Saqib Saleem is a great new find I say new as this is the film that will get him noticed and not his earlier outings like Mujhse Fraandship Karoge and Mere Dad Ki Maruti.
He takes a bold approach and establishes the main protaganist’s sexuality in the first scene itself. It is also a film where Johar steps out of a cliché ridden world where homosexuality is about effeminate caricatures ( Rishi Kapoor in Student of the Year), scandalizing domestic help ( Kanta Ben in Kal Ho Na Ho) or Punjabi mothers ( Maa Da Laadla Bigad Gaya in Dostana). He is focused on telling a story here, he is focused on dismantling all that is Karan-Joharesque about his cinema… However, he hasn’t given up on the quality and the people he works with ace cinematographer, Anil Mehta has shot the film, Manish Malhotra has styled Rani Mukherjee, who herself is a Dharma Productions regular. With this film, we discover a new Karan Johar where he doesn’t have to stress about the three hundred Caucasian dancers in designer Indian costumes or the waist size of his gorgeous leading lady. He who makes multi-million dollar blockbusters that are known for their flamboyance than cinematic artistry, has turned the tables with this small-budget, realistic short film. Banerjee grows with each film and is not afraid to experiment from Khosla Ka Ghosla to Oye Lucky, Lucky Oye Love, Sex Aur Dhoka to Shanghai and now Star, he is what the Doctor prescribed for Bollywood’s problem of recycling everything. He puts an emu in the chawl to describe the lead character’s failure in business and you see the bird again in another important scene.
Banerjee’s style is lucid and the story touches you emotionally more than the others in the film. It is also great to see Sadashiv Amrapurkar return to screen in a well written cameo. Nawazuddin Siddiqui as Purandar is simply outstanding and the last two minutes of this short are bound to leave you teary-eyed and in awe of this actor’s talent. It is a poignant tale about a father who does not have a new bedtime story for his ailing daughter… it is about a failed actor who gets a shot at stardom in his own small way. My views on the four short films in Bombay Talkies, in order of my preference (minor spoilers ahead):īased on Satyajit Ray’s short story, Patol Babu Filmstar, Dibakar Banerjee’s Star is as much about failed ambitions as it is about hope and happiness. Maybe, we’ll see something like that soon but for now I applaud the effort called Bombay Talkies, which is not an outstanding film but is a brave attempt that needs to be appreciated. While a true tribute would have been filmmakers from other regions also participating (think of an anthology with films in Hindi, Bengali, Marathi, Tamil and English), it would have been a tough project to sell commercially. Bombay Talkies has four interesting short films by four directors who represent the modern Indian cinema (read Bollywood in this case) – Karan Johar, Dibakar Banerjee, Zoya Akhtar and Anurag Kashyap. I am glad that the film made to commemorate hundred-years of our cinema looks beyond all these clichés and focuses on story-telling. Indian cinema is not only about song and dance, colourful costumes and overtly emotional characters.