what I watch?

Rang De Basanti (2006), by Rakesh Omprakash Mehra

The plot of the movie straddles two different time periods – first one, the contemporarysetting revolving around a group of friends. The second one is in the pre-independence India, revolving around freedom fighters like Chandrashekhar Azad, Bhagat Singh and Ashfak.

Parallels are drawn between the characters in the two time periods and as the story moves towards its conclusion, the barrier of time begins to dissolve and the characters become one in spirit.

Sue (Alice Patten) comes to India to make a documentary on some freedom fighters about whom she gets to know from the diary of her late grandfather who was a British officer in India before 1947.

After having auditioned many in vain for her movie, Sue, aided by Sonia (Soha Ali Khan), meets a group of friends in whom she sees the characters of her documentary. The group consists of DJ (Aamir Khan), Aslam (Kunal Kapoor), Karan (Siddharth) and Sukhi (Sharman Joshi).

DJ is originally Daljeet Singh from a Punjabi family consisting of a loving mother (excellently portrayed by Kiron Kher). A beer guzzler who is never serious about anything in life, DJ starts hitting on Sue the minute he sees her.

Aslam comes from a Muslim family and refuses to endorse the opinion that Muslims ought not mingle with Hindus.

Karan is the silent one. He is rich but has a dry, loveless life. He smokes heavily and seeks happiness among his friends.

Sukhi is full of fun and frolic. He has no girlfriend and rues (quite portentously) that he would die a kunwara.

Also part of the group is Fl. Lft. Ajay Rathod (Madhavan), the love of Sonia (Soha). He is the only one in the group who has dedication to serve the country.

None of the friends is serious enough to be a part of Sue’s documentary. To them values like patriotism, sacrificing oneself for the sake of country are just beautiful words they cannot relate to.

But Sue can see the characters of her movie in them. In DJ she sees Chandrashekhar Azad. In Karan she sees Bhagat Singh and in Aslam she sees Ashfak.

Even as the five friends agree to be a part of her movie, they still cannot accept the virtues of the characters (of the freedom fighters) they play. But then, Ajay dies in a MiG crash and is labeled as a rookie pilot by the Defence Minister who is unwilling to accept shortcomings in the MiG aircrafts.

DJ, Aslam, Karan, Sukhi, Sonia, Ajay’s mother (Waheeda Rahman) and Pandey (Atul Kulkarni) lead the protest against the Defence Minister to get Ajay the honour he deserved. But they are beaten mercilessly by the cops. Ajay’s mother goes into coma.

DJ and friends decide to bring the truth to light. But they choose a very extreme way to do it.

Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra deserves full praise for making a movie that certainly raises the bar for filmmakers in Bollywood. There is not a single dull moment in ‘Rang De Basanti’. The movie begins on a light note and there are humourous moments aplenty in the first half. The second half gets serious after the death of the character played by Madhavan. From then on, the story takes a grave turn and ends on a tragic note.

The most remarkable part of the movie is the parallel that Mehra draws between the freedom fighters and DJ and his group of friends. The movie keeps transposing the same actors into characters from the past. And then, as the story draws to its conclusion, even these differences in the characters disappear. The modern, city-bread ‘young guns’ of the twenty first century become one in spirit with the revolutionaries who sacrificed themselves for the country’s freedom.

Very interestingly, Mehra has even kept the same locations in the two time periods. The DAV college of Lahore in pre-Independence India becomes the radio station in the contemporary setting.

Only Aamir Khan could have enacted the role of DJ, the good-humoured, bike-riding ex-graduate who is afraid to go beyond the life of college campus and friends. Aamir speaks his dialogues with a Punjabi accent, spicing his lines with an expletive here and there. Particularly notable is his performance in the scene after the protesters (him included) are beaten by the police and he weeps helplessly in Sue’s apartment.

Alice Patten is perfectly cast. She delivers a flawless performance and even shows that she can swear in Hindi.

Kunal Kapoor, Soha Ali Khan, Atul Kulkarni are up to the mark. Sharman Joshi is a delight to watch. Siddharth gets his moments of acting at the movie’s end.

Cinematography by Binod Pradhan is top notch. The editing is slick. The songs in the movie are so indiscernibly placed in the narrative that they don’t hamper the pace at all.

For the sake of concluding this review, let it be said that ‘Rang De Basanti’ is an impressive movie that definitely ought to be seen once, if not more.

A Must-Watch.

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Umrao Jaan (2006), by J.P. Dutta

A little girl, Ameeran, from a lower middle class family in Faizabad is kidnapped and sold to a brothel in Lucknow. Played by Aishwarya Rai, she grows up to be the most famous nautch girl of her times and is re-christened Umrao Jaan.

While performing her first mujra she falls in love with Nawab Sultan (Abhishek Bachchan) and vows to be loyal to him all her life. However fate decides otherwise, and Umrao ends up losing him after the Nawab’s father throws him out of his home.

Umrao decides to wait for her lover, even as the dacoit Faiz Ali (Sunil Shetty) wants to woo her.

The film is a journey of a woman who is living a life born out of circumstances, and has no control over her own destiny.

Though the courtesan wants to live like any other woman, that isn’t her destiny; she believes that she was just born unlucky.

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Doodh Aur Apheem (2006), by Joel Palombo

milkandopium.com

Milk and Opium is a poetic film about a young Sufi musician who leaves his remote Rajasthani village in search of work. Fourteen-year-old Swaroop is an innocent boy who wants to explore life outside his village. His wish is granted when his uncle Nizam reluctantly agrees to take Swaroop on a music tour. Along the way, they are joined by two of Nizam’s friends and the four musicians perform at roadside locations along the way to scrape enough money to make it to the capital city. But things change once they reach the city. Nizam’s greed leads to a break-up in the group and eventually forces Swaroop to make his own way through an alien city. Backed by soulful sufi music and an award-winning performance by young Swaroop Khan, Milk and Opium is a charming journey across the poetic Rajasthani landscape towards the fast-paced Westernized capital city of New Delhi.