FTII People

review by Vinoo
Language : Malayalam
Director : Shaji N Karun

‘Piravi’ should be counted among one of our best films. It tells the story of an old man’s, Raghava Chakyar’s, wait for his son, Raghu. Raghu, an Engineering student, goes mysteriously missing from his college. He does not turn up for his sister’s engagement ceremony. His father sits in wait hoping his son will come back one day. Finally he learns from a newspaper report that Raghu has been taken into custody by the police. Raghava Chakyar goes to Trivandrum to meet the Minister and then the Police Inspector and finally returns with nothing but reassurances. He keeps the news to himself so as not to bring grief to his wife and daughter. The daughter meets Raghu’s classmate from who she gets the news of his arrest. She decides to find out what really happened and meets Raghu’s classmates to get details of his arrest. She figures he has been arrested by the police allegedly for being a naxalite sympathizer, and specifically for directing a play that mocked one of the ministers in the then cabinet in Kerala. She returns home and tells her father that waiting for Raghu is futile, to which her father angrily responds – “Forget him? How can I as his father, she as his mother and you as his sister forget him? Well… how can we?” (Bad translation that). His daily routine of fording the river to get to the bus stand and wait until the last bus has left before he returns home really kills you. The film ends on that note, with the father expectantly looking for the last bus with the profound hope that his son will return today. The emotions of the father is conveyed so very well through the eyes of Premji. Raghu never appears in the entire length of the film, except as childhood memories. Thanks to my cousin for sourcing this film from Switzerland. Could have shared this if only it had English subtitles.

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Review by Vinoo

Language : English / Hindi
Director : Jaideep Varma

This one will go right alongside ‘Buena Vista Social Club’ in my collection. Hats off to Jaideep Varma for a wonderful tribute to, arguably, the best band in the country. The passion with which the group makes their music is nothing short of infectious. The film begins wonderfully with various sounds, street calls, vehicle honks, hawkers singing, all of which could be music if seen the way it should be, culminating in the house where Indian Ocean has been jamming for years making the wonderful music that they are. The inspiration to the music that Indian Ocean makes has been varied, be it the ‘Ma Rewa’ from the people of Narmada, or ‘Kaun’ inspired by Kashmir, or ‘Kandisa’ pulled out from Aramaic, or the wonderful music for ‘Black Friday’ which is definitely one of those films where the soundtrack will be talked of much after the film’s lifetime.

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Review by Vinoo
Language : English
Director : Susan Koch / Jeff Werner
‘Kicking it’ is a documentary on the World Cup for the homeless. 48 countries participate in a World Cup for the homeless in 2006 during which most of the football footage for this film was shot. Started in 2003, by Mel Young and Harald Schmeid, this initiative is simply remarkable. The premise is that a football can change lives. How true! The film follows 7 people from various countries : Jesus (a 62 year old with an alcohol problem, an ex-player for the junior team of Real Madrid, Spain), Slavan (from the streets of St.Petersburg, Russia, Najib, from the Taliban-ruled, war-torn Afghanisthan), Damien and Simon (from the drug rehab centres of Dublin, Ireland), Craig (a homeless from the streets of North Carolina, USA), Alex (a toilet-cleaner, from the slums of Kenya).

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Review by Vinoo
Language : Persian
Director : Abbas Kiarostami

What a movie. If I hadn’t seen it I would have dismissed ‘Shirin’ as pretentious stuff passed off as an experimental film. Here is the gist. Make what you can of it. Abbas Kiarostami experiments with an audience, comprising of 112 Iranian women (and I think I vaguely remember 2 men as well), watching a twelfth century Persian love story, the story of ‘Khosrow and Shirin’. All you see is the face of the audience. This goes on for five mins… ten… twenty… and by then you know that is all you will see for over an hour and a half. All you see is the expression of the women in the audience, who are really us. The expressions tell you the story. There is just the play of light on their faces, and the rich soundtrack that you hear. You almost feel you have seen the love story on screen. The actors have been filmed in fixed-frame close-up I gather. And for Juliette Binoche fans out there her face is one among the many women watching the film and reacting to it: sometimes smiling, sometimes shedding a tear, sometimes trying hard to mask an emotion. Surely was one movie that left an impression at this year’s IFFK. Hats off to the director for even thinking of making something that would seem outrageous unless of course you have seen it. This ran to a full house in Kerala. What more can I say?
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Review by Vinoo

Language : English / French
Director : Ken Loach

‘Looking for Eric’ is the story of how an imaginary Eric Cantona helps his huge fan, Eric Bishop, work his way out of a crisis. Eric Bishop is a middle-aged man working in the franking section of a post office. He has two step-sons who show him no respect whatsoever. His second wife has not contacted him for a while now. Eric is on the verge of committing suicide. During one of his drunken evenings he is high on dope and almost magically his Manchester United celebrity Eric Cantona appears. Eric cantona will serve as an example and will help his fan, Eric, put his life back in order. You get to see some old footage of the genius Eric Cantona playing for Manchester United. I am no great fan of this club but I sure loved Eric cantona and the film. How a Manchester Untited mob sorts all issues and how Eric re-unites with the family forms the rest of the film. Loved watching this one at the IFFK.

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Review by Vinoo

Language : Hindi

Director : Basu Bhattacharya

‘Anubhav’ tells the story of an urban couple. Meeta Sen (Tanuja), a middle-class woman, and Amar Sen (Sanjeev Kumar) a businessman, have been married for six years. Amar is too involved in his business and ignores his wife. Meeta decides to change everything and takes things head on by firing all the house help, save one. Hari (A K Hangal), the house help, is the only one who is witness to the fast breaking up relationship. To make matters worse Shashi (Dinesh Thakur), Meeta’s old boyfriend joins Amar’s office as his secretary. Meeta is not comfortable when he is around and even tries avoiding him. Things come to a break point when Amar overhears Meeta speak with Shashi and realizes that there is a past he doesn’t know about. He confronts her and she says the happiness she had in Shashi’s company in all of a collective six days, when he didn’t even touch her, Amar hasn’t been able to give her in six years of marriage. This shakes him up. And then all ends well with Tanuja playing her role to perfection. The body language and the roles played by Tanuja and Sanjeev Kumar only Basu Bhattacharya could have got out of them. When you watch the movie you feel they are a couple. The intimacy is not staged. Guess that’s what they call ‘On-screen Chemistry’.

If I fell in love with Supriya Pathak in ‘Bazaar’ I fell in love with Tanuja in this one.

This film has some of my favourite songs : ‘Mujhe jaan na kaho meri jaan’, ‘Koi chupke se aake’, ‘Mera dil jo mera hota’ (all by Geeta Dutt my favourite female playback) and ‘Phir kahin koi phool khila’ (Manna Dey). ‘Anubhav’ is part of the trilogy ‘Aavishkar’ (has my favourite Manna Da song ‘Hansne ki chaah ne itna mujhe rulaya hai’, and ‘Grihapravesh’. ‘Anubhav’ was the last film Geeta Dutt sung for. It is believed Geeta took to alcohol, after Guru Dutt’s suicide in 1964, and died of Cirrhosis in 1972.

All the songs except ‘Koi Chupke se aake’ (lyrics by Kapil Kumar I gather) has lyrics by Gulzar. The film has music by Kanu Roy, Geeta Dutt’s brother.

Also watch Basu Bhattacharya’s ‘Teesri Kasam’ (a rare Raj Kapoor favourite of mine), ‘Tumhara Kalloo’, ‘Aavishkar’, ‘Grihapravesh’, ‘Aastha’. The characters in all his films are so well etched out.

Useless trivia : The famous Bengali singer and composer, Subir Sen (of ‘Manzil wohin hai pyar ke’ from ‘Kathputli’ which you will mistake for Hemant Da’s voice) appears as himself in the movie and sings Tagore’s ‘Shei Din Dujone’ which has also been sung by Suraiya as ‘Nain Deewane’.

And just for the record, when Shashi gets dropped off at a theatre the movie playing is Vittorio De Sica’s ‘Sunflower’.

Review written by Vinoo

Language : Marathi
Director : Paresh Mokashi

‘Harishchandrachi Factory’(Harishchandra’s Factory) is the story of the making of India’s first full-length feature film. Dadasaheb Phalke gets to see an English film on the resurrection of Christ. He decides that very day to make a film for Indians, and the obvious decision is to make something about India and its culture. Beginning with his brief experimentation on the germination of a Pea plant he will go on to make a trip to England and will not rest until he makes that first film ‘Raja Harishchandra’ way back in 1913. His occasional trips to the red light area scouting for an actor to play his heroine is hilarious, particularly so his wife saying “Yes! I know he has gone there. So?”. Brilliant performances by the entire cast, particularly Phalke (Nandu Madhav), his wife (Vibhawari Deshpande) and the kids. A Biopic told in a way that is very interesting and funny at the same time. This film is definitely a very well-made tribute to Dadasaheb Phalke. The Director’s (Paresh Mokashi) theatre background is very evident and he has adapted very well the style onto film. This film stood out as one of the better films at the IFFK 2009, Trivandrum. The ‘Factory’ in the title comes from Phalke’s suggestion to his actors to use the foreign word to make it sound respectable at a time when cinema was unheard of and looked down upon. Releases on 29 January 2010. Don’t miss this one.
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