HEROINE : My three impressions

One of the highly talked about films these days; Madhur Bhandarkar’s HEROINE. Another one in his ‘realist’ series. Madhur has produced several box-office hits as well as a hard hitting stories and the same was anticipated from HEROINE. However after watching the film I had three distinct impressions.

First: The film is itself a confused mass. While there are some excellent scenes, dialogues the film as a whole misses a consistency in story as well as its depiction. Even after considering the instable and inconsistent nature of the lead character Mahi, one cant deny the fact that the story simply fails to catch that inconsistency properly and ultimately what comes on the screen is a haphazard attempt..

Second: Unlike many other so called ‘realist’ films, which, if we observe carefully have a similar pattern, content and most importantly a typical ‘positive’ ending, HEROINE goes down a different path. Obviously it cant be radically different given the topic which it addresses Madhur has been careful enough to avoid the familiar ‘realist film’ identity. HEROINE’s uniqueness lies in its inconsistency to which I refered above. It simply disassociates itself from a realist image which is ‘acceptable’ to the audience and hence disloyal to its motif.

Third : Resembling to a character in this film named Tapanda- a bengali Director. A National award winner, skilled in making off-beat realist films Madhur got caught betweenn making a truly realist film staying loyal to his creativity and the pressures of making a sellable commercial craft. Balancing the two is an probably impossible and hence the film remains a hotchpotch.

The music of the film is average. Many tracks and fillers remind of Madhur’s earlier blockbuster Fashion and compell the audience to compare the two films. The comparison undoubtedly tilts in the favor of the Latter.

As far as portrayal of characters by the artists is considered, Kareena does a creditable job but still falls short of the mark she herself has set for her. Arjun Rampal has done a fairly good job but at places appears monotonus. Shahana Goswami, Ranvir Shorey make a remarkable impresison even in their cameos. While characters like Mugdha Godse, Ranjeet Hooda have done a average job. Their characters reflect the same inconsistency as the film. Some characters are simply annoying and leave the audience wondering about the justifications of them getting the parts.

            All and all, HEROINE is good film falling much shorter than what it could have been.