Glorious colours
Rang De Basanti
Director: Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra
Cast: Aamir Khan, Alice Patten,
Kunal Kapoor, Sharman Joshi, Siddharth, Soha Ali Khan
Pataudi, Atul Kulkarni, Mohan Agashe, Anupam Kher,
Kirron Kher, Waheeda Rehman, Om Puri, K.K. Raina, Steven
Mckintosh, Lekh Tandon, (R. Madhavan)
9/10
Take a bow, Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra. At this point of time, it may sound too
inquilaabi and raise too many eyebrows to prop Rang De Basanti right up there
near Black, but let’s stick our neck out: go ahead, you can put the black hood
over our head, but in Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra is another Sanjay Leela Bhansali.
After Black, it’s Basanti.
Mehra’s film isn’t just about history; cinema history in the years to come
will also read Rang De Basanti as another masterly written chapter.
A decade back, music magician A.R. Rahman had come out with a modernday
version of Vandemataram and which had blazed its way up the charts. The
kneejerk reaction was that it was sacrilege, catering to the rising trend of
remixes. But very tellingly, Rahman explained that it was necessary to jazz up
the great old Vandemataram and reach it to the younger generations. And he was
bull’s-eye right.
Mehra has done exactly that in film format and interestingly, Rahman is also
the music director of Rang De Basanti. At the first level, it is the story of
Bhagat Singh once again. But using technique and technology, he transforms it
to the story of Daljit Singh aka DJ — and pagdis off especially to Mehra,
Rensil D’Silva, Prasoon Joshi and Kamlesh Pandey’s jaw-dropping
script/screenplay/dialogue; and Binod Pradhan’s awesome cinematography. Mehra
puts his arm on the shoulders of the young guns of India and talks to them in
their tongue, yaaaar, and brings out the Bhagat Singh, Rajguru, Bismil and
Chandrashekhar Azad in them.
Mehra is a man of guts and his conviction and passion also make him a willing
shaheed to his art and craft. By adopting a film-within-film format, that too
partially, and not in the conventional format as we have seen in so many of our
art filmmakers, leading up to a kind of political thriller, Mehra hands over
his safe and smooth ride ticket and treads instead a creative minefield. And
comes off with absolutely flying colours, Basanti being only one of them.
Then, there is the starcast. Each one of them fits the mould so snugly that
you feel like snuggling up to each of them, whether it is the best Brit in
Bollywood, Alice Patten (Tumhaari maa ki aankh, Alice!), or this unknown entity
(soldier, we nearly said), Siddharth; whether it is the nothing-particular yet
so herself Soha Ali Khan Pataudi, or the totally adorable Madhavan; whether the
as-natural-as-nature Kirron Kher or the little-over-the top Atul Kulkarni (who
looks a little older than perhaps required).
And then there is Aamir Khan. The overplayed intensity of Mangal Pandey is,
thankfully, all gone, along with the handlebar moustache. So easy, so relaxed,
so ‘it’, just like the chemistry among the pals and the gori mem.
What else can we say, Mehra man, behn de takke?
Anil Grover
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1060203/asp/etc/story_5789072.asp
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