Dil Bechara-An Ode

–Ahana Chanda

Year: 2014

It was in my 10th grade that a certain movie named The Fault In Our Stars released. Unaware of the contents of the book, I downloaded the film and watched it on my desktop on a certain Thursday evening. 10 minutes into the film and I knew this movie was going to be special. And at the 15th minute of the movie entered the boy who not only swept Hazel but also the girl writing this off her feet. People who know me, have experienced the phase of me being an absolute fanatic over Augustus Waters. He was a charm. He was a dream. 

Year: 2017 

A rumor started doing the rounds that a Bollywood adaptation of TFIOS is about to take place. I’ll be very honest here, the idea of a Hindi TFIOS didn’t excite me much. For me, there could be only Augustus Waters that was portrayed on screen. 

Year: 2020

On a certain June afternoon, the country was hit hard by the death of an enigmatic persona. His fans, followers and loved ones were shattered. It took people days and months to get over the loss of a beautiful soul. 

Three weeks later, the trailer of Dil Bechara – the last film of Sushant Singh Rajput – released. In less than 2 hours the trailer hit million views. It was going to be one of the very few movies where tragically the fate of a character was similar to that of the actor who portrayed him. 

July 24th, 2020

The much-awaited film – Dil Bechara- released. Like many, I too started watching it the minute it was released on an OTT platform. 

Dil Bechara

And there he was once again. In his full glory and self. Dancing to the beats of a South Indian song was Immanuel Rajkumar Junior aka Manny. Oh, that smile! If the movie had released in the theaters, that scene would probably have been a “seetidarr” entry. But I do know that there was a smile on every viewer’s face when Sushant entered the screen. For a moment we didn’t remember that this person is no longer amongst us. For a moment it felt like he was chilling in his home, laid back on a couch listening to his favourite music.

Coming to Manny, nothing could make you feel happy or ecstatic than his smile and full of life dialogues. Every time he is on screen, our life “lits up like a Christmas tree”.

Aside from Manny, we have two more very loving characters Kizzie and JP. Both trying to make the most out of the life they have. The film takes you to a place where we all want to be today. Peace. It gives you peace and brings sparkle to your eyes. 

Dil Bechara is not Sushant’s best film and neither is it better than The Fault In Our Stars. But seeing Sushant for the last time on screen as a jovial young boy is what makes it special. 

We bid adieu to the boy who taught us the “khulke jeene ka tareeka”. You will always be in our hearts :’)

Dear Zindagi

–Gourab Nag

A film for the ones trying to find happiness in a crowd of sad faces. This film made me cry and then smile and then realize how little things can make us happy, like playing “kabaddi” with the sea. Things in this film can sound so crazy and childish but when we think about it, we all have that crazy and happy kid playing inside us, we just need to find it out.

Kaira, the cinematographer, ambitious but confused .The beginning of the film features kaira as someone who unintentionally cheats on her boyfriend Sid, for Raghuvendra, tall ,handsome and someone who promised her to offer a big international project in Newyork .

The pain of hurting someone hits her harder and she starts getting irritated on the fairy tales type “love stories”. I personally feel the next part of the story is a bit on the theory how “karma” works  when she herself gets to know that Raghuvendra gets engaged with his ex.

This act of raghuvendra broke her…she couldn’t sleep,started getting irritated with her family and friends she also lost that international project offer.

It was this point of time when we meet the most interesting person of the film ,Dr.Jehangir khan ,“jug”(pagalo ka doctor)  a doctor, a friend, a teacher who made kaira and us realize the meaning of life. His theories will change all your ideas of love and life ..I personally feel the idea of “Kursi” is too much good but is misused by this generation, “jug” said we should keep on searching for that one kursi. Some kursis are attractive but not comfortable , some are comfortable but not so attractive ,we have got a lot of time to find the right  kursi. But what we do is we use people like kursis. We break them,we make them dirty and when they get old we start searching for new a new one without even trying to repair them.

Jug tries to open kaira’s lost story book ..the lost kid ,the happy face,each day we get to know more about kaira’s life.She made mistakes and jug taught her how to correct them,on her own.

The last part of the film is a little sad but will still make you smile ,the last lesson will repair all the wounds and will make you realize how our happiness is a choice ,we can be happy for ourselves . We come across people who adds to our happiness but we are the only reason of our own happy face.

“Aane do aane do
Dil mein aa jaane do
Keh do muskurahat ko
Hi, hi, hi, hi

Jaane do, jaane do
Dil se chale jaane do
Kehdo ghabrahat ko
Bye, bye, bye, bye, bye-bye

Love you zindagi, Love you zindagi
Love you zindagi, Love me zindagi”

……………………………………………………………………………………………

by Gourab nag

La La Land

-Damini Ghosh

Directed by- Damien Chazelle

Cast- Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, John Legend, Rosemarie Dewitt, JK Simmons

Music by- Justin Hurwitz

Genre- Musical, Drama, Romance, Comedy, Performing Arts

“Dreams are not what you see in your sleep, dreams are things which do not let you sleep.”
And as the quote suggests, La La Land was a simple screenplay visualized by Chazelle during his days as a drummer. It was only after that when he decided to give life to this amazing story.
La La Land is a 2016 American romantic comedy musical drama revolving around a jazz pianist and a struggling actress, who happen to meet and fall in love while chasing their dreams in the heart of Los Angeles.

Emma Stone and Ryan Gosling in La La Land

The long walks in the moon lit night and everlasting exchange of glances between Sebastian (Ryan Gosling) and Mia (Emma Stone) makes you believe that love might turn your life into a beautiful ballad until reality hits hard. The old school romance soaked in nostalgia along with the heart whelming chemistry between Stone and Gosling is just extraordinary. Right from the opening song, ‘Another Day of Sun’ with people dancing on top of cars and everyone singing, gives us the feeling of a classic Hollywood musical.
The beautiful way in which the different seasons portray the highs and lows in the relationship of the characters is mesmerizing. The way in which Gosling tries to hide his emotions and the million on spoken words which is conveyed by Stone’s eyes it’s like the cherry on the top of the cake.

The heart of the movie is its musical album that features songs based on major human emotions due to which it won Best Original Song for “City of Stars” in the 89th Academy Awards alongside Best Actress for Stone, Best Cinematography, Best Original Score, Best Production Design and Best Director making Chazelle the youngest director to win in this category. It won seven Golden Globes setting the record to grab the highest number of globes for a single film. Also received 11 nominations in the 70th British Academy Film Awards and won under five categories.

The film will never stop giving one chills of the nervous excitement of first love and the lyrical masterpieces tells you of hundreds of shattered dreams, tugging at your heartstrings. This is the kind of movie you would always like to watch in your dark days. The surreal silence creates an unknown void that reveals the vulnerable protagonists with which, all of us can connect at our own personal levels, reliving our own pains. One can’t deny that the film is a homelessly romantic case but at the end of the day it’s worth giving a watch. The inner conflict between dreams and reality is shown with the soul stirring last scene. Stone’s poignant smile in the end depicts the difference between the future which the lovers imagined and the present they were living in.

Webseries Review: Asur

– by Subhrakanti Dasgupta

Title: Asur

By: Voot Specials

Director: Oni Sen

Cast:

Arshad Warsi as Dhananjay Rajput

Barun Sobti  as Nikhil Nair

Anupryia Goenka as Naina Nair

Ridhi Dogra  as Nusrat Saeed

Sharib Hazmi  as Lolark Dubey

Amey Wagh  as Rasool Shaikh

Pawan Chopra  as Shashank Awasthi

Vishesh Bansal  as Shubh

Gaurav Aurora  as Kesar Bharadwaj

Anvita Sudarshan as Raina Singh

Nishank Verma as Samarth Ahuja

Archak Chhabra as Aditya Jalan

Aditya Lal as Moksh

Deepak Qazir as Neelkanth Joshi

Bondip Sarma as Ankit Sharma

Jayant Raina as tatti Joshi

Sunayna Baile as Lolark’s Wife

Genre: Crime-Thriller and Mystery

Due to this pandemic when each of us seem stuck up in a hole, a bit of fresh air becomes a lavish. Sleep and smart phone became a valued partner of our daily slow paced life. But thriving on webseries is a new trend having marked hike this time leading to a host of such webseries coming up in multiple languages. As craze wrought up, the debate of Amazon Prime versus Netflix wrought up. But Amazon Prime as if gave a new heist in hindi crime thriller through Asur, the most downloaded show this lockdown. With a great story and heaving round the good old word of karma, Asur was a breakthrough. For me, an avid lover of crime thrillers, this one was a just gift to pass boredom.
It is directed by Oni Sen and set in current times and revolves around serial killings. Arshad Warsi styled as DJ, Dhananjay Rajput, made his web debut in this series.Set in the backdrop of the mystical city of  Varanasi, Asur follows Nikhil Nair,on screen Barun Sobti, a forensic expert turned teacher, who returns to his roots at the  Central Beareu Of Investigation, and along with his former mentor Dhananjay Rajpoot, finds himself caught in a cat-and-mouse game with a brutal serial killer. What follows is a blend of suspense, mythology and the murders of some people totally unrelated.
The story becomes criticial because its base is the religious fanaticism and hypocrisies in our society with a ting of our aincient views regarding karma and fate. Featuring great actors and a rich script, Asur also puts up our thinking regime as well as mystries regarding our thoughts and age old faiths. The series is well filed across several episodes with a balance between our known and unknown as well as our dark side. It shows that there is dark energy in synergy with the good and points out in current context how this dark energy or our character’s dual feel is getting awaken supresing the good in this modern era.   It has deep underlying meaning with a blend of mystrey and crime to make it a must watch on Voot Specials this break.

Web Series Review: PANCHAYAT

– Upaneeta Chakraborty

Cast: Jitendra Kumar, Neena Gupta, Raghubir Yadav

Director: Deepak Kumar Mishra

Creators: TVF

The eight-episode webseries “Panchayat” premiered on April 3 on Amazon Prime is a comedy-drama revolving around the journey of Abhishek Tripathy, played by Jitendra Kumar aka Jeetu Bhaiya, a young ,ambitious chap from Delhi who has landed in a village named ‘Phulera’ situated in UP as a Panchayat Secretary because everything else in his prospect has dried up.

As the series proceeds, Abhishek gets stuck among crazy situations and a different village lifestyle which brings out various situational comedies.

Abhishek starts his job with  the sole motivation of getting out of there as soon as possible for which he even starts preparing for CAT.

Location:

The whole web-series was shot in a real village.And the scenic beauty of the village that the series has captured is worth appraisal.

Cast and Crew:

The series features eminent actors like Neena Gupta as Manju Devi and Raghuvir Yadav as Pradhanji along with Jitendra Kumar as the protagonist.Also,Chandan Roy and Faisal Malik play the roles of Vikas and Prahlad respectively.     

Direction And Cinematography:

Right from the first scene of the village the viewer will start appreciating the cinematography of the whole series by Amitabha Singha.

The director successfully reveals the various politics that exist in the rural areas that often interferes with the welfare of the society. At the same time,he also doesn’t fail to showcase the simplicity and good hearts of the village men which adds up to the beauty of the web series as a whole.

Acting Performances:

Each and every cast has given their best performances to make the show an awesome piece.Jitendra Kumar, Neena Gupta,Raghubir Yadav have all done a great job as expected .But the debut performance of Chandan Roy as Vikas was exceptional.Every other supporting cast was brilliant.

Music:

Music is one of the most overwhelming features of this show. Anurag Saika’s music helps the show to maintain a happy vibe throughout. 

BOOK REVIEW – “Veronika Decides to Die” : A Soul-Shifter

– SUKANYA GHOSH

“You have all these kinds of books and then comes one which
changes a part of you altogether. Veronika Decides to Die is such a book.”

There are two names in the world of authors, whose writing, in the truest sense, strikes a chord
with me. They are Khaled Hosseini and Paulo Coelho: two men from completely varied cultural
and economic backgrounds, yet sharing an innate ability to find a place in the creases of your
heart with their stories. Today I’m going to talk about the latter, and his book, Veronika Decides
to Die.
You read books for fun, entertainment, to avoid boredom, to transport yourself away from your
reality, for insight, and what not. You have all these kinds of books and then comes one which
changes a part of you altogether. Veronika Decides to Die is such a book. The story revolves
around a young girl named Veronika and her unshakable desire to kill herself. She has no
heart-shattering backstory, no pitiable financial issues, no apparent history of abuse or
heartache. Yet, she wants and decides to die. As such, this is quite a bleak beginning, nothing
remarkable – almost as mundane and breathtakingly real as normal life and as a reader, you
may decide to give up the book right here. However, if you stick around for a couple more
pages, you get to dive into Veronika’s psyche and you see through her eyes how her pain
revolves around the absence of exceptional events in her life, not due to them. Her depression
is seeded in years of normality and dullness, in doing as she has been told and in leading a
constructed, ‘comfortable’ life. Soon, you find yourself in her shoes, because we have all felt it,
how our lives have no purpose. You soon after find the girl attempting to kill herself and you
see, how in the last moments of her life, she feels nothing. You’re left with a feeling of
emptiness.

“Soon, you find yourself in her shoes, because we have all felt it,
how our lives have no purpose.”

What happens afterwards is a gentle but mind-boggling journey of her waking up at a mental
hospital, making friends with ‘mad’ people, having just a week to be alive and in that time, falling
in love with a schizophrenic. The book is a lifetime squeezed into seven days and Veronika’s
journey to discovering just how much life can show you if you let yourself see. The stories and
plight of some of the characters who come in contact with Veronika are summarized but equally
powerful and soul-stirring. The relaxed narrative gives you a sense of living the life of the people
mentioned in the text. This, paired with the overlapping story arcs, doesn’t give away even a hint
of the glamorous ending that awaits you.
As you close the covers of the book, you are left with a thought that will remain afloat in your
musings for days, before it finally sinks in: the value of Life lies in the awareness of Death.
These words may mean nothing to you now, but if you do decide to read the book, they will
remain with you as a mantra and give you hope, as they have done for me. I will be honest, it
took me over a year to complete the book, because I read it in bits and pieces; but I’m glad
because I grew with the book, with every turning in the plot and I took my time to absorb each
emotion, and I made it till the end. In the bargain, I gained an experience, an experience that will
remain with me for life.

“…of her waking up at a mental
hospital, making friends with ‘mad’ people…”

A Review of “NAYAK – THE HERO” (1966)

– Prantap Nag

Director – Satyajit Ray
Cast –

• Uttam Kumar as ‘Arindam Mukherjee’
• Sharmila Tagore as ‘Aditi Sengupta’
• Bireshwar Sen as ‘Mukunda Lahiri’
• Somen Bose as ‘Shankar Da’
  and many more.

A film actor is nothing but a puppet, a puppet in the hands of the director, a puppet in the hands of the cameraman, in the hands of the sound-recorder. He is also a puppet in the hands of the editor who cuts and pastes the movie.” .
What if an on-screen hero, with a certain mirage associated with his personality, reveals himself as flawed as a common man?
This is one of the various questions this Satyajit Ray film sought to explore, one that was appropriately named Nayak (The Hero). Ray’s mild dislike for mainstream cinema was reflected in his conception of the hero, Arindam Mukherjee (played by the biggest screen idol of Bengali cinema, Uttam Kumar). Presenting Arindam as a talented but compromising social climber, Ray was introducing the average middle-class audience to the human self of a star.
Arindam Mukherjee, having achieved stardom in fairly quick time, but is plagued by a sense of emptiness that erupts in violent outbursts which are captured by many newspaper and media outlets. Conscious of the necessity to preserve the countenance of a ‘star’, he decides to take a train journey with upper middle-class passengers of the kind likely to constitute his audiences and for whom he has great disregard.

The journey has a wizened journalist who holds cinema in contempt for its lack of reality.
Toward the end of the train journey, Arindam is drunk and feels a need to confide his wrongdoings. He asks the conductor to fetch Aditi Sengupta ( the journalist). He begins to reveal the reason behind the altercation he was a part of, but Aditi stops him, as she has already guessed. It was an affair he’d had with one of his co-actors. Afraid that he might commit suicide, Aditi makes sure he returns to his cubicle, before going back to her own.
As the star re-lives and examines his life with Aditi, a bond develops between them. Aditi realizes that in spite of his fame and success, Arindam is a lonely man, in need of empathy. Out of respect for him, she chooses to suppress the story and tears up the notes she has written. She lets the hero preserve his public image.

The other surprise is that there is no romance in Nayak, but this movie still offers you one of the best chemistry between the leads.’ Director Satyajit Ray had written the script of this movie considering only Uttam Kumar in the lead role. He had confessed that if Uttam Kumar had refused this movie,he would have abandoned this project altogether.
The train service shown in this movie still runs in the present days in between Howrah and New Delhi. At that time the train was called as ‘AC Deluxe Express’ since the train was consisted of AC coaches only. But later Non-AC coaches were added and the train was renamed as ‘Poorva Express’ .

PK

–Akash Kar

Film: Pk
Director: Rajkumar Hirani
Cast: Aamir Khan, Anushka Sharma, Boman Irani, Sanjay Dutt, Saurabh Shukla, Sushant Singh Rajput

There are some stages in a film story line like plot  , climax and ending . A film like PK starts at the very top in its first phase. The creative scope of such a subject is beyond brilliant.  There’s no rocket science to where this analogy ends. But the film , PK offers the right kind of resistance. A great concept goes through a very simple  execution to reach a climax that is great .  The way Raju Hirani used his crafts and techniques of film-making to execute his ideas is beyond incredible . Fact is this film had the promise to be much more. Even with few flaws, PK is still one of the best movie ever.

• 

PK is an Alien who visits earth to understand about its ‘intelligent’ inhabitants, but the very first lesson is a painful one when the remote control of his spaceship is stolen. Hence he now faces myriads of problem in a planet where he is alone unaware and can’t even speak its language. But he is helped by a noble soul named Bhairon Singh (Sanjay Dutt) and hence his search takes him from Rajasthan to Delhi.
Then the story deals with a scraggy little alien ,PK( Aamir Khan), teaming up with a spirited young girl , Jaggu( Anushka Sharma) and learning how human lives function in a complex system of communication, religion and faith. Along the way they expose the hollowness of superstition and religious myths . The film builds up a logical argument against all the religious rituals while that could easily form a vital controversy in our country . PK captures the fear and falsehood humans weave around faith . In the film , PK ( Aamir Khan) gets confused about the religion system of society and then finally comes to the conclusion that fanaticism of every religion runs because of the fear of mind . Hirani sir uses the motif of an extrordinary asking all the logical questions. And even the answers aren’t black and white. 

In the end point , we came to the conclusion that there is only one mighty god which is humanity , the mighty god never differentiates people , he had made the world with clemency and love but because of some insidious people there are many fake gods stirring up the controversy among the people . To make this world a better place , we must follow the mighty god , not the  superstitious , hateful, and heartless one currently propagated to the masses which Pk (Aamir Khan) calls as the ‘Wrong Number’.

The acting of Aamir Khan in the entire movie is beyond incredible . I suggest everyone to watch this movie and appreciate the essence of it .

Life Is Beautiful: A Warmth

-Archi Sasmal

Movie: Life is Beautiful

Director: Roberto Benigni

Cast: Roberto Benigni, Giorgio Cantarini, Nicoletta Braschi, Horst Buchholz, Giustino Durano, Marisa Paredes, Richard Sammel, Sergio Bini Bustric, Aaron Craig, Pietro De Silva.

Initial Date of Release: 20 December 1997(Italy)

La vita è bella(Life is Beautiful), this Italian film is one of the master pieces in the history of cinema. It is indeed an unforgettable fable that proves love, family and imagination conquer all.

The movie portrays the horrific and pernicious conditions of the Holocaust and also the beautiful relationship between a father and son, and the love that is shared between a married couple. This movie is set before and during the German occupation of Italy in WWII.The right mix of humor, romance, drama, history and tragedy made this a Cult Classic. It really manages to show the beauty as well as the cruelty of life. The story is all about an eternal sacrifice of a father. It deals about the lives of a Jewish servant’s family, who were surrounded by Nazi death camps. Living in such a dangerous environment, he wanted to protect his very young son from those fears of war, so he uses a lot of humor and imagination…by telling this was all a part of a game, and who ever could hide well they would get more points. The innocent child felt that as game and enjoyed it, despite being had all those turmoil around him in the camp.

The film was so comic and at the same time completely emotional. The background score of the film lifted the emotions in the scenes a bit more. The acting by the lead Roberto Benigni was absolutely phenomenal that it’d be a crime to call it “acting”, who bagged a well-deserved Oscar for the same.

The film was a critical and financial success. It grossed over $230 million worldwide, becoming one of the highest-grossing non-English language movies of all time and received widespread acclaim, despite some criticisms of using the subject matter for comedic purposes. It won the Grand Prix at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival, nine David di Donatello Awards (including Best Film), five Nastro d’Argento Awards in Italy, two European Film Awards, and three Academy Awards (including Best Foreign Language Film and Best Actor for Benigni).

Chhichhore

–Arunima Maiti

Film: Chhichhore
Producer: Sajid Nadiadwala
Director: Nitesh Tiwari
Music: Pritam
Running time: 143 minutes

The storyline of a movie rotates around plot and climax. The movie ‘Chhichhore’ switches between 90s and the present. Back then, In Bombay there was a group of friends studying in Indian Institute of Technology Bombay. And in the present time they becomes reunited at their middle age at a very dreadful situation.

Raghav, a teenage boy, appeared for engineering entrance exam. His father Anirudh Pathak is a successful corporate employee and very dear to his son. Raghav’s mother Maya is separated due to divorce. Inspite of being a son of rank holder parents Raghav fails to be selected in his IIT entrance exam. He commits suicide by jumping from the terrace for his fear of being tagged as loser. With severe injuries in brain Raghav gets admitted to hospital. Doctor informs his parents that Raghav has lost all his hope to be alive and doesn’t want to live anymore. In order to encourage Raghav, Anirudh recalls his college days where he not only met Maya but also achieved unconditional friendship. He narrates his college days spent in H4 as a loser. Due to the narration Raghav gradually knows about all the losers of H4 who were Sexa, Acid, Mummy, Derek, Bevda and his father Anni. Anni calls all his loser college friends and makes them meet with Raghav for the sake of his life. Then they elaborate their college days to Raghav. He comes to Know that how they tried hard to remove the loser tag and became fighters. After hearing the story Raghav regained his will to survive and learns how to be strong emotionally.

The main moto of the movie is against suicide. Nowadays, it is a burning problem of our generation. Depression and suicidal thoughts are very serious issues in our society. Here, the main character Anni tells us that suicide is not the ultimate solution of every problem. We should fight back and deal with the failure. The Chhichhores teaches us that life is the most important thing itself. Beside these, the ups and downs in the life of a college student is also persented very well.
The movie has huge emotional beats. The dialogues and music are very heartwarming. Screenplay, content and performance of the actors are very tempting. The acting of Sushant Singh Rajput is much amusing. Overall ‘Chhichhore’ is an inspiring, bittersweet movie with heartfelt moments. I will suggest everyone to watch the movie and enjoy the raw essence.