Listen... Amaya

Amaya Krishnamoorthy (Swara Bhaskar) is what her mother calls – a free spirit.  She is a modern day working woman.  One who harbours hopes of writing a book one day – hopefully sooner than later.  As luck would have it, she finds a reason to write sooner.  He boss makes a pass at her and she leaves her job.  After “One Tight Slap” across the bosses face of course.

Amaya’s mother is Leela Krishnamoorthy (Deepti Naval) who runs a café in the heart of New Delhi.  It is called “Book a Coffee”.  It is one of the more popular joints in the city.  Because people could come in alone but leave with at least one new friend, if not more.  One such person is Jayant Sinha (Farooq Sheikh).

 

Jayant is retired and is following his passion – photography.  He gets along immensely well with Amaya and when the office incident occurs, they hit upon a plan to write their first book together.  And the project called “Busy Day At the  Bazaar “ (based on Amaya’s first write up) starts in the by lanes of Old Delhi.

 

But, the project is about to take a back seat to everything because Amaya maybe a modern girl with the values that are associated with the 21^st Century but when it comes to accepting a relationship between Jayant and Leela, she moves back to the 18^th.  Leela has been single for a while and Jayant is genuinely in love with her.  But its not going to be as easy as just informing Amaya. 

 

Listen… Amaya is a strong film made on a topic that is still considered quite taboo across the country.  How can 2 elderly people fall in love? Especially if they have children to take care of? And more often than not, the elder allows her/his aspiration to be compromised in favour of the happiness of the child.

 

The movie is very simple.  But despite the simplicity it is very well made.  Avinash Kumar Singh pays a lot of attention to detail.  However, he does miss a point or two especially with some ill placed songs and editing that could have done with quite a bit of improvement. 

 

Having said that, the performances of a pair that gave us 7 fabulous movies in the early 80s, is as unadulterated as ever.  Nearly 30 years after their last movie together (Faasle), Farooq Sheikh and Deepti Naval come together to act in a manner than can be best described as effortless. 

 

And lets not take anything away from Swara Bhaskar who has come up with a brilliant performance as well.  She has, in my opinion, always been under rated and relegated to secondary rolls such as those in Tanu Weds Manu.  She may not be mainstream but she is a superb actress.  Like the pair she is working with.

 

Listen… Amaya is definitely the best movie released from Bollywood in 2013.  It was made in 2011 it would seem (as per Wikipedia).  Wonder why it took so long to release.  Better late than never I guess.  7 on 10. And don’t miss that Beautiful song – Mann Ki Patang – by Indraneel Hariharan all the way to the end.

 

Trailer on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XeHLyGV0jaA