Aamir

A lot of good reviews about this movie had made this movie a must watch… though I hadn’t read any of the reviews – I only check out the stars which each critic gives – the name of the movie did hint that the movie would be about religious extremists and an Aamir who would be the odd one out! When I have high expectations from the movie, the movie has to be really good to meet those…

But Aamir just did that… A very well made movie – and everything from the music to the cinematography is amazing in this movie… I downloaded its songs a day before I saw the movie and the music sounded good. It sounded fresh and before I saw the movie I knew that the music would be well blended into the movie… and that’s exactly how it was. I had liked the soundtrack of Anwar and commented on how bollywood OSTs were catching on… and kudos to Amit Trivedi and Amitabh (soundtrack and lyrics respectively) for churning out this bold soundtrack. As far as I remember, before these two movies RDB had such a well blended soundtrack… Chakkar ghumyo lightens the moment in the movie when Aamir is confused about all that is happening with him; Haara speaks about his state of mind after he realizes what he has been asked to do; Ha Raham is a beautifully written qawali while he fights back to get ‘the bag’ back and Ek Lau is the perfect track to end the movie with – it gave me goose bumps when it played with the ending titles of the movie.

Debutant director Raj Kumar Gupta (he assisted Anurag Kashyap on No Smoking) and cinematographer Alphonso Roy do an amazing job taking the story through the ‘real’ Bombay and some of the filthiest parts of our city while depicting the plight of people from Aamir’s quom… The camera movement while the story travels thru the gallis of Bombay, though gives an effect of a handheld camera does not strain your eyes like in Sarkar Raj. Needless to say the script of the movie is the strong point and the character of Aamir is very well written… I am not sure if I agree with the end of the movie but I guess it seems like the appropriate end. The natural elements in Aamir’s character are evident, like when he is in a cab, flustered about the happenings and he snaps at the cab driver – but in the next moment apologizes to him; his journey from the airport to ‘National restaurant’, where he first refuses to sit in the cab and later on is directing traffic to reach his destination on time; he bursting out into tears after he snatches ‘the bag’ back from the thugs. Rajeev Khandelwal does a lot of justice to the character and even though he might have to work on certain aspects like dialogue delivery, his acting and facial expressions put him in a category of professional actors. Like every good movie, each character has its own role and importance in the movie… apart from the policeman chasing Aamir, none of the characters seemed unnecessary!

Speaking about cinematography some of the random shots of Mumbai through out the movie, the shots of people on the street when Aamir is directing the traffic are all so natural… I’m sure those are not actors and they have just been captured sometime during the shoot of the movie or even randomly at various spots in Mumbai.

I am not a big fan of the Harry Potters and Lord of the Rings of world cinema. I like movies with simple subjects which may not even have a message attached but touch my heart with their story. And seeing the recent change in cinema, the different subjects on which movies are being made and technical excellence showed by the film makers fortifies my faith in Indian cinema… For me to conclude on Aamir… it inspires me!