Cast: Ritwick Chakraborty, Paoli Dam, Mamata Shankar, Sauraseni Maitra, Arjun Chakraborty, Kaya Blocksage
Director: Pratim D. Gupta
Music: Anupam Roy
Language: Bengali and French
Duration: 108 minutes
Introduction:
Bengali and French folks share their common love for food, romance, art, culture and an easy paced life style in general, which more or less sums up the plot and background setting of 'Maacher Jhol', which is woven mostly around food and shot aptly in Kolkata and Paris.
The Plot:
Kolkata boy, Devdatto aka Dev D (Ritwick Chakraborty) is an acclaimed Masterchef who owns and runs a 2 Michelin Star restaurant in Paris. He is in a live-in relationship with Simone aka Sim (Kaya Blocksage), a French ballerina who cannot cook to save her life, but loves Dev D enough to propose him with a ring.
A sudden phone call compels Dev D to instantly visit Kolkata, along with the clogged up memories of his past life in the City of Joy, the city which he had abandoned around thirteen years back and never bothered to look back.
The aforesaid phone call was made by his Mashi (mother's sister), so as to inform him the hospitalization of his mother (Mamata Shankar), who had suffered a seizure.
While in Kolkata, Dev D is required to put up in a five star hotel as he has been on no-talking terms with his strict and stubborn father, ever since he had left for Paris, empty handed but full of determination and dreams.
It goes without saying that the Chefs of the afore mentioned hotel are thrilled to have him amongst them. He jolly well reciprocates their feeling by sharing some words of wisdom and organizing a cooking competition between them.
Alongside, he is constantly irked by the presence of Palash (Arjun Chakraborty), a young journalist from a local publishing. Palash is in dire need to get Dev D's interview, so as to save his job. But Dev D is in no mood to give any.
When Dev D visits his mother in the hospital, she expresses her wish to taste Maacher Jhol, a fish and gravy based Bengali delicacy. She expects him to cook it himself, following the same recipe that he had used years back to cook a nice Maacher Jhol for her.
In the hospital's waiting area, Dev D also meets Sreela (Paoli Dam), his separated wife, whom he had simply chosen to abandon for no proper rhyme or reason, when he had departed for Paris. Now she stays alone in her paternal home and practices the profession of teaching, but keeps good relationship with her in-laws.
Dev D's mother is diagnosed with a complex case of brain tumor, which is required to be operated soon enough. The concerned operation is quite risky.
To fulfill his mother's food desire, Dev D gangs up with Maggi (Sauraseni Maitra), the brightest and winning Chef of the afore mentioned hotel. Together they brainstorm, visit local markets and cook sumptuous Maacher Jhol four days in a row, because though Dev D's mother enjoys her daily dose of Maacher Jhol, well presented by her son, she never gives him the green signal of getting that exact old taste that she has been seeking. It's only on the fourth day i.e. on the eve of her life threatening operation, that she confesses to him, that she got the desired taste on the very first day itself, but wanted him to experiment enough to create an altogether new and brilliant recipe of Maacher Jhol!
All through the times, while Dev D was experimenting with his Maacher Jhol recipe and dissuading the romantic advances of impressive Maggi, he was also giving interview to Palash (yes, he finally consented) and reminiscing about his past life, relations and state of suffocation as an engineer who aspired to do something big and different. This reminiscing helps him in gaining some long pending closures in his life.
For the betterment of everyone, the concerned operation is successful and an evolved Dev D returns back to his anxious and waiting French beloved, with a newly established sense of commitment, which was earlier absent.
About the movie:
The movie is easy on the mind and quite well made. Both Bengali and French sensibilities are well captured and casting is done in tandem with the roles. If you notice, then with his lean frame, beard and mild mannerisms, Ritwick Chakraborty actually looks like a walking-talking French Chef!
All the characters have been intelligently kept deglamorized, thereby enabling the impeccably curated food shots to garner the required focus. Be it the pouring of oil in the 'kadha/kadhai' or wok, or dicing of vegetables, or even pouring of ginger paste in the hot oil, each scene is well shot, beautifully capturing the colors, freshness and bounce of each vegetable and other food items. Every time the protagonist serves Maacher Jhol to his mother in the hospital, a different style of plating is used, nothing complex, but elegant and doable. In fact once the movie ends, Ritwick actually teaches his perfected recipe of Maacher Jhol to the movie audience!
The movie also celebrates the cause of women empowerment, specially via Sreela, who has been playing single parent to her son and though her heart misses a beat upon seeing her separated husband after more than a decade, she neither seeks child support or union with him. In fact, she never even informed him about the presence of their child! Upon Dev D's argument over his right to be informed about his son, she aptly answers him back that his mere contribution of sperms do not exactly give him any such right to proclaim! She further asks him to grant her divorce and not bestow Sim with the same fate that he bestowed upon her years ago!
Also, when there is a feud between Dev D and his father, whether or not to operate the lady of the house and Dev D shares this dilemma with Sreela, she simply advises him to ask the lady in question because it is after all her life and she is the rightful person to decide the amount of risk she is willing to take for it!
A drunk monologue by Dev D, in front of his father, wherein he unabashedly pours out all of his suppressed feelings and condemnations towards him, is quite hilarious.
Thankfully, the movie is devoid of the usual song and dance routine. The music of the film comprises of three tracks, which are more of background scores and quite situational. The track 'Je Tore Pagol Bawle' is very well sung by Saheb Chattopadhyay. It's lyrics are by Rabindranath Thakur. The song beautifully ends with the last four lines sung in French. The other two songs are also nice.
Reviewing an exotic dish is not equivalent to cooking up a similar one. Similarly, reviewing a movie is much easier a task than making one. Rarely it happens that, an acclaimed movie critic is able to create magic on celluloid. But with 'Maacher Jhol', his fourth movie, Pratim D. Gupta, the popular movie critic has managed to create the fine balance between both the mainstream and parallel cinema!
The entire movie is accompanied with English subtitles.
About the crew:
As mentioned above, Ritwick Chakraborty is just perfect in his avatar of a Paris based Kolkatan, who dons the hat of a Masterchef. He is secure and subtle in his dialogue delivery, quite indulgent in the cooking scenes and very impressive in the drunk scene. Paoli Dam has few scenes and that too sans any glitz and glamour. But she beautifully holds her own in simple cotton sarees and silent glances. Her confrontation monologue with Ritwick is quite iconic. Sauraseni Maitra has a glint in her eyes which goes in tandem with her portrayal of a Chef with aspirations. She brings in the much needed vibrance to the screen. Mamata Shankar is wonderful with her different shades of maternal projections, all carried on while lying and sitting on a hospital bed! Arjun Chakraborty and Kaya Blocksage come across as honest and genuinely concerned well wishers of the protagonist. Rest of the cast has also acted well.
Conclusion:
All in all, 'Maacher Jhol' is an honest, clean and beautiful movie, shot with international style of film making, wherein, while recalling and perfecting his Maacher Jhol recipe, the protagonist also recalls his past life and ties it's loose ends. Finally, both the dish and the cook evolve as something/someone altogether new and better.
Last but not the least, when Dev D visits Sreela for consultation, at Narayana School in Rajarhat and requests her to step out with him for a brief moment for some important discussion, in the very next scene the duo are seen sitting in Paris Cafe, which though has four outlets in Kolkata, but none of them are in the Rajarhat area!
Was it an overlook by the production team or simply branding overriding the content?
