Dhobi Ghat Review

It’s Aamir Khan, who always loves to show that variation in choosing the films he act and even more versatile in the movies he puts in money. “Dhobi Ghat” is yet again a diverse film from the house that made “Lagaan, Taare Zameen Par and Peepli Live”. Dhobi Ghat reveals few pages from the dairies of four people in Mumbai, who hail from different walks of society…Kiran Rao directs the flick.

Here’s the detail about the movie….

Four pillars of the film….

Munna (Prateik Babbar)…a Dhobi, with high ambitions, works hard and aspires to become an actor. While he loves his profession and the same time he is self-motivated to win the odds keeping Salman Khan as his idol. He is not different and that makes him easily identifiable. Munna meets Shai...a banker by profession.

Shai (Monica Dogra) is a banker who works in America and visits India for a study on small businesses. With Photography as her hobby, she helps Munna for photographs to build the portfolio for a model. Munna gets fascinated by her simplicity and looks, but Shai is looking at Arun, an Artist.

Arun (Aamir Khan) an isolated artist loves loneliness. He is all set on his new exhibition in Australia. Same time he comes across video dairies in his new home made by an earlier tenant Yasmin.

Yasmin (Krithi Malhotra)… the character only seen in videos is a simple house wife. She wants to showcase her lifestyle to her brother with help of video tapes. Her vision of Mumbai and her lifestyle is nostalgic and there is mysterious truth behind her!!

And there is Mumbai…the heart of this film. The city at times resembles a soothing melody like pure rain…And sometimes reminds us of furious waves that disturb the harmony. City truly has a potential of holding vivacious characters into it.

Honest Performances…

Prateik Babbar is so believable in his portrayal of Munna. His expressions when he hesitantly sits on the Sofa at Shai’s house or when he feels extremely discomfort when Shai keeps on enquiring about Arun.

But it is Monica Dogra as Shai who gets over us very soon and she is best among four. She cleverly maintains that distance with the boy…and she knows the good and bad. She speaks with eyes many a times easily connects with audience.

Aamir is no doubt the reason for pulling the crowds to the theatres to watch an off-beat film but he strictly confines to that. He is definitely a superstar for he accepts a role overshadowed by the debutants. He is good in the role but he limits himself this time.

Krithi Malhotra as Yasmin is sweet. She touches our heart with her down to earth nature. No doubt she haunts us for some time more after we leave the theatre.

Direction and Technical departments…

Aamir’s wife Kiran Rao debuts as director for this film. This is a very tough one for a starter. I believe she succeeded in pleasing her target audience. Screenplay is so tight connecting four characters very cleverly. The little confusion at the beginning is rather an intelligent one to awake us as to watch the movie more caringly.

Gustavo Santaolalla, an international musician who won an academy award for Brokeback Mountain scores music for this one. Music goes in sync with the film and sets the mood.

This is Tushar Kanti Ray’s first film as cinematographer. His vision for the city is something that makes us truly involved in the film. He walks us through streets of Mumbai with lots of crowds, various life styles in the slums, pleasant rain and calm sea.

Movie is not for everyone….

May be Aamir made this movie,more for accolades at film festivals than to entice the regular crowds as he failed in getting Oscar for his previous films. And here comes the warning, this movie is definitely not for regular movie audience who look for entertainment.

One should tune his mind so much that “I am gonna watch an off-beat film which many a times are made in Kerala”. Though movie is just 90 minutes, you feel it sufficiently long as Kiran fails to infuse humor and thus could not make an interesting narration. As this movie reads few pages of certain Mumbai dairies…and so there’s no regular “The End” as we expect.

Final Say…

Strictly don’t expect an entertaining stuff…and if you are keen on admiring a different film that is not loud, you can give it a try.

Rating

I go with 3 stars…