Author: Anshuman Rawat

Excerpt: In, what seems to be, yet another attempt to sell ”Indian Exotica” to western audiences, ”Road, Movie” becomes a largely contrived and entirely self-indulgent cinematic exercise. If you really must go on a journey today, take some other road.

Spoiler Alert: Since the film is more about a collage of instances than a story, the review mentions a few scenes in their entirety. If you wish to not know anything except the verdict, you may leave this page now.

Review: It has become almost fashionable to have logos of many international film festivals on Indian movie posters these days. One thread, however, that binds them together is that irrespective of the cinematic quality of the ”festival appreciated” (often with “5-minute long standing ovations”), most of these films exhibit an unsaid lack of confidence with regards the box office.

In the case of ”Road, Movie”, the fear is quite understandable – for neither the ”Road” (read “the journey”) looks for real, nor the ”Movie”.

”Road, Movie” presents most things, which the western audience  (only at the festival circuit at that; rest still doesn”t care), look forward to seeing in an Indian fare – vibrant colours; poverty; a distinctly distant life and way of life et al. It even has a widow of rural Rajasthan (played by Tannishtha Chatterjee) break into an impromptu, possessed rendition of a folk song on the first night of her journey with three strangers in truck. “Oh, such an exquisite piece of Indian folk music” – someone in Berlin might have uttered. But Dev Benegal (the writer-director) would have been shattered beyond redemption, if he had witnessed the audience reaction to that portion, here in one of the major cities of India.

Maybe, the reaction was exaggerated because the film had already lost the audience by then!

Or was the audience ”exaggeration” was quite in sync with the film”s exaggerated definition of ”chic”. Sample this: Abhay Deol, driving a truck, is stopped by a dhaba kid (played by Mohammed Faizal Usmani), in the middle of nowhere. He then gives Abhay tea and biscuits. When Abhay makes a face after tasting the tea, the kid remarks – “Toh yeh STARBUCKS hai kya”!

Maybe when uneducated kids, who work at tea stalls by rural India highways, know their CCD from Starbucks, they become worthy enough to earn appreciation at film festivals! “Oh look, the kid is so poor and uneducated, but he is so intelligent and knows so much”, did we hear a western lady say that?

The above two are only a couple of an entire ”road” of contrived situations.

The biggest of them all is a sequence about a ”Mela” – right in the middle of absolute nowhere. Maybe this author is intellectually challenged, by can anyone please inform him (and the entire audience, with which he watched this film) whether the ”Mela” was for real or a dream sequence! Ideally, when one reads a statement like that, the instinct is to give up on the person who utters that. You may do so for this review. Unfortunately, however, for the makers of ”Road, Movie”, the audience too decisively gives up after that sequence.

This is not a vindictive rant, but one must add one more of illustration of how the film meanders in and out of nothingness: A ferocious leader of the water mafia (played by Yashpal Sharma), who is also mentioned to have killed the husband of the film”s heroine, hunts the ”road team” down, captures them, takes them to his work site, beats them and then lets them off in exchange of a few bottles of hair oil! Yes, you read that right. Apparently, after Abhay Deol massaged his head with the oil, combed his hair and told him of the oil adding to male virility, the water mafia don “becomes a man”. “Maine aapko mard banaya hai”, Abhay Deol tells the goon – if you must know exact dialogue!

A rural Rajasthan widow walking away with some stranger kid after traveling and making love to a truck driver, as if nothing ever happened; a water mafia man talking of corporate philosophy …

The only saving grace of the film is Satish Kaushik. Though hindered by abstracts, he delivers a seasoned performance as a mechanic-cum-showbiz passionate old man. He looks the part; talks, walks and acts the part with the ease of a master.

What however his performance does is that it tells the audience the inadequacies of others. Tannishtha Chatterjee looks and acts more like a hottie doing the ”ethnic round” on ramp than a Rajasthani widow. Mohammed Faizal Usmani does better than her, but still does not manage to convince.

That brings us to Abhay Deol. How many more movies would he do in which he plays the cool dude – irrespective of the socio-cultural roots of his character? He looks and acts precisely like the Abhay Deol that the audience came expecting. Never mind if an actor is loud or subtle, if he or she knows just one way of delivering, he would end up being predictable. We are sure that Abhay Deol is way too good to end up becoming that. Or lets say, we hope so.

Dev Benegal should take a call on the kind of films that he wants to make. Because both Split Wide Open and Road, Movie belong to the “neither here, nor there” category. He looks confused at the moment. Maybe he should just make it for festivals and not worry about box office release. Or maybe he should move around the country a little more and meet some real people.

Verdict: Wait for the DVD to come out in the market, if you must.

Excerpt: Ever played a game of three cards, where the first card provides undefined promise; the second card makes a potentially victorious pair with the first; but the last one, just as your heart longs to hit the jackpot, lets the first two cards down, decisively?Teen Patti stands for an enticing promise that never quite delivers beyond threatening to do that.

Review: Probably bound by self-inflicted demands of plurality and morality, the writers of Teen Patti (Shivkumar Subramaniam and Leena Yadav) try to wade through an ocean of cinematic opportunities in all directions, till it becomes clear even to them that the only way to end the stylish zig-zag is to drop anchor right in the middle of deep sea.

In Teen Patti, the plurality act is played out by trendy music (by Salim-Suleiman), glitzy cinematography (by Aseem Bajaj) and the selection of often irresistibly sensuous bodies to, firstly, support Bachchan”s old and Madhavan”s ample frames and secondly to offset the often-abstract-and-aimless interaction between Bachchan and Sir Ben Kingsley. The morality act is provided at the climax via, once again, by an Amitabh Bachchan speech – probably to put all that goes earlier in the movie in perspective!

Unfortunately, neither the chic tools nor politically correct explanations work in totality.

In the end Teen Patti is a film that could have been a razor-sharp, pulsating film devoid of any reasoning or an incisively intelligent film full of cerebrum. The key phrase, however is, “could have been“. It is not.

Teen Patti is a film that is better than the majority of trash that we see everyday, but fails – by some distance – to become a film that we can watch any day.

Teen Patti is about a soon-to-retire math genius Venkat Subramaniam (Amitabh) and his research paper on probability. A simple game of ”teen patti” on Internet convinces him of the potency of his findings. When he shares his thoughts with a fellow lecturer Shantanu (Madhavan) and 4 of his students, he gets sucked into the bait of trying the theory in a real life situation – across underground gambling dens. But before anyone can utter ”mathematics”, all of them get caught in a whirlpool of greed, deceit, ransom and finally, murder.

While the premise looks fresh and interesting, it doesn”t quite pan out that way.

Some of the reasons are unconvincing acting by new actors, often verbose moral talks, sprinkling of known actors (Ajay Devgan, Jackie Shroff, Tinnu Anand, Shakti Kapoor, Ranjit etc) with characters that barely look more than annoying caricatures and, most of all, less than purposeful script and direction (by Leena Yadav).

But what makes up for the above is the freshness of story / scenario, stylish execution of frames and an impactful performance by Amitabh.

And that is the problem with this film. Even in the “impactful performance by Amitabh”, one can clearly ask – “How come he never, ever exhibits any south Indian accent?” Well, maybe because he never lived in his native state. The example is a mere illustration of how nothing fits to the ”perfect T” in the film.

Madhavan is a huge star and a very competent actor. But if it was not told clearly, and enough number of times, he would have been misunderstood for one of his own students. In fact, it might even be a “Five Years Later” portion of 3 Idiots.

Ben Kingsley is an utter waste in the film. So is the special appearance by Ajay Devgan, which does nothing to the film – except making it feel long and labourious. Jackie Shroff”s portion in the film is a disgrace to his own “Hero” legacy.

The newcomers should thank their stars for getting to work with Bachchan, Sir Ben Kingsley and Madhavan. All of them, except Vaibhav Talwar (as Abbas) look raw and need to work on their skills.

What makes the film tick at all times is some pleasing cinematography by Aseem Bajaj. But if camera were the only thing, YouTube would have long killed cinema.

As for the two most important aspects of the film, script and direction, what better illustration can sum up the confusion than the putting together of Amitabh Bachchan and Sir Ben Kingsley – for actually nothing. In fact, and this may seem an exaggeration of sort, Teen Patti can still be the same film, even if you completely remove Sir Ben and all his portions.

And if you do a similar treatment to portions like Mrs Kale”s (Mita Vashisht) scene with Venkat, along with Ajay Devgan”s and Shakti Kapoor”s portions, you might actually have a much tighter and impressive film.

Get the drift?

Verdict: Teen Patti falls short of the promise it held – but can be viewed once, for the sake of trying out a fresh and different story.

In this issue’s column, we’ll spend the entire time discussing an issue with the help of an Urdu feature film from Pakistan, Khuda Kay Liye.

Directed by Shoaib Mansoor, Khuda Kay Liye revolves around a young Pakistani man named Mansoor who goes to the United States for higher education. During his study years, the tragic events of 9/11 turn the World Trade Center into dust. Chaotic investigations and arrests engulf the United States. Mansoor too gets arrested by the American authorities, although he is innocent of wrongdoing. The experience leaves Mansoor severly traumatized.

Meanwhile, his younger brother Sarmad is encouraged by an old friend, Shershah to cease his musical career in favour of the “straight path of God”.

Mansoor and Sarmad’s uncle arrives from the UK with their only cousin Mary (Mariam) who wanted to marry her non-Muslim boyfriend back in the UK, against her father’s wishes.

When they arrive in Pakistan, Shershah trucks them to their village in a tribal area near Afghanistan, forces Mary to marry Sarmad, and leaves her there. She tries to escape but Shershah and Sarmad follow her and bring her back to the village.

This film also stars Naseeruddin Shah in a short but powerful cameo. He plays a Muslim scholar who clarifies oft misunderstood and misinterpreted tenets of Islam during a court case.

So, why are we discussing the film here?

Well, apart from the fact that it is a well made film, the most notable feature surrounding the film is that it was made and released amidst severe criticism – often laced with threats of dire consequences – by the orthodox Islamic forces of that country.

It also amply demonstrates how media and creative arts can really do their job of highlighting issues and starting a dialogue, if supported by the rulers of the nation.

Apart from the raging dialogue about terrorism and religion, the film’s many themes include the role of music in Islam and the balance of Muslim values with moderate Western enlightenment.

While audiences and film critics loved the film, the religious clergy slammed the film for manipulating the teachings of Islam and its scholars to suit the theme of the film.

There were serious differences between the makers of the film and the religious figures, but there was no violence from either side.

So, basically, Khuda Kay Liye is an example of a situation where a film challenges the status quo of a society and helps start a dialogue by bringing all the various viewpoints. Can there ever be a greater success for any form of art?
Pakistan and its films may or may not ever mean anything to us, but what this example teaches us is that if you wish, you can have a socially-relevant film in a terrorism-infested dictatorship. But, if you don’t deserve it, you won’t get it even in the most remarkable example of democracy.

Let’s ponder over our cinema and values all over again.