Heroine

Dear Mr. Madhur Bhandarkar – a few pointers that I picked up from Heroine

1. What is the necessity of getting in so many characters into the movie to support your main cast? After a while, I actually lost count of the number of characters. Aryan (Rampal) is boyfriend 1. Angad (Randeep Hooda) is boyfriend 2. Rashidbhai (Govind Namdeo) is secretary. Pramita (Shahana) is lesbian fling. Mummy (Lilette Dubey) is having affair with politician. Rhea Mehra (Mugdha Ghodse), Shaheen (Pooja Chopra)and Gayatri Reddy (Meenakshi – I think) are competitors. Tapan Da (Ranveer Shorey) is an eccentric Bengali director. Abbas (Sanjay Suri) is the hot shot lead actor. Zara (Shilpi Sharma) is Abbas’ wife!!! Like WTF??? The average movie watcher would go half psycho by the time s/he finishes the first 45 mins.

2. And why is everyone after ruining Randeep Hooda’s image as an actor by forcing him to over act like his life depended on it?

3. Arjun Rampal is one of the – if not THE MOST – constipated in this performance of his. He was always challenged but this time the struggle was super obvious.

4. Why in the blazes would you make up Kareena to look even more heinous than she looks normally? Seriously – some of the shots with mascara running down her face made me believe that Heroine was a horror flick ala Vikram Bhatt.

5. And as if that weren’t sufficient, your actual run time is 2 hrs 29 mins!!!! What???? Seriously???? SERIOUSLY???? Why do you have to stretch all your stories to an extent that it starts competing with Ramanand Sagar’s Ramayan – in my time it was called the Height of Elasticity.

6. And what makes you believe that everyone and their uncle and their mother in the movie industry is a chain smoker? The “Cigarette Smoking is injurious to health” disclaimer at the beginning was apt for Heroine. There was barely a shot in which there was no cigarette. Now don’t get me wrong – I am a smoker myself but with so much smoke around, I would have contracted cancer even by watching. And if the idea is true then at least try and get your actors and actresses to smoke naturally and not like they have been forced into it.

7. For future reference – Please do not use terms such as Bi-Polar disorder loosely. It is a serious psychiatric issue. Mahie Arora (Kareena Kapoor) showed any indication of a “frenzied state (as described by Wikipedia)” probably only once in the entire movie. Eccentric – yes. Bipolar disorder – you fell way short of that. – not the first time you are doing it.

8. But fear not. The movie is not fraught with only bad points. There are some high points in acting for certain. I thought the support cast – no matter how unnecessary they were – actually put in a solid effort. Govind Namdeo, Shahana Goswami, Divya Dutta, Helen and even Ranveer Shorey as the eccentric Bengali director were all superb.

9. So much that they kind of overshadowed a performance from Kareena that was much better than her usual performances to date. Maybe she really took a leaf from the role of Tarannum that she played in the movie. All this despite the sad make up. Overall, a decent watch, despite all the negatives.

10. Yet again, you have delivered an average flick that will be received reasonably at the Box Office, make some money and maybe get a national award (much as I would hate Kareena pipping Vidya Balan’s performance in Kahaani).

11. Will the audience get bored? No. But is it essential to watch on big screen – No again. 5 on 10.

Thanks & Regards

An avid movie watcher and a hopeful that someday you will deliver a superb movie

Watch the trailer on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWB_h91HqP0

I Am Afia Megha Abhimanyu Omar

I Am Afia, Megha, Abhimanyu, Omar. Not the name of one movie. Not the names of the lead characters either. But 4 different stories. Each dealing with a topic that is extremely sensitive and has been portrayed quite boldly on screen. 4 short stories with a minor extent of intertwining through the appearance of one stray character somewhere in the story who is the lead character in the other. I Am is directed by Onir, who seems to have finally got his sense of direction in place. He seemed to have lost interest in film making with Bas Ek Pal and I was dead certain that he has lost his ability to direct with Sorry Bhai!!! It would seem that our man, who coincidentally was born in Bhutan, seems to have found his groove. Now, I haven’t seen My Brother… Nikhil yet and therefore am ill equipped to comment on whether he had it in the first place. But with I Am, Onir seems to have pushed back his detractors just that little bit. In a little under 100 minutes he has been ably supported with screenplay by Urmi Juvekar of “Oye Lucky Lucky Oye” fame and Merle Kroeger.


The first story is - Afia (Nandita Das), a 30+ woman whose only goal in life seems to be motherhood. Her husband, however, isn’t ready for the concept of fatherhood. While he keeps stalling her attempts, he is also happily cheating on her with another woman. A few months after he leaves Afia, she finds him with a visibly pregnant wife – shattering her even further. That’s when she decides to take the route of artificial insemination.

Afia’s friend Megha (Juhi Chawla) is clearly against the concept. But has problems of her own. Her ancestral place in Srinagar has to be sold off and she is extremely circumspect about going there today. A Kashmiri Pandit by birth, the scars of being forced out of her own land and leading a life that was far from enviable has built a sense of disgust and angst against the very people who she grew up with. She does build up the courage to fly over and complete the formalities but all through the visit, she is nothing but crabby towards Rubina (Manisha Koirala) who used to be her closest friend.

Afia’s business associate Abhimanyu (Sanjay Suri) is quite shocked when she asks him to donate sperm for the procedure. Abhi has been bought up in a household where his step father (Anurag Kashyap) would abuse him when his mother was away. Abhi is now bisexual and doesn’t quite value relationships as much as he should.

Abhi was involved in a minor fling at one time with Jay (Rahul Bose). Jay has been a victim of a con job at the hands of Omar (Arjun Mathur) and a cop (Abhimanyu Singh) in the days preceding amendment of Article 377.

The usually popular names – Manisha, Juhi, Nandita Das and Sanjay Suri falter with their performances all through the movie. But the dependable Rahul Bose comes up with a solid performance yet again. Ditto for Purab Kohli who is fast growing into a mature actor who can comfortably hold his own. I do hope to see more of Purab in the coming days cause I believe his best is yet to come. Rounding off the cast is probably one of India’s best actors today – Abhimanyu Singh – who yet again delivers a splendid performance in the small but pivotal role of a corrupt cop who abuses his position not just for sexual favours of a gay kind but also for extortion. What disappointed me with Juhi and Manisha – and I guess they aren’t to blame for it – was the obvious struggle to speak Kashmiri. Now I am no language expert per se but I do understand when people are struggling to speak a tongue that is not native to them.

In a nut shell, I Am is a well made movie with some good performances and definitely worth a dekko. But for certain only meant for the mature audience. I was honestly not surprised with the laughter that erupted in the hall during the stories of Abhimanyu and Omar. We live in a country of literates but not educated. Watch it if you can. Don’t know if it is still playing though. wouldn’t be surprised if it isn’t. 6 on 10 from my side.

Watch the trailer at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdWQZFFGdBA