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A fine show: Some American, some desi
AMERICAN DESI
THIS IS coming of age time in Indian cinema. Cinema, which relies more on content than special effects, films which fare well in the story-telling department, movies where the script is the king. Or queen, if you please. Films coming with generous helpings from real life, realistic without sermonising, engaging and entertaining. Films which are a fine bridge between New Delhi and New York, between London and Ludhiana. Late last year we had Mira Nair's "Monsoon Wedding" which did decent business. Early this year, we had Revathy's "Mitr' which got Shobhana the National Award for the Best Actress. And just a couple of months ago, Gurinder Chadha's "Bend It Like Beckham" was the toast of the town.
Prepare now to welcome aboard Piyush Dinker Pandya and "American Desi". Doesn't ring a bell? Never mind. It is a name you will get to hear a lot in the coming months on the multiplex circuit frequented by the well-heeled and the well-perfumed people, moving around with a copy of "Inscrutable Americans" and discussing the films coming up at the Film Festival. His "American Desi", poised for release at cinema halls across Delhi this coming Friday, is as breezy and contemporary as "Beckham" at its best. It is also also enjoyable as "Monsoon Wedding" and just as identifiable as "Mitr". If hope can blend with optimism, then one is tempted to say that it may just be a winner all the way.
"American Desi", as the name suggests, is the story of NRIs - Krishna Gopal Reddy or Kris as this fully Americanised kid would like to be called, Saleem and Jagjit Singh. Young kids, straight into college, trying to find a middle path between Indian tradition and American ethos. When they are at home, the parents bind them to spiritualism, when they are out, they marry other pleasures. In hostel, they wake up to strains of Louisa Fernandes and shabad kirtan together! Guys for whom having a rubber means something other than an eraser, for whom knowledge - ah! That gateway to power! -- means a quick reading of Vatsyayana's timeless work for those timeless moments. This film is all about the pangs and pleasure of those Indians, hailing from Mirzapur but seeking to make a fortune in New Jersey, who tell each other: "Hey! Man! You don't look or sound like an Indian," without being sure if it is meant as a compliment or an insult.
Well, man, here you have a film you can identify with as an upwardly mobile urban Indian, living in New Delhi or Mumbai but nurturing aspirations to a better future, somewhere else. "American Desi" may not have much novelty to lure you but the presentation is fine, editing fair enough and one-liners catchy enough to catch the fancy of the young and the learning!
It has one obviously flawed note: the namaaz is performed twice. Twice it is wrong. And the Arabic scriptures are hung upside down in the room of Saleem! Probably, just taking irreverence a bit too far.
SHAKTI
(At Delite and other Delhi theatres)
SOME OF the most memorable moments of life are also the most fleeting. Strangely, some moments seem to gain in joy in retrospect. Krishna Vamshi's "Shakti" starts off on a similar note, giving us all some hope that here will be a film where the heroine will not be a mere appendage, that she will not be the central character of the film without actually being a passive witness to the goings-on. Well, the hopes are largely belied. So much so, that if Karisma were to look back at films like "Fiza" and "Zubeidaa", she would feel she had a better deal there than this one touted to be the most challenging role of her career. Well, the challenge is for the audiences to come to realise whether they are actually watching a film cleared by the Central Board of Film Certification or just a street-side nautanki, replete with corny humour. You would not want your child to watch it. You can do without watching it.
The bestiality of this film hits you in your face. If it is art, then it is ugly; and if it is ugly, it can only be at art it its degenerate worst. At best, it has a powerful theme, it worst, it is repulsive cinema. This tale of an American-born mother seeking to protect her child at any cost from a vengeful grandfather back home in some village in India is gory, loud, abrasive. It comes with lots of vituperative, plenty of vitriol. Often reduced to a seesaw battle between an uncouth, uneducated father - Nana Patekar in an absolutely stunning performance - and his son - Sanjay Kapoor in the customary wooden performance -- this film only occasionally gets gripping. The grip loosens soon too.
Unfortunately, if the first day's shows are anything to go, the ribaldry and innuendos are clicking with the audiences. Truly, if it is sad to see a good film failing, it is worse to see a bad film clicking. "Shakti" may do just that, at least in parts of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar which are entrenched in most suffocating norms of patriarchy, societies where men dictate, women abide, where men summon, women surrender.
Besides a passable Karisma, the film has the beautiful Aishwarya Rai in a special appearance for a raunchy number which is on its way up on the countdown shows. However, try hard as she might, Rai does not have the raw, untamed sexuality to fit the part. Clearly ill at ease with the hip-wiggling, pelvic gyrations she is called upon to do, her strength lies in appealing to the finer senses of men, not pander to the baser ones. Wonder, why she did it all? Was it to please Boney Kapoor for whom she has earlier done "Hamaara Dil Aapke Paas Hai"? Clearly, the heart has prevailed upon the head here.
GUNAAH
(At Odeon and other theatres)
DID YOU see "Raaz" in February this year? The Vikram Bhatt film which turned out to be the first hit of the year, giving Bipasha Basu a foothold in the industry and Dino Morea a toehold to survive another day? Well, if you did not, here is a chance to see it in another form - this time called "Gunaah". The Mahesh Bhatt presentation is very like the first one. Only thing is it is not as fast and does not quite get you holding on to the armrest of your chair.
Though it has the same lead pair, it is the love story of two people enemies at the worst of times, love-birds when things get better. It is the story of a woman inspector and her target, a silent revolutionary who saves her life when she is on a hot pursuit to nab him. They both have a past. Her mission is to fulfil her duty without sacrificing her love. His mission is to save his love from scheming colleagues and also to settle old scores with those cops responsible for the death of his journalist father. At times, it actually shapes up into a fine film with superb performances by Irfan as the corrupt police officer and reasonable ones of Dino Morea - who is much better here than "Raaz" - and Bipasha, who gets the meatier role. However, the film comes unstuck at the end which is a pity.
If well begun is only half-done, not well-concluded is a sin. That is unpardonable in a film called "Gunaah".
UNFAITHFUL
(At Shiela and other theatres)
THERE IS room for each mood in life, just as there is a mood for each room in the family. Just as it is important for the whole of life to be qualitatively greater than the sum of all parts, it is also important to enjoy each moment as it comes. And do it with those who give you maximum happiness, those who understand your body, mind and soul. Enjoy the moment, banish the past, forget the future. Adopt this as the credo and life is without any blues. If not forever, for a while though. And that is what happens in Adrian Lyne's "Unfaithful", the story of an apparently happy husband-wife duo - Richard Gere and Diane Lane. All until the wife runs into a self-styled book-lover, who guides her to just the right book. What follows is predictable in a film which faithfully follows every cliché.
The only time it steers clear of the stereotype is when the husband gets suspicious, goes to the other man in his wife's life. But the movie does not degenerate either into a thriller at the end, nor does it always rely on sex to sell. What happens then? Well, Lyne comes up with a surprise or two. But why talk of it now? The Richard Gere die-hards might just faithfully queue up to see the film where seduction is elevated to a fine art, where love is as it should be -- beautiful.
ZIYA US SALAM
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