Thursday, March 19, 2009

I was pretty excited about Dev D (D for Dhillon!). Promos tempted me so much that I went for the first day first show. Though ‘No Smoking’ was devastatingly obnoxious but I still have faith on Anurag Kashyap that he’ll at least create something genuinely different, more than anything else. And it was really flattering for me that he kept my faith intact! The film was genuinely different (though pretentious sometimes).

I’m not very fond of Devdas, the character. I think he was a coward, pompous and an egoist insect and the way Sanjay Leela Bhansali presented him in his magnum opus ‘Devdas’, I was even more firm that I’m NOT gonna watch another version of this monumental lover’s story if it’s coming in near future!!! SLB’s ‘Devdas’ was dreary, over-the-top and
extremely conceited. Thank God to Madhuri, Kirron Kher & to certain extent SRK, film was worth a SINGLE watch otherwise the more-furniture-than-actors like Aishwarya Rai ‘Bachchan’, Smita Jaykar and Vijayendra Ghatge made the film look like an advertisement for three humongous “kothis”, owned by the three actors mentioned above…

But when I heard that Anurag Kashyap is making a version of Devdas and that too in an contemporary world, I knew he is gonna create history in some way or the other and he did it! I donno about the box-office fate of the film but it has created history in many other ways.
To begin with, for the first time in the entire more than 100 yrs history of Hindi Film Industry, our heroine, and that too Paro, clicks her nude pictures, scans them and sends them to Devdas!!! On the first meet itself, she wants to have sex with Devdas! (Remember Paro struggling with a bumblebee when Dev comes to her house for the first time after 10 yrs?) And if that’s not enough, she even rolled up a mattress to her cycle carrier and rides it to the farm so that she can easily have sex with Dev without any disturbance and Peep Tomming… Seen any Hindi film actress doing this ever before??? A History…
Coming to Chandramukhi, have you ever seen a daughter, in any Hindi film, yelling at her father, who has watched her sex MMS clip, saying, “how could you see it? Do you want to jerk off me???” Hushhhhh…And also telling her mom, “I’m not gonna suck every cock coming my way!” I was exasperated, amused and happy. At least someone is trying to think progressively and presenting 21st century Indian women the way they are. A History…

But there are people who’re cribbing about not showing the intensity of love between Devdas & Paro. Also they’ve problem with Paro coming to Dev’s hotel room & cleaning his clothes! I also heard people grumbling about disappearing of Paro at the end…

Well, those would be the justified objections if Mr. Kashyap had claimed to “remake” Devdas but he “adapted” it and in his adaptation he has shown that Dev & Paro were never actually in love! That’s the whole point of not showing the intensity of their love and he concentrated more on the lust part of a relationship which, according to me, is such a great relief from those candy floss love stories & Switzerland bound train catching sequences…And I’m so glad Devdas doesn’t die, rather opted for Chandramukhi! It was such a respite as I always wondered why he chose to die instead of being with someone who loves him unconditionally!!! A History…

To sum it up, all I can say is at least someone is trying to make a difference & revolutionized Indian cinema one more time…

I know it’s not a review but it doesn’t deserve less than 4 stars…

A History…