lo karlo baat…aaree English to aisi aave hain ke I can leave angrez behind…I can talk English, I can walk English, and I can laugh English…”

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20 January, 2017
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Take 11: Mother Maiden Mistress (Day 1014)

By Books

Mother Maiden Mistress (2012) co-authored with Jigna Kothari and Supriya Madangarli is celebration of women in Hindi cinema from 1950 -2010. How this book came about is a story by itself. I contacted Jigna and Supriya as researchers but enjoyed talking to them so much that we decided that we will all jointly write a book and it was a good decision because the topic was exhaustive and daunting and there were many times during the process when we wanted to give up the idea but kept encouraging each other.

It has been a long hundred years since Dadasaheb Phalke portrayed a man as his heroine in Raja Harishchandra (1913) and women have a come a long way since then both on and off screen. Mother Maiden Mistress documents the journey of women characters in films post partition to new millennium where the definition of the mother, the maiden and the mistress have changed beyond imagination.

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19 January, 2017
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Take 12: Talking Cinema (Day 1013)

By Books

 Talking Cinema (2013) my twelfth book features passionate conversations with actors and filmmakers on their craft. Have you ever wondered what actors think about just before a shot, have you wondered how they prepare for a crucial scene? Behind the greasepaint and glycerin, and into the heart of what gives the audience goose bumps, Talking Cinema goes behind the scenes with several of film fraternity’s best known stars and filmmakers to unravel what goes on in the mind of an artist. It has conversations with the actors about how they get acquainted with their characters and absorb them as part of their psyche. How they live with these characters and bid them farewell when the film is completed. The book is about the skill, effort and resources that go into the making of a scene stealer or a classic.? Have you ever wondered what the director feels when his set has to be demolished after the film is completed.

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18 January, 2017
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