Guru - Movie Review

So yesterday night was Manduka's turn to go with a group of 30-40 friends to the opening of Mani Ratnam's much awaited Guru, especially what with the upcoming wedding rumors and all that. Here is the point of view from Manduka's well.

Acting:

Abhishek - An out and out Abhishek movie. I think this is probably his best movie to date. Going beyond the multistarrers where due credit is not given to his acting skills, he shows what he is made of. The role is well fleshed out and he does great justice to it. You can see some of the flashes of the father that made him what he is – angry young man, arresting voice and dialogue delivery, timing of funny lines. Loved him in this movie more than any other.

Aishwarya – after Kandukondein, I think this is one where she has actually acted, and seemed natural rather than most of her other eminently forgettable recent roles.

Mithun-da – what can one say? I am glad finally someone of Mani Ratnam’s calibre actually picked him up for a great role in a mainstream movie. Hope such roles keep coming his way, because sure enough he can do justice to them.

Madhavan/Vidya Balan – well delivered roles, albeit small ones. Mainstream actors continue their new found interest in on-screen liplocks. The movie was a bit busy to actually give due justice to these two characters and they were not fleshed out well enough.

Mallika – item number girl, and man, did she do it justice! Received the maximum hoots and whistles during opening credits, so its clear who the most popular actor in the movie was J

Supporting cast:

As expected, great performances from stalwarts like Rajendra Gupta and Sudhir Pandey. Can’t remember the name of the actor who played Ghanshyam-bhai, but he is good in a lot of his recent movies, and did not fail this time either. Arya Babbar – who was that? I didn’t know either, until I looked it up. Other than the last name, I don’t think he shares any other talents with his father. Hope he tries other things with his career rather than expecting us to tolerate him. Overall, pretty strong supporting cast.

Cinematography:

Was great! Rajiv Menon of Bombay and Kandukondein fame, does not fail to deliver. I think one expects a certain exceptional quality of cinematography from Mani Ratnam movies, given the magicians who have worked with him like Ravi K. Chandran, PC Sriram and Santosh Sivan, and its amazing how they live up to the expectations each time.

Art direction, Production design, costumes, locales:

Quite a lot of attention to detail and period in sets and costumes, and wonderful and picturesque locales for the cinematographers to weave their magic. What disappointed me was the ill-thought out juxtaposition of South India in the songs and the story set in Gujarat. Mani Ratnam should stop making dual-language movies and ruin the experience. It is good to either see the monsoon rain and waterfalls in Kerala or Tamil Nadu, or a story set in Gujarat. Something that is made based out of Tirunelveli and Gujarat does not gel well, and it definitely seems forced.
Checked up and saw the names of Sabu Cyril for Art Direction (Virasat, Kala Pani, Amaram, Hey Ram) and Samir Chanda for Production Design (Omkara, Iruvar, Rang de Basanti, Krrish, Zubeidaa and a host of others). Now I know why I liked those aspects so much J

Editing:

Was disappointed by the totally linear storytelling. I checked it up and see that Sreekar Prasad has done movies like Yuva and Kannathil Muthamittal before. Definitely not one of his best attempts I would say. There were sections of dialogue, especially in the second half, that were best left on the cutting floor. That time could have been used to do some more justice to the continuity of the film.

Music:

I know I will get lynched for saying this, but songs were a bit too ARRahman-ish. The chorales with their harmonies, the standard ballads, the typical Rahman song. But then again, I am a fan, so I am not complaining J. A movie like this could have done with music that didn’t have the standard signature of the composer, which did not happen. Bappi-da was good in his song though the music for it was a bit dissonant to my ears. Loved Jaage Hain, which is what Rahman does best – the big instrumental and vocal crescendos and elevate one’s spirit. The music by itself is great, don’t get me wrong. But takes away from the movie when one sees the great hand behind each song writ large. Mayya, Ay Hairathe, and Tere Bina are my other favorites in the movie. Mayya for a change sounds Middle Eastern as it is supposed to, thanks to Maryam Tollar, unlike Rahman’s attempt in Rang de Basanti. Other than her, I liked Hariharan, Shreya, Rahman in that order. I think Udit was wasted on an average song., and Chitra didn’t have much to do in the best song in the soundtrack.

The songs definitely grow on you, like a lot of Rahman offerings. Don’t know if people would still be listening to them a decade later, like they do with Roja or Bombay.

Lyrics:

Gulzar-saab – so quality of lyrics is good by default. But the bhaang song (ek lo ek muft) could have been done without. In general some lyrics sounded forced into the music rather than usual collaborations one expects like Akhtar/Rahman classics like Lagaan and Swades.

Choreography:

Item number was the best choreographed for me. Then Ash’s rain song. The group dances were all so-so, and the supporting dancers nowhere as good as Dhoom2 for example, but then the steps here were a lot more basic and slow compared to Dhoom2. But the costumes, music and the wonderful locales keep your eyes busy anyways.

Dialogue:

Was quite good. Looked it up and Anurag Kashyap has done other cool movies like Satya and Kaun, but also other eminently forgettable ones like the 2004 disaster called Deewar. Well, I guess this one worked for him

Story, screenplay and direction:

Average story and screenplay. Too many jolts from one period to another that were not handled well. This was supposed to be a biopic, and should not have felt like a bad play with scenes jumping from one year to another. Too many years to cover in a short span of time given all the gyrations take up an hour, so supporting cast is wasted in roles not well fleshed out. To his credit, Mani Ratnam managed to paint the lead pair in well fleshed out roles and interesting shades of grey. But what destroyed the whole thing for me was the ending. To reduce the entire movie to a blind hagiography of someone who has genuinely used questionable methods on his way up seems like such a cop out, especially from someone who claims to make serious movies. But if you look at how the serious problem of terrorism was wasted in Dil Se, or that of adpotion wasted in Kannathil, he has managed to stay consistent to those low expectations of him to do justice to a socially relevant topic. I guess Yuva was a notable exception in the recent past for me, among his other failures in story.

Direction – well it IS Mani Ratnam, so what more can one say? Well done, sir! Except, please please stop making dual-language movies and confusing the heck out of us by jumping from rural Kerala/Tamil Nadu to Gujarat.
Overall, the first half was awesome, though it had a tad too many songs. The film completely changed tone for the worse in the second half, lost its way and tried its best to make up for it towards the end, but just didnt make up for the first hour after intermission when you're yawning away at the usual heartwringer and tearjerker moments. And then he comes out with the most unkindest cut of all - in terms of how he ended it in a literal on screen pooja of winning at all costs as long as you can speak well and navigate your way around it..