Friday, February 17, 2006

RDB - Thoughts

**SPOILER ALERT**

Disclaimer: This post is not meant to be one of those controversial reviews of 'Rang De Basanti' that abound in blogosphere. These are merely my thoughts, as a member of the generation that supposedly 'awakens' in the movie. Oh, and it won't make much sense if you haven't seen the movie.

1. I wonder if the director wanted to create a youth movie or an idealistic movie. Perhaps he wanted to merge the two, in which case, the merging was not done very well. The first half is the youth part, with the sort of music that the youth likes, (though I must admit, the music is good - even a person as out of touch with Bollywood music as I am had heard most of the songs, albeit out-of-tune and badly sung by my unmusical friends) and the second half is the unrealistic, idealistic, stupid part.

2. Unrealistic, idealistic, stupid? Certainly. Noone but the stupidest would do what the protagonists in the movie did. There are people I know - Delhi University students just like the people in the movie - who feel as strongly about corruption and female foeticide and all the other issues plaguing our country, but they take out processions and marches. Yes, perhaps the processions have little effect, but then what effect did what the characters in the movie did have? Sure, at the end, they show interviews with college students, in which the tagline of a generation awakening supposedly comes true - but does anyone think that all these people are going to do anything? I feel strongly about India's vote against Iran. I don't think that we should vote with the US, never mind "enlightened national interest". But that does not mean that I'm going to shoot the External Affairs Minister. (Not that we have one at the moment.) Sure, the shooting of the Defence Minister makes for a good scene, but come on - it's unrealistic.

3. I really liked the camaraderie between the members of the gang in the first half of the movie. But I thought the parallels between the members of the Independence movement and these youngsters were too heavily drawn. Especially the Aslam-Lakshman bit at the end, when they die together.

4. And why oh why oh why was India Habitat Centre made out to be Delhi University? Isn't the DU North Campus beautiful enough for them? Did they have to go the rarified intellectual-snob air of the Habitat Centre to get enough privacy to shoot? It's an insult to the brilliant campus that we have that they chose to go elsewhere.

Other than that, though, the locales were spectacular. Where ever it was that they shot, the places were brilliant. In fact, I believe one of the places was Jodhpur.

And what did other people think of the India Gate scene? That a bunch of insensitive young drunks would find India Gate arousing their latent patriotism is something I find hard to believe. Perhaps it was meant to portray their insensitivity? The loud music, the exaggerated salutes, the drunkenness?

5. What was Om Puri doing in the movie, anyway? He was brilliant as usual, of course, but wasted, with about one and a half scenes to his name.

6. The acting was brillaint. And it's not even Aamir Khan - one of the few mainstream Bollywood heroes who, IMO, can act - who walks away with the glory. Every actor plays his part well; every character is brought to life - from the good-natured Aslam to the playful Sukhi to the sensible Sonia to the brooding Karan Singhania with his secret heartache, not to mention the Hindutva proponent turned actor Lakshman Pandey.

7. I was rather thrilled to spot a guy from my college in the movie. He appears in one of the early scenes, in which auditions are being held for the roles of the freedom fighters in the movie, and does a rather funny Shah Rukh Khan imitation. I guess belonging to one of the best dramatics societies in DU does have its advantages.

8. I probably ought to write this post again, with a bit more venom thrown in. Why do people feel that, just because they're young students watching a movie in a group, they have to behave like total clowns? The actor on screen says, "Mein apko kuch bataoon?" and there are shouts of "Haan ji, please, boliye." This happens in every scene.

9. I also had glimpses of the insensitivity of today's youth that the movie portrays. There is this sequence in which Rajguru and Bhagat Singh are holding a hunger strike in order to get paper and pens for writing. Rajguru puts their demand forward and is clouted mid-sentence by one of the British officers. The scene earns laughs from some of the audience. And that too not the sort of quickly stifled laugh that is a reflex response to something that the brain initially processes as slapstick, but is not; a proper belly laugh with no embarrassment, telling me that these people find it amusing that Indian freedom fighters got slapped around (and worse) by the Britishers.

10. This movie has been hailed by a lot of people as a watershed in Bollywood movies. I'm not sure I agree, but perhaps there is a need for such a movie in the context of India today. We do need to be reminded of what people sacrificed for us to enjoy the freedom that we are enjoying today. More than that, we need to know what it was that drove those people - patriotism of a kind that none of us shall ever know.
• • •

9 comments:

The Priestess said...

Random blog?! it is YOUR BLOG. how can i not visit it daily :P

I felt more like getting drunk and driving in open jeeps on the wide delhi roads than doing somethg for the country.

"rarified intellectual-snob air of the Habitat Centre" well put!

Ad astra per aspera said...

Hear! Hear!
Well said.
I agree with you Jazz.

clemenza said...

jasmine

a rocking review on RDB

i agree on the India Gate scene...where a bunch of drunks salute...me felt like kicking their ba115...

for me...moral of RDB...

"dont wake up...if you do wake up...you will get ur a55 whopped !!!"


Cheers,
tECHJ

PS: BMW...for the uninitiated and the unmarried is Baby Making Weather ;-)

Pradyot said...

:)) Very similar to my review of the movie. Have to totally agree with The Pristess... after watching this movie we went for late dinner at food court in Habitat Center. Next weekend was spent high-speed-biking to Suraj Kund! The meaning of the movie was totally lost...

Anonymous said...

Nice review...read a lot on the same lines in other reviews on many other blogs...
And though I agree with you, yet somehow a very important part of the film for me was how edible Sidharth Narayan is :P

Jade said...

The Priestess: What wide Delhi roads? I certainly didn't recognize any of the roads that they were driving in, except in the India Gate scene, of course.

And two compliments in one comment? Wow! :D

Ad Astra Per Aspera: Thank you, thank you. :)

tECHJ: Well, I didn't feel like kicking their balls, since most of them were too delectable (:P), but yeah, I get what you mean. And BMW? Jeez, the things guys come up with!

Pradyot: So you're living through the first half of the movie, eh? So next weekend will be spent shooting the Defence minister? ;)

Anon: Please please tell me who you are, because I thought the Siddharth guy was the yummiest of the lot, too. And I thought I must be crazy, since it's so obviously the guy who plays Aslam who's the hottest. Am I glad to find someone who thinks like me!

Tarantismo said...

my thoughts egsackly..hic..!!!

Anonymous said...

Though there are parts of the review that I agree with, like Om Puri being wasted and college punks yelling throughout in the theatre, there are some others that seem a bit dodgy.

Unrealistic climax? Yes... but only because nobody in their "supposedly proper" minds, today would have the balls to pull the plugs on a high profile personality like that.
And the scene of the drunken salute was my favourite... because the whole point was to show the pseudo-patriotic feeling that the youth carries in their hearts when in reality they don't know what patriotism is.
Meanwhile, as I come across another one of these RDB hate reviews... I'm left wondering how everyone can be judging of it, but still cry their hearts out on the latest posh-romantic floss that feeds us recycled idealism to the dozen...

Ciao!

N. said...

Nicely reviewed.
Better than the so many other reviews that unnecessarily keep ranting about the ending and nothing else.