A racy entertaining thriller after long time - Kahaani

Kahaani (2012)
Starring - Vidya Balan, Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Parambrata Chatterjee
Direction - Sujai Ghosh

After quite a long time, I got the feeling of watching a very good Indian thriller movie. At least for me this is the case, as I haven’t seen any film “made in India” as good as this one in recent years. When a husband sent away to work is missing for days, a wife dares to go to any extreme to find him, despite her pregnancy and health conditions. Kahaani is the story of one such wife.

Vidya Baghchi is a pregnant woman living in London with her husband Arnab. When Arnab, who came to Kolkata for an assignment didn’t contact her for days after the assignment was over, she herself arrives to Kolkata from London to find him. There she faces a number of obstacles during the investigative pursuit of her beloved husband. What makes the rest of the story is whether she accomplished what she came for. 

For a woman centered film, there is more responsibility on women actors usually and Vidya Balan does it with ease and perfection here. She did come up with yet another excellent performance, as a pregnant and naïve Vidya Bhagchi, without any support or any known person in a densely populated metro city, but well determined in purpose of her travel. She is the ‘one woman army’ of Kahaani, a center of attraction, fulfilling all the responsibilities. There is no wonder she is considered to be one of the very few well-talented actress. She seems to be turning into directors’ actress when the plot is fully woman-centered, as she has already done a few such films like Ishqiya, The Dirty Picture, and No one killed Jessica. I’d like to share a thing I once read in a magazine long back about Vidya. For the tamil film Run, its director rejected her during screen tests, as she was not beautiful enough to be a heroine. Thanks to him. Things turned out different after that!!!

Parambrata Chatterjee as a rookie cop Rana did an impressive job as the one who supports Vidya right from her arrival to Kolkata and throughout her pursuit. Nawazuddin Siddiqui as ruthless intelligence officer Khan gives liveliness to his role. The LIC agent cum hitman Bob Biswas role done by Saswata Chatterjee is interesting. There are other small characters who did what they are asked to without fail.

The director of the film is Sujai Ghosh, who has failed to make an impression with his previous ventures. But this time he succeeded in making attempt a fruitful one giving a firm place for himself. The story written by Advaita and co-written by Sujai is gripping and lively to the end. The extensive research performed and effort laid down, in order to bring an authentic Kolkata to screen is largely evident. As a native of Kolkata, it helped Sujai do this in a better way. Photography by Setu is another attribute to the success of the film. To achieve the reality, director Sujai filmed the scenes in the streets of Kolkata without the knowledge of people there, with a crew less in number and barely known. This aspect of filmmaking is called guerilla filmmaking. It includes the densely crowded Durja Pooja festival scene also. Background score by Clinton Cerejo is in par with the script.

There may be some flaws in the film, as is with every film. But Vidya’s mesmerizing performance as well as the edgy story is well enough to make you not think of that. Don’t miss this rare, racy entertaining thriller if you haven’t seen it yet.

My Rating: 8.6/10

Read More

The Others - Genuine thriller, no cheap scares...

The Others (2007)

Cast: Nicole Kidman, James Bently, Alakina Mann, Fionnula Flannagan.

Direction : Alejandro Amenábar 

 

I used to have confusion in identifying (not now) the Australian actresses Naomi Watts and Nicole Kidman because of their strikingly similar appearance. Just like the giant ape starts to like Naomi in the film King Kong, I also started liking her from the moment I saw her in the same film. One day I saw a few scenes from the film The Others for the first time, and couldn’t beat the thought about its lead actress that, “is this the same girl whom Kong likes?” My friend clarified me they are different actors. King Kong’s actress is Naomi Watts and Nicole Kidman is the lead actress here. I was amazed that they look almost exactly same. The same night I finished watching The Others. And it was really good. Yesterday night I saw it again and it is still good as the first time. 

Grace Stewart (Nicole Kidman) is a single mother living in a lonely mansion in coastal England in the near end of World War II. She is badly waiting for the war to end soon so that she can be reunited with her husband who went to fight in the war. Her 2 children Anna (Alakina) and Nicholas (James) are about 6 to 8 years old and they have a strange and rare light sensitivity disease. They cannot be exposed to light brighter than a candle. Suddenly one day, 3 servants, an aging housekeeper Mrs. Bertha Mills, an old gardener Mr.  Edmund Tuttle and young maid Lydia who is a mute. They come and take the jobs voluntarily. Things turn after the arrival of the servants and their weird behavior which makes the rest of the film. 

The Others bears remarkably brilliant performances from Kidman and her on screen children. She captivates and scores by her clean and neat performance, as a fear-ridden, over caring mother who gives utmost care in keeping her children away from disease. Rest of the cast is also no different. They did what is required at their best, especially the young lad.

What makes The Others interesting is its very minimal cast, low lighting and a single location – the palatial mansion where they reside. Unlike most horror films having barrels of bloods and gory images, this is different from them that there are no cheap scares and not even a single drop of blood spilled. Spanish director Amenábar deserves a large applause for this. This is the most interesting part of the film. The fact that the children have a light sensitive disease itself gives a necessary dark and eerie setting to the film. His screenplay seems to be at a slightly slower pace for a thriller-horror. But the thrill and suspense never faded away from the beginning to the end of the film. For a film of horror – thriller genre, it is surely one of the best made, without leaving the viewers disappointed at the end.

My Rating: 9/10

Read More

Maniratnam's Magic with Train and Rain

Every artist in his work reflects his or her personal characteristics, who he or she really is, or want to be. How they want to see things in their life is largely apparent in their works. If the artist is a filmmaker, you can see such fascinations repeatedly occurring in their films. One can find the same aspect in Maniratnam, one of the most talented filmmakers of Indian cinema. Maniratnam is well known for his distinctive direction style, handling controversial subjects, and visual splendor. However his fascination about rain and train are not widely known by many. His enchantment about rain and train is visible in all his movies, making them integral features in his films. His unique talent of be-charming the audiences by perfect placing of the train and rain is an aspect one cannot see in any other director. Well… let’s briefly explore his rainy world. 

Maniratnam - The magical man

Rain, nature’s most beautiful aspect, is often considered a romantic element in most of the regional movies. But it really matters how it is portrayed and director Maniratnam mastered that art years before. In almost all the movies he has directed, love blossoms between the hero and heroine in the midst of rain, drizzle, mist or foggy environment with a pleasant breeze and music. In the classic Mouna Ragam, Manohar (Karthik) chases Divya (Revathi) and at last wins her heart after a series of mishaps. Their romance is the most interesting part of the film which starts blossoming in a rainy night. In Dil Se, Shahrukh and Manisha meet for the first time in a rainy dawn at a railway station where he falls for her at first sight.

If not romance, then its violence and racy emotions heavily supported by rain, as in Thalapathy in which Rajini’s character thrashes goons in a rainy night, one of superstar’s most heroic intro scenes. The emotional encounters usually take place with a great support rain. The song Evano Oruvan Vaasikkiran in Alaipayuthe where Karthick (R. Madhavan) searches his lover Sakthi (Shalini) in the backdrop of drizzle and breeze and wailing winds has one of the finest emotions with soulful voice from the late singer Swarnalatha. Simply poetic..!! 

A love-sick maddy in Alaipayuthe

Mani’s last flick Raavanan has a gloomy and drizzling environment throughout as it is set in hilly region. Not only romance and emotional scenes, songs in his film are also usually set in rain, for example andhi mazhai megam from Nayagan, Kannaikatti kollathe from Iruvar, the former film considered as one of the greatest films. His fascination about rain doesn’t simply end here. When most tamil movie heroes have intro songs, he gives her heroines intro song, letting them dance in rain. Teenagers in 80s were crazy about the film Mouna Raagam where a dance number is done by Revathi in the song megam vandadho. Another lucky star to dance in rain is Aishwarya Rai in the film Guru in the song barso re.

 

Aishwarya Rai in Guru

Another fascination of the ace director is the portrayal of trains in his films. The vivacious song Chaiya Chaiya in Dil Se is performed by SRK on top of a train. raja rajathi rajan indha song from Agni natchathiram, one of the most performed songs in many college cultural events, was also set in train. Not only songs, some of the crucial scenes also take place in trains. The opening scene of Thalapathy is the most crucial scene in the film where a new born is abandoned in a goods carrier, a soulful and painful scene with whistling train adding more power to it. A very emotional climax in Mouna Ragam, a tension building climax in Raavanan where Dev questioning her wife Raagini’s (Aishwarya) infidelity, Velu (Kamal) sending away his children for their safety in Nayagan, and love proposal in Alaipayuthe were also some noteworthy shots set in train.

Chaiya chaiya (Dil Se)

Maddy's proposal to Shalini in Alaipayuthe

For those who haven’t seen his movies or only a few, you’d be surprised to know this fact if you give a close observation, like how I was surprised.  This close observation also reveals a fact about how he loves women or how he wants to see young women. In most of his films, the leading ladies have same attitude, energy, fun-loving, secretive and unconditionally good characterizations. Anyone who is an ardent fan of Maniratnam, or fond of romantic movies would’ve surely observed his magic with train and rain. Expecting his magic in his upcoming film Kadal…

Read More