Date:05/11/2006 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2006/11/05/stories/2006110502060200.htm

Karnataka - Bangalore

A flawed masterpiece

DISAPPOINTING FARE : Aishwarya Rai in Umrao Jaan.

Umrao Jaan (Hindi)

Director: J. P. Dutta

Cast: Aishwarya Rai, Abhishek Bachchan

MIRZA RUSWA'S novel continues to breathe new life into our ailing filmmakers. Now, J.P. Dutta, adapts the novel for the fourth time to the big screen. Anu Malik's music is too fast-paced for the era. But, hang on, do not write off Dutta's Umrao Jaan. There are these blemishes, as indeed is the length of the film.But these are mere asides. At its soul, body, even content, Umrao Jaan is as beautiful as its leading lady, the one who once had the world at her feet. Aishwarya Rai undertakes the difficult job of doing Rekha's role. And manages to hold her own. Never the greatest of actresses, she makes a valiant attempt to bring the angst, the anguish of the woman rejected by all: her family, her lover and her buyer. Rai does an adequate job in most sequences, reserving her best for the final showdown with the hero — Abhishek Bachchan.

Talking of performances, there is none better than Shabana Azmi's. As Khannum, the madam at the brothel she is superb. When she is on the screen, the film goes up a notch or two. Its male characters are second fiddles: Abhishek is a misfit as a nawab. And Puru Rajkumar is not even a shadow of Naseeruddin Shah as Gauhar, the man who loved Umrao. And Sunil Shetty as Nawab Faiz does the role with the same indifference he shows in countless potboilers where he arrives and departs in all fury. Never mind. Umrao Jaan, all dressed up and beautiful, is still fetching. The story has feeling but the narration is inadequate.

Ziya Us Salam