Rang De...truly rocks Mayank Shekhar
FILM: Rang de basanti DIRECTOR: Rakeysh Mehra ACTORS: Aamir Khan, Alice Pattern, Soha Ali Khan Rating : **** An Outlook magazine cover story, not too many years ago, lamenting the state of the urban Indian youth, had summed up the catty piece with a riposte from a yuppie hairstylist in Mumbai. Justifying why certain species eat their young (!), the writer had asked a hip, south Bombay salon girl, if she knew who Modi was. This was roughly right after the Gujarat riots. Yet, all that the word 'Modi' could remind the befuddled young stylist of, was, a Xerox machine! Of course the article on dunder-headed awareness levels of the metropolitan Gen-next appeared a tad exaggerated to me. Until, almost as a coincidence, not many months later, I had my jaws hang in mid-air. When a St Xavier's College Economics under-grad, who I'd tutor once in a while, told me he was a socialist. Because he went to too many parties. No; I am really not kidding. Neither does the timely premise of Rang De Basanti. Which, like Mani Ratnam's Yuva, aims to mirror a confused, callous collective that's reconciled itself to individualism. Which sees itself separate from the goings-on of a so-called 'real-world' – starkly cynical of the maladies of a welfare state; or, how they can part-take in propounding a possible cure. Mehra's exceptionally etched and enacted foursome – Aamir, Siddharth (the actor who played Vivek Oberoi's role in Yuva's Tamil version), Sharman Joshi and Kunal Kapoor, besides a supposedly sensible Soha Ali Khan - belong to Delhi University, a setting that deserved far more justice than this chic flick affords it. Actually, they all once belonged to the same campus. Aamir's central character can at best look 30, albeit the incredibly neat make-over. Hailing from a hot-bed that once gave up intelligent collegians, to selfless Naxal politics in the 70s (the subject of Sudhir Mishra's recent, Hazaaron Khwaishen Aisi), we now see Y2K kids who couldn't care less about anything but their hollow, pleasure-seeking existences. Viewers of CNN/BBC may recall Chris Patten, an old British Governor of Hong Kong, crying on live television as the island was handed over to China in 1997. Well, Patten's daughter Alice gets to weep here in public, as a sympathetic Sue, a filmmaker who just cannot come to terms with how the actors of her movie (the above-mentioned happy-go-lucky foursome) just cannot fathom their characters, their motives, or the relevance and seriousness of her project. It hurts, given that they all belong to the same age-group that gave India some of its fieriest, fearless freedom fighters - Chandrashekhar Azad, Rajguru, Bhagat Singh… -- the subject of Sue's film (within this film). Playing the parts however, gradually, the said actors sense a transformation in their personal beliefs and value systems. And eventually, their lives get intertwined with the roles they are supposed to render. Like the revolutionaries in Sue's script, or the lead-man in Farhan Akhtar's Lakshya, the young protagonists finally find a cause worth dying for. A cause inspired by Air Force pilot Abhijit Gadgil (played here by Madhavan) who lost his life due to technical errors on a flight training exercise in 2001. You may, or may not be entirely convinced by Mehra's phenomenally filmed, but rather far-fetched grand finale. But to me, it somehow worked, just as the competently and subtly structured screenplay (Renzil De'Silva, Mehra) that begins to breathe a life of its own. Thanks to a brilliant piece of photography (Binod Pradhan) that never draws attention to itself, and a sizzling score (A R Rahman) that does. And above all, no doubt in my mind, Aamir, who exudes a rare candour, irresistible charm and characteristic charisma to take an inspirational subject to an altogether another level. Throwing caution to the winds may not be the best way to recommend a film that bears the weight of such huge expectations. But I think I can safely submit that unlike Mehra's first work (Aks), Rang De Basanti, by and large, manages to meet every minute of the hype around it. You rarely get to hear that for a Hindi film these days. http://www.mumbaimirror.com/nmirror/mmpaper.asp?sectid=10&articleid=12720062185331127200621838500 Explore, Experience, Enjoy A.R.Rahman - The Man, The Music, The Magic. Only at arrahmanfans.com - The definitive A.R.Rahman e-community. Homepage: http://www.arrahmanfans.com Admin: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To Subscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] To Unsubscribe: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/arrahmanfans/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
