30 Mayıs 2012 Çarşamba

ROCKSTAR: MOVIE REVIEW

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Cast:Ranbir Kapoor, Nargis Fakhri, Aditi Rao Hyadri, Piyush Mishra, Kumud Mishra Director:Imtiaz AliRuntime:158 min. Verdict:Thoroughly frustrating. Mostly silly. But with some awesome moments.  Genre:Romance, Drama
(Note: When it comes toverses, my comprehension skills attain sub-zero levels. I don’t get them atall, and often during a film when I do happen to merely understand what theline is that has been sung, it is a personal eureka moment. So huge parts ofthis film captured in the songs might have completely escaped m   e, and if so, any help/correction would bemuch appreciated.)
                Mr. Ali’s Rockstar continues with the trend of our “serious/meaningful”cinema rationalizing a film song. It was 18 years ago when Hum Aapke Hai Kaun strung together 14 songs in a narrative andearned the tag of a marriage video. I mean, a lot has happened with the filmsong since then, but mostly it has been a reluctance to dilute the tone of afilm and “break” into a song-and-dance number, and wanting to find more andmore ways of including songs without having to stage them, or ways in whichthey are an organic output of the narrative and not a detour. Mr. Ali’s conceithere is including just as many songs as Mr. Barjatya’s film without any of theresulting artifice or breakdown of tone, and although only one of them is consciouslydealing with Music the insights gained are probably just about the same.                Let us consider here any randomHindi film, and the manner in which the songs echo the narrative. Say, Mr.Inder Kumar’s Dil, and how the songs– from the foot-tappers Khambe JaisiKhadi Hai and Dum Dama Dum to themellowed down considerably slower and romantic Mujhe Neend Na Aaye to the almost wailing O Priya Priya. I mean, one could pick up any film reliant on songs,like say Phool Aur Kaante, and seethis very obvious and basic method of film narration. In those films, we neverwondered, and we still don’t wonder how those guys could sing and dance, andalso we do not mind if the same actor is voiced by different singers. I mean,Mr. Shahrukh Khan had both Mr. Kumar Sanu and Mr. Vinod Rathod for him in Baazigar, while the latter lent hisvoice Mr. Siddharth Ray. It’s horses for courses, and we don’t even botherabout these trivialities, and I don’t think we’re supposed to either. I mean,it is one of the very basic tenets of movie-illusion. In Rockstar, the end credits (and this is a first time for me) statequite explicitly that Jordan’svocals have been supplied by Mr. Mohit Chauhan. So yeah, there you go, that is sometonal austerity for you, and not that I don’t appreciate it. Who knows, maybe adecade or so down the lane we might have actors voicing themselves. The question here, though, is to understand whatMr. Ali’s Rockstar does with thisausterity? I mean, the late K.V. Mahadevan had Mr. S.P. Balasubramaniam to singall the compositions in Mr. K. Viswanath’s Sankarabharanam,and that was a film that actively dealtwith its art-form (music). One understands the need. Does Mr. Ali’s film dealwith musical expression in any significant way that movies haven’t for the past50 or so years, either implicitly (Dil)or explicitly (say, Karz)? Is Jordan arockstar because of the film, or is his talent a mere rationalization of allthe songs, and even, in some case, some sort of narrative device? Right afterJordan (Mr. Kapoor) reaches Pragueand meets Heer (Ms. Fakhri) and finds peace making a return in his life, hewalks up to a bunch of street musicians. It seems to be building into then theonly moment, in a film about a popular artist, which is only about the artist and his art. And nothing else. Oh yeah, artdoesn’t spring out of vacuum, sure, but this is not about the output. It isabout the lure, the magic, of what is it about an art-form that inspires anartist to choose it as his mode of expression. Jordan is entranced by the sheerjoy of whatever it is they’re playing so much so that his hands start playingthe imaginary guitar to the tune of it. It ought to be pure, and for a momentor two it is. Until he starts singing, and the song turns out to be about acaged-princess. Like you know, Rose from Titanic,or Heer here. Coming on the heels of their joint escapades, the music distractsus too much towards the content and leaves us with precious little by way ofform. The rockstar is not indulging in music; he is merely conveying what hethinks about the girl’s predicament. Which sort of undermines all that blahabout the film and its music and the embarrassing reduction of the nature ofart, assuming it is experience and pain that give birth to it, when all thefilm seems to be interested is in some sort of star-crossed love story andwhere the music is merely incidental. You know, like Romeo-and-Juliet, or Heer-Ranjha, or you know, Kites. Oh yeah, death then becomes anecessity.                 Songs here, then, assume theirusual reactionary service of conveying the emotional state of affairs, and Mr.Ali’s conceit is to cause a protagonist who can facilitate their existence, andthus build a character/narrative arc. Both of them address each other, which isquite economic, and even resourceful. Questionable are the results, I say.Confession: Mr. Ali’s overarching themes about love and stuff come across aspainfully silly in their adolescence, and that is something I cannot overcome. Anddon’t get me even started on all that nonsense around Tibet, or the blink-and-miss nods to the Khalsaand Kashmir, so brief it is disrespectful, andeven disgraceful. Chances are my blood might start boiling. Let us leave itthere.   And concern ourselves with the manner in whichthe film goes about presenting them. Consider for instance, the opening and itssurefootedness, the blunt forceful cuts and the pace that is achieved, Jordanalmost walking out of one of them, a glimpse of his relationship with the mediaand its camera, and the serenity of the past it matches on to. I got to admit Istill don’t get why Mr. Ali does that thing with his opening credits (even in Love Aaj Kal), where he sort of lays outtemporal instances of his protagonist in a distinctly haphazard fashion, sortof freeing them of the captivity of narrative, and then proceeding to just dothe opposite. I do not understand the meaning/implications of such a narrativechoice other than some sort of confusion. This is not the problematic partthough. What truly baffles me is the lighting and colors he uses to introduceHeer into the scheme of things, by means of a stage-performance, and – here’sthe curious part, especially for a love story – not via your standard-issuebright lighting but the seedy red-and-black you (at least I do) normallyassociate with dance bars. At least, it is unflattering and the least bitcharitable.
  Inmy defense of straight-jacketing this sort of lighting with one sort of place,here’s another frame from the film when the bucket-list is well on its way.



Thisformal choice is further underlined by the near excessive lusting on the partof Jordan’sfriends, and whose reaction shots sort of frame Heer. Is that literally ared-herring? Probably not when you come across this shot.


Butthen, yeah, when you find her excited to visit one of those seedy movietheatres, or booze, or do whatever it is a guy supposedly does. Courtesy thoseinitial reaction shots, Heer is mostly an object who attains some sort ofpersonality (and respect?) once she jumps the gender. Or some such nonsense. Thegender mishmash here’s a mess, but again, let’s stay away from all that. What’scrucial here is the casting of Ms. Fakhri, and the complete lack of any degreeof orthodoxy in her, both as a result of her appearance and the way Mr. Alibuilds her. I am not even sure if her marital infidelity is supposed to morallystun us, because (a) when she invokes right and wrong and resists adultery itdoesn’t make much sense considering their preceding whatever, and (b) when shedoes commit adultery, we’re mostly numb. In support of (b) consider that SouthAfrican model they used in Ms. Pooja Bhatt’s Rog. You can wrap saris all around her but she’s still a foreignelement. The orthodoxy just isn’t there in the first place to cut throughlater. Which leaves me a whole lot confused about her trajectory.  Mr. Ali’s Rockstarbecomes a thoroughly frustrating and reductive affair – long passages of completelyineffective filmmaking interspersed with moments that soar way beyond the realmof the inspired and attain true transcendence. Just when performances breakdown, scenes break down, angles break down, and a line of conversation doesn’tmake any sense other than gift-wrapping for us the moment, a little movementaround Jordan (Mr. Kapoor in a more-or-less brilliant performance) completelyshatters the built-up defense and blows you away. Consider a pivotal moment in the film that causesour protagonist much of his anger. Their relationship is in top gear, thepassion unbearable, and it’s time for Jordanto leave Prague.They meet, and the impatience Mr. Ali exhibits here is quite inexplicable. Iwouldn’t want to divulge anything here (just in case you haven’t yet watchedit), but Jordan’s reaction to it, especially considering his knowledge ofHeer’s intentions, put his IQ somewhere in the range of 52-68, because hey,even Forrest Gump understood what love is. More criminal is Mr. Ali’sconception and staging of these affairs, when he could easily have kept Jordan(and us) momentarily clueless about the Heer lash-out, considering he gives ashot of her walking behind a wall and breaking down. A filmmaker who just needsa single fluid shot, the camera zooming and craning out, to convey the wholeparadox that is spiritual awakening (which involves both pride and humility inthe way one feels special) ought to know better than that.
  And he also ought to know better than having a journalist (Ms. Hyadri)who provides the same service to the narrative as Ms. Jiah Khan did to Ghajini, i.e. a built-in expositiondevice, especially when he has one readily available (Khatana, Mr. KumudMishra). He ought to know better than to ask Heer’s sister to bludgeon us witha sledgehammer on how to feel about Jordan's role in her, let us say,hopeless medical condition. I mean, the little shouts at the top of her lungs,for crying out loud. Exposition is a slippery device, and one of the rules inthe instruction manual is to never use it in drama or romance, especially inits running-commentary form. More so when you have the chops to pull it offvisually. Consider the way Mr. Ali framesthe expanse of Prague in the film more romantic moments, providing the nomadJordan, who is walking throughout the film with nowhere to go and nowhere tobelong to, at least the warmth of his own space. And when things go down, especiallyafter Prague, he makes a mockery of his private space finding newer ways to lockhim up within his public persona. I mean, yeah, the vertical bars of the prisonare a touch literal, but then the system is the least of his problems. Thereare hands swaying all around him, and there are figures stacked all about him.






  Except for that little room with Led zeppelin and JimMorrison, this Rockstar has precious little in the film by way of a home, andonly the hope of a land where he can live like he wishes to. Oh yeah, like thatother wall filled with fantasies this year (MissBala), Jordan gains a whole lot of weight when considered an allegoricaldevice. The film’s opening passage with its crowd worship feels totallydifferent when Mr. Ali cuts to it at the end, less about the fame and adulationand more the implicit obligation. In a way his talent is his curse. When thefilm finally gives him his own little space, under a little tent, from where hedoesn’t have to walk anywhere to, absolutely cut off from everything, you knowhe deserves it. I mean, despite the fact that he’s stupid. Oh yeah, a punch tothe system. And the finger to us. Sometimes, you know, you got to feel sorryfor them.

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