My first visit to a movie hall since mid November. And boy! was it worth it!!
From the first scene itself, you are hit with what can only called a lot of 'Calcutta'. The city and its sights, its festival, Durga Puja, and all the sites and sounds surrounding it are captured brilliantly. And it is shown with so much reality, seen only very rarely, even in Bengali movies. As Vidya reaches the city, and is driven through it, you see it go by in a blur of sound and colour, just how an outsider would see it when they enter this bustling metropolis. As the story unfolds, you see the strength of a woman on a mission, to find her missing husband, lost in an unknown and bewildering city. You see the helpless vulnerability of a pregnant woman, seemingly on a wild goose chase a very long way from home. When the story reaches the climax, you see the resolve of a wife and mother to be, doing everything in her capability to get her life back to normal.
The story line is watertight, as watertight as I've seen in a Hindi movie in a very long time. At the end of the movie, no matter how much we tried to find some loopholes in the plot, there was none that we could put on finger on. No stone has been left unturned in making the story believable and gripping. Director Sujoy Ghosh has come up with Bollywood's answer to some of the more mind boggling movies we are used to seeing from Hollywood. I'm not sure if it would be right to talk about the movie in the same breath as 'The Departed' and 'The Usual Suspects', but it's the closest I've ever seen any Hindi movie come, except maybe 'A Wednesday'.
The movie boasts a who's who of Bengali actors with Parambrata Chatterjee and Saswata Chatterjee playing important characters. Parambrata plays a police officer who helps Vidya Balan's character in the movie. He is restrained and plays his part without much over-enthusiasm. The only downside perhaps is that he is so completely over shadowed by the Queen Bee of current day Bollywood. In every frame, in every dialogue, your attention is drawn towards the woman beside him, and perhaps it is also a complement to him, that he played the 'supporting' role so well. Saswata Chatterjee is downright scary as the LIC agent who only has one 'client', but that client doesn't ask him to help protect any lives, rather completely opposite to it. In the all too famous scene with Vidya Balan at the metro station where he pushes her onto the path of an incoming train, he is successful in scaring you with his smile, all the while shouting asking Vidya Balan's character to return back.
And then there is Vidya Balan. What do you say about someone who has won three consecutive filmfares and a National Awards in the same period? She is exemplary, stealing a march over every other of her contemporaries with this role, just like she has been doing with all of her past few roles. The expressions, the voice, the desperation of a pregnant woman caught in a dire situation she portrays with aplomb. Anything which is said in praise of her would be less. And then there is the climax, the stirring ending will make you sit up straight and take notice. Anything more I say here will just about spoil it.
From the first scene itself, you are hit with what can only called a lot of 'Calcutta'. The city and its sights, its festival, Durga Puja, and all the sites and sounds surrounding it are captured brilliantly. And it is shown with so much reality, seen only very rarely, even in Bengali movies. As Vidya reaches the city, and is driven through it, you see it go by in a blur of sound and colour, just how an outsider would see it when they enter this bustling metropolis. As the story unfolds, you see the strength of a woman on a mission, to find her missing husband, lost in an unknown and bewildering city. You see the helpless vulnerability of a pregnant woman, seemingly on a wild goose chase a very long way from home. When the story reaches the climax, you see the resolve of a wife and mother to be, doing everything in her capability to get her life back to normal.
The story line is watertight, as watertight as I've seen in a Hindi movie in a very long time. At the end of the movie, no matter how much we tried to find some loopholes in the plot, there was none that we could put on finger on. No stone has been left unturned in making the story believable and gripping. Director Sujoy Ghosh has come up with Bollywood's answer to some of the more mind boggling movies we are used to seeing from Hollywood. I'm not sure if it would be right to talk about the movie in the same breath as 'The Departed' and 'The Usual Suspects', but it's the closest I've ever seen any Hindi movie come, except maybe 'A Wednesday'.
The movie boasts a who's who of Bengali actors with Parambrata Chatterjee and Saswata Chatterjee playing important characters. Parambrata plays a police officer who helps Vidya Balan's character in the movie. He is restrained and plays his part without much over-enthusiasm. The only downside perhaps is that he is so completely over shadowed by the Queen Bee of current day Bollywood. In every frame, in every dialogue, your attention is drawn towards the woman beside him, and perhaps it is also a complement to him, that he played the 'supporting' role so well. Saswata Chatterjee is downright scary as the LIC agent who only has one 'client', but that client doesn't ask him to help protect any lives, rather completely opposite to it. In the all too famous scene with Vidya Balan at the metro station where he pushes her onto the path of an incoming train, he is successful in scaring you with his smile, all the while shouting asking Vidya Balan's character to return back.
And then there is Vidya Balan. What do you say about someone who has won three consecutive filmfares and a National Awards in the same period? She is exemplary, stealing a march over every other of her contemporaries with this role, just like she has been doing with all of her past few roles. The expressions, the voice, the desperation of a pregnant woman caught in a dire situation she portrays with aplomb. Anything which is said in praise of her would be less. And then there is the climax, the stirring ending will make you sit up straight and take notice. Anything more I say here will just about spoil it.
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