Teri Meri Kahaani

Directed by: Kunal Kohli

2012

Teri Meri Kahaani had the potential to be a cute, romantic film with some brilliance but, unfortunately, became a pedantic, long-winded saga with trite emotions.

The story follows a couple in three incarnations as they find each other, fall in love, and through "circumstance" (read: their own actions) are separated. Ultimately the pair ends up together, overcoming the obstacles on their path to love. The overall idea feels a little musty, and despite my natural disposition to like this flavor of romance I have to admit that I left the theater underwhelmed.

The concept of the film is solid and could have worked out wonderfully if one of the stories was made the focus and the other two were kept as background references. There was far too much focus on re-developing the characters in each decade. I did, however, appreciate that each time the story changed, the basics of the characters changed. Maybe. They had different personalities, they were fresh and different. Clean slates for the love story to build from. Perhaps they were too different though, if the point of the film was to suggest that this couple was destined to be together in all lifetimes then there should have been some basic character frame that they subscribed to in order to add a suggestion of continuity. Just the physical look of the characters remained consistent from 1910 to 1960 to 2012.

While very stylized the first third of the movie (set in 1960) is almost brilliant; but brilliant in a “this is never going to work” kind of a way. Mirroring techniques of The Artist there is very little talking and most communication is done by the songs. There was a lack of commitment to the idea, however, and the effect is disappointing. Full dedication to a silent-ish film would have been absolutely stunning and ground breaking. 

Fast forward to 2012 for an introspective on how technology is both ruining and creating our love lives. I was watching my life unfold and kept turning to my friend saying "Oh my, this is genius". It probably wasn't that genius but it was nonetheless an honest look at how we communicate today. Tweets, FB, texts, Skype it's all represented and social media-obsessed me was totally in love with it.

The film mega-rewinds to 1910 for the last installment of our lovers’ story. Honestly, I prefer things in chronological order and wish that this part had come first; but far be it from me to get my OCD’ed opinions over everything. I thought this story had the most weight behind it. Had it been the singular focus of the film it could have developed into something really great. Unfortunately it felt rushed, jarring and a little shallow, as all the stories did.

Priyanka Chopra is one of my favorite actors but in this film she just does not deliver. She was stoic as the 1960s bombshell, too damn fidgety as the 2012 college student and unbelievable as the 1910 activist. Snooze, Piggy Chops. Is playing multiple roles some sort of life mission for her? I'm all for stretching yourself as an artist but this is getting a little out of hand. I say it with love, Pigs. 

As a closet favorite of mine I don't expect a lot out of Shahid Kapoor. Give me a bashful smile, do a little dance, wear a kurta and I'm good to go. Hence, in Teri Meri Kahaani, Shahid Kapoor performed to my very low standards. He's detached, a little lost and mostly unexciting but... kurta. There are no further arguments.

All in all Teri Meri Kahaani is as mediocre as it was expected to be. Timepass for those ice cream-induced, woe is me, Netflix Instant nights. 

Shanghai

2012
Directed by Dibakar Banerjee

I wish I were somehow smart enough to organize my thoughts about Shanghai. It's a stunning film with a lot of depth and nuance. There is something artsy-fartsy about it, which is great, but I'm a "give me a good item number and I'm happy" kind of a girl and while I appreciate sophisticated cinema, I don't really understand it.

Let's focus on the basics, then:

Politics motivate the  action of the film from the first frame to the last. While I'm no expert on Indian Politics (and really don't want to be) the idea is vague enough to evoke enough emotional, ethical and political feeling to get the viewer involved; and, more importantly, to pick a side.

Emraan Hashmi is apparently capable of acting. He happens to be a weakness of mine (please, that beard? Those eyes? The paunch? Hold me.) but I was never one to profess that he was a force on the screen. Set in the role of a pendu-y, videographer he really shines. Good directors bring out the best in actors and it was evident in this film. I was very impressed.

Abhay Deol does a fantastic job as the prim government paper-pusher. Unfortunately I felt his character's development was a touch short sighted and the audience wasn't given enough information to know him or his motivations. Actually, I think this opinion holds for all of the characters. I understand that in an ensemble cast such as this you can't devote a lot of time to the who/what/when but I felt that there could have been a little more revelaed about the people on screen as the movie progressed. Kalki Koechlin, ironically, had the most developed character and surprised me the most. Perhaps I've never seen her in a role that I liked but I found myself very impressed by her in this film. Personal opinion: start giving her roles with substance because she can really handle them.

It's no surprise to me that Shanghai is doing well, since it's a very clean, well made film. It's an edge-of-your-seat kind of experience that keeps you interested from beginning to end without any flimsy tricks and it requires that the audience bring their brain along while watching. I respect films that respect the audience and I hope that it's a trend that continues.

Rowdy Rathore

2012

Directed by: Prabhudeva

Rowdy Rathore is a badly sewn together quilt of two entirely different films. On one hand, a violent action film; on the other a throw back to 90s SRK-Kajol-YRF blockbusters. Though disjunctive it manages to work as a Masala throwback and play homage to a few of the classics. If you saw the recent adaptation of Aagnepaath and if you’ve seen Sholay and Dabanng you’ve seen Rowdy Rathore. While RR feels a touch stale, it does possess a certain sparkle unique to itself.

In all honesty the movie would have functioned beautifully if all of the pre-intermission stuff had been scrapped. Spending 1+ hours on the development of one story just to (almost) throw it away just before intermission was grueling. Sure, I want my filmi love story as much as any other auntie sitting in the audience but it was all but neglected once it had had gone as far as it could with its limited scope.  The post-intermission half was more engaging and had an obvious agenda. The change in direction half way through was simply confusing.  It would have been much more clean to condense the first half of the story to 30 minutes, interspaced more of the songs into the latter half and run the stories simultaneously rather than as separate Act 1 and Act 2 entities.  Doing so would have relieved a lot of stress in the second half and have given more footing to the wobbly first half.

The first half of the film is decidedly filmi. Colorful, bright, full of large-scale dance numbers with hundreds of backup dancers. There is the ever-present “did she really just fall for that asshat at first sight?” moment but you can’t really escape from that. (I guess. I’m resolved to it). However charming the first half is, it simply had no backbone to stand on past it’s initial 1 hour time slot. Usurped as it was by the second half wasn’t the fairest thing but I do recognize that it needed nudged along to bring it out of its static state.

I’ll be the last person to begrudge the semi-trend of bringing back 70s and 80s Masala but could we lighten up the overt and senseless violence?* It really, really turns me off. Gabbar Singh is an excellent villain because, for the most part, we use our imagination when we consider his actions. The audience doesn’t have to be subjected to multiple fights scenes with machetes and tomahawks (in Bombay in broad daylight, no less) with body counts in the hundreds to take a villain seriously.  The audience’s imagination shouldn’t be neglected just because we’re watching a film—employing some tactics from stage productions (namely: less is sometimes much more) would both clean and class up this movie.

Some of the moments in this movie were barbaric. While we know the “good guy” is focused on justice it feels exceptionally skewed when we have to sit through the “good guy” fighting off no less that 50 goons and killing them all while his very young daughter watches on. The pursuit of justice, no matter how noble the intention, simply falters when your “good guy” becomes a mass murderer.  Also: celebrating the fall of the dacoit but stringing up his dead body and dancing around it with the villagers is horrific on any level and it left an awful taste in my mouth as the final frame in the film.  It was morbid and macabre to a point that made me uncomfortable.

RR fell into bloody hack-fest ruts with an attitude that was nonchalantly “well, it is inevitable” rather than as a means to establish characters and motives for the actors to bounce off of.

Aside from the gore and the meshing together of two different films RR is not a total timepass. There are some great comedic moments, the songs are stunningly shot and Sonakshi Sinha sparkles with a Preity Zinta-esque quality that brings everyone around her to life.

I wouldn’t recommend rushing to the theatres for this one, but it’s great for a night in with your trusty Netflix Instant.

Just throwing this out there: is anyone else super surprised that Sanjay Leela Bhansali produced this?

*And I’m no sucker for gore and violence…I was raised on Rambo.