Pink (16 Sep 2016)

Cast: Amitabh Bachchan, Taapsee Pannu, Kirti Kulhari, Andrea Tariang, Angad Bedi, Raashul Tandon, Tushar Pandey, Vijay Verma, Dhritiman Chatterjee, Piyush Mishra, Vinod Nagpal, Mamta Malik, Mamata Shankar

Director: Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury

Producer: Rashmi Sharma, Shoojit Sircar

Story & Screenplay: Ritesh Shah

Cinematography: Abhik Mukhopadhyay

Music: Shantanu Moitra, Faiza Mujahid, Anupam Roy

Editor: Bohaditya Banerjee

Duration: 136 minutes

Say, an individual enters into a contract with an international tattoo artist, so as to enable the tattoo artist to create a world record, by creating some intricate tattoo on the individual's arm, which would require considerably long hours of painful tattoo creation. Out of some sudden jitter, this individual refuses to participate at the last minute. Can the concerned tattoo be drawn on his body part against his will?

Say, an individual is travelling for the first time, in an international aircraft, carrying five hundred plus passengers, during prime business hours. Just few minutes before the ignition of the aircraft's engine, the concerned individual displays an extreme phobia of flying, and becomes hysterical and uncontrollable. Will the aircraft still take off, with him on the board?

The answer to both the aforesaid questions, is simply NO, irrespective of the fact that, they involve great loss of time, money and aspirations of other people. The protagonists in the aforesaid cases, may end up paying the required penalties. But they cannot be forced upon, by any entity, to bodily participate into anything, that they wish to stay away from, for the simple fact that, the right of an individual's body privacy, simply belongs to him/her and no one else.

So, if under any given circumstance, in spite of any previous understanding and stake at hand, an individual cannot be forced to bodily participate in any activity, then how come on the mere basis of short dresses, late hours, exchange of smile or drink, and sexual history, some men find it rightful to force themselves upon women and violate them?

Aren't they WRONG in doing so? Of course, they are.

Way back, it took a Bal Gangadhar Tilak to declare the essence of our existence via the line "Swaraj is my birthright and I shall have it", and now, it took an Amitabh Bachchan to declare the essence of our right over our body privacy via the line "No is not just a word, but a sentence on it's own, which doesn't require any argument, clarification, explanation or briefing", meaning to say that when a woman says No, she means No!

The movie 'Pink' is a tight and intelligent story weave, spun around all the extreme scenarios, that are considered as signals and invitations by women, to have random good time with men folk. The movie further displays the general notion that, any kind of refrain exercised by such ‘inviting women’, is simply meant to be ignored, going in flow with the misogynistic concept - "they asked for it, so they got it"!

However, by the end, the movie and it's impressive cast and crew, successfully manage to nullify this pathetic concept, and further establish the fact that, not just violation, but even molestation is a grave and heinous crime.

Three working ladies cum room partners - Minal Arora (Taapsee Pannu), Falak Ali (Kirti Kulhari) and Andrea (Andrea Tariang) share a great bond, along with a rented flat, in a residential area of Faridabad (NCR).

One fateful night, while enjoying a late night rock show, this gang of three, bump into the trio of Rajveer Singh (Angad Bedi), Dumpy aka Raunak Anand (Raashul Tandon) and Vishwa aka Vishwajyoti Ghosh (Tushar Pandey). Minal and Rajveer happen to be old school mates. All six of them retreat to a resort for food, and then retire to Rajveer's booked room therein, for further partying. Eventually, upon finding her alone, Rajveer tries to enforce himself on Minal. After a spate of repeated Nos and physical restrains, finding herself helpless to control Rajveer's passionate advances, and in order to free herself from his grip, Minal hits him with a bottle lying nearby. Unfortunately, this hit creates an ugly blood oozing gash, very near to his left eye. This jitters everyone. The girls rush to their flat, and the the boys speed to the nearby hospital, to avail Rajveer, the required medical aid.

Upon return, the girls undergo immense fear and tension, speculating the upcoming revengeful moves of the boys. Even a mere door bell puts them on high alert! Whereas, the brash Rajveer, further fuelled by another friend Ankit Malhotra (Vijay Verma), seeks to humiliate Minal. A couple of folks from both the sides, try to play truce, but things worsen, and end up in the abduction and further molestation of Minal in a moving four wheeler, on her way back from an early jog!

The girls try to file an FIR of this mishap, only to get snubbed at different police stations. When they actually succeed to file one, a back dated FIR is filed by the Rajveer team, which terms the girls as prostitutes, who baited the boys at late night hours, demanded money to impart their services, and when the decent boys refrained from giving in to their demands, Minal ended up in wounding Rajveer, who may have lost his left eye, if a shard of glass did not miss the concerned eye by an extremely small measure!

Resultantly, Minal gets arrested and is put under police custody. Shocked and humiliated by the sudden course of unfair actions, the rude comments of the neighbors, the nonchalance of the appointed lawyer, and the state of no support from the concerned police station, the baffled and broken girls find a supporter and crusader in Deepak Sehgal (Amitabh Bachchan), an efficient but old lawyer who is out of practise since long. Wearing the hat of the girls' new lawyer, and pitted against the cunning and condemning Prashant Mehta (Piyush Mishra), who is Rajveer's lawyer, Deepak Sehgal fights a patient, heartfelt, painful and logical battle, to ensure the appearance of the right picture in front of the judiciary, as well as, the public.

'Pink' is an extremely well made movie with a strong social message, and the film imparts this message with immense conviction and clarity. The film excels in story idea, screenplay, direction, acting and editing. The film's music comprise of a total of four songs, sans any item number or dance routine. 'Kaari Kaari', a background number gels well with the displayed turmoil of the victim protagonists.

A special mention needs to be made of the beautiful and respectful reference of Meghalaya, an Indian State, by Deepak Sehgal. It is heartwarming, the way he refers to the state's scenic beauty, music etc., so as to dignify the hailing of Andrea from this very state, who did confess that, girls like her, have to undergo more trouble than the normal Indian girls, just because they hail from the north-east!

Deepak Sehgal is often shown, taking care of a terminally ill lady, Sara (Mamata Shankar), who also dies midway. The purpose of this character, and her actual relationship with Deepak Sehgal remains unclear.

Amitabh Bachchan is simply excellent in his new avatar of a crusader of women's rights. His dialogue 'No means No' carries more impact and weight than multitude of slogans fired by various women's rights organizations. Looking old, frail and forgetful, he displays a lot of pain and pent up emotions, to put forth his points in the courtroom scenes. The seventy plus megastar, still holds the court strong, is ready to take up unconventional meaty roles, and manages to surprise us with his acting skills and ever emerging new acting techniques! Taapsee Pannu, Kirti Kulhari and Andrea Tariang are very convincing as victims of social abuse and injustice. They appear natural in their bonding, and submissive but defiant in the courtroom scenes. Angad Bedi has well played the role of strong silent brat, who is used to his family's political clout, and feels not an iota of remorse over his misogynistic actions. Dhritiman Chatterjee, the judge is also quite effective as the courtroom patriarch, who gets shamed by the unfolding drama, is unable to display any prompt human empathy, but tries his best to maintain the courtroom decorum, and also safeguard the girls' dignity. Piyush Mishra has displayed his usual brand of fine acting, with expected eye twitchings. Rest of the cast is also good. Background score and cinematography are also nice.

All in all, 'Pink' is a fantastic movie, made upon a long pending women's rights issue, which suggests a giant leap in the sensibility of the Indian cinema, along with a massive evolution in the social behavior of the human kind.

Akira (2 Sep 2016)

Cast: Sonakshi Sinha, Anurag Kashyap, Amit Sadh, Atul Kulkarni, Smita Jaykar, Mukesh Hariawala, Konkana Sen Sharma, Mishiekka Arora

Director: A.R. Murugadoss

Story: Santha Kunar     Screenplay: Santha Kumar and A.R. Murugadoss     Dialogues (Hindi): Karan Singh Rathore

Music: Vishal-Shekhar     Background Score: John Stewart Eduri

Duration: 139 minutes

Imagine yourself as a village kid, who is intently looking forward to attend the upcoming ‘mela’ (fair), as he has heard about the new joy ride, which is expected to be the crowd puller of the season. In his mind, all he can spell is, the usual ‘masti’ (fun) plus a brand new ride!

Now, imagine his dismay, when he actually goes to the ‘mela’ and finds out that, apart from the new joy ride, all the other rides are absent, including the free-for-all swings and see-saws! Also, the new ride comes with a catch. The ride duration is considerably less than the usual ones!

This is exactly how I felt upon watching ‘Akira’.

Being a product of A.R. Murugadoss, the maverick director of action thrillers (Ghajini, Holiday: A Soldier Is Never Off Duty), and being enacted by Sonakshi Sinha, the A-lister, tall, stoic and healthy Bollywood heroine, who looks natural enough to punch a pack or two when required, ‘Akira’ was expected to be a high energy action thriller, with enough adrenaline pumping fight sequences, and an intelligent story weave. Instead, it turned out to be a low budget action film, with the storyline, mostly leading towards the action, and not actually displaying the action!

‘Akira’ is an official remake of the Tamil film ‘Mouna Guru’ by Santha Kumar, wherein, the protagonist was a male actor.

Akira Sharma (Mishiekka Arora), a fearless, self reliant and strong opposer of anything wrong, is well assessed by her deaf, dumb but wise father (Atul Kulkarni), who chooses to enroll her to a martial arts class, rather than a dance class in Jodhpur. Her mother (Smita Jaykar) is the usual run-of-the-mill town lady.

In her bid to teach some hoodlums a lesson, Akira enters into a fight with them, and in her self defence, she  accidentally spills some acid on one of their faces. In spite of the fact that, the acid bottle belonged to the victim lad, and even the acid attack was initiated by him, Akira ends up spending three years in a Child Remand Home!

Upon reaching the college going age, Akira (Sonakshi Sinha) and her mother (father is now deceased) are made to shift base to Mumbai, by her brother, who is already settled there with his spouse and a newly born baby. His brother-in-law Sidharth (Amit Sadh) is also putting up with them, on a temporary basis.

Upon sensing a non-friendly environment, Akira chooses to stay in the college hostel, and this is where she faces trouble from a rowdy student gang, and eventually a group of four corrupt cops. The cops brigade is headed by ACP Rane (Anurag Kashyap), the evil cop who doesn’t think twice before doing anything unlawful or sinful.

In their sheer greed for big money, these cops commit a crime, and mistake Akira for someone else. Things boil down to such a point that, serious attempts are made, to encounter her! Finally, she is disposed in a government run mental asylum, and given inhuman electric shocks, so as to turn her into a vegetable, and brand her as delusional!

Alongside, a heavily pregnant SP Rabia (Konkona Sen Sharma), a woman of small physical stature but steely resolve is assigned to solve a young lady’s (mistress of ACP Rane) suicide case. Slowly but sure footedly, she manages to join the dots and draws the big picture, which entails the aforesaid suicide, the cops and their big crime, the college principal (Mukesh Hariawala), and finally Akira.

In the meantime, Akira, whose name translates in Sanskrit as ‘graceful strength’, turns from being a resilient, aloof and confused girl, to an angry, hard hitting and self-defending warrior.

Rest of the story entails, consequent captures and running aways of Akira, till all the evils are put to rest, and she ends up sacrificing some more period of her life, staying in captivity, for the general good!

A movie sans the usual songs, dance, romance, and elaborate sets, needs to have an ultra crisp storyline, and enough thought provoking executions. Sadly, though ‘Akira’ has some juicy female action, it still lacks the entertainment factor.

Even the action scenes are far paced and of considerably short duration. You end up waiting the full first half, and more than half of the second half, expecting Sonakshi to turn 360° like an Uma Thurman or an Angelina Jolie, and evolve as a lady full of wit, shrewdness and confidence, and go bang-bang on the baddies and every other evil soul that falls in her way. But instead, you come across a physically strong, but mentally naive and unsuspecting girl, who keeps on going to the wrong people and places!

The movie tries to establish a slight romantic angle between Sonakshi and Amit Sadh, which falls flat on the face. Music as such, in the typical ‘hindi gaana’ style is absent, not that the storyline required any.

Though the film’s main portrayal are the consequent attempts of mental and physical breaking of Akira, thankfully, there are no gruesome depictions of exploitation, violation or brutality. The director has conducted his scenes wonderfully in a restrained environment, wherein you do get the gist of the matter, but are not left feeling repulsive.

Actingwise - Sonakshi Sinha, Anurag Kashyap and Konkona Sen Sharma are excellent. Sonakshi looks quite natural as an angry fighter. She has well trained for this role, and played it sans any botheration of camera angles. It’s difficult to imagine that this is Anurag’s first attempt as a mainstream villain. The otherwise director, is quite natural in his inning as an actor, and has displayed the required cold blooded evil, without any exaggerated effort or costume drama. Konkona is extremely believable in her stance as a heavily pregnant woman. Mishiekka Arora, the child actor has also acted well. Also, she is a great find by the casting team, as her body-type and caricature, quite well matches that of Sonakshi’s own. Other actors have also worked well.

But, why on earth is Konkana shown such pot-bellied pregnant? Was it to underline the fact that ‘naari shakti’ or woman power, can be brought to play by a fit bodied, tall, stoic, agile and martial art trained girl, as well as a, short, petite, heavily pregnant, and sharp brained woman?

Last but not the least, this movie deserved a little more of Anurag’s and Konkona’s drama scenes, and much more of Sonakshi’s actions scenes.