Release date:
|
February 1, 2013
|
Director:
|
Bejoy Nambiar
|
Cast:
Language:
|
Neil Nitin Mukesh,
Vinay Virmani, Vikram, Monica Dogra, Neil Bhoopalam, Milind Soman, Anupama
Kumar, Nassar, Lara Dutta, Rohini Hattangadi, Tabu, Isha Sharvani, Prahlad
Kakkar, Nishan Nanaiah
Hindi
|
David is
based on potentially explosive material that proves to be a damp squib. Director
Bejoy Nambiar’s Shaitan – released in
2011 – was beautiful in its slickness but most unfortunately opted for style
over substance. David, on the other
hand, has the makings of great style and great substance, but fails to go the
whole hog on either front. Still, the content is unusual enough to be worth
discussing.
This is the story of 3 men with the same name in 3
different cities of the world, whose lives we enter in 3 different years. London,
1975: David played by Neil Nitin Mukesh is the loyal
lieutenant of a gangster. Mumbai, 1999: David played by Vinay Virmani is an
aspiring musician who can’t get along with his father, the pious priest Fr
Noel, though his sisters dote on dad. Goa, 2010: David played by Vikram is a
drunken layabout in a Goan village whose bride left him at the altar on his
wedding day.
The London episode is about family politics and an
international political game involving a government and gangsters, with an
interesting twist at the end. The Mumbai episode most unexpectedly leads to
charges of “forced conversion” against Fr Noel by a dangerously opportunistic
and violence-prone Maharashtra politician in a chilling scene that’s the most well
executed part of this film. The Goan story leads … well … it leads nowhere in
particular.
The film’s problems begin right at the beginning with the
tiresome inter-weaving of 3 tales and the constant, confusing back-and-forth
between 3 decades. Too much time is spent on introducing us to too many
characters – particularly in the London episode – and by the time the actual
action takes off, it’s the interval and already too late to salvage the film. Still,
the slick production values are definitely worth noting as is the interesting
decision to present London 1975 in black and white. The retro look of that
episode – costumes, hairstyles et al – are very well done. And the three main
players are supported by some excellent performances, especially Nassar as Fr
Noel and Rohini Hattagandi as the Maharashtra neta Malti Tai.
Of the three leads, the handsome National Award-winning
actor Vikram is dealt the poorest hand by this film. Anyone who has seen his work
in Tamil knows his brilliance. Hindi film buffs may also recall how his small
role as Aishwarya Rai Bachchan’s husband in the Hindi version of Mani Ratnam’s Raavan outshone Abhishek Bachchan’s
central performance. But the best actors in the world are helpless in the face
of limited material, which is what Vikram suffers in David. The Goa episode featuring him meanders too much and has the
most awkward ending of the three. Neil is effective in the London saga
and makes a very interesting physical transformation post-interval of which I
can’t give you details since that would involve spoilers. And the events
unfolding in Mumbai 1999 give us Vinay Virmani, a talented young Canadian actor
of Indian origin who we in India earlier saw in the Canadian-Indian co-production
Speedy Singhs aka Breakaway in 2011.
As it happens, the Mumbai saga is the most memorable of
the three not just because of the good acting all around but also because it’s
handled most effectively, the subject is one that Bollywood has not touched before
and even the mainstream news media avoids. Christians in Hindi cinema up to the
1990s were almost always portrayed as drunkards and gangsters, cabaret dancers
and gangsters’ molls, quasi-foreigners who barely spoke Hindi and only wore
western clothes. From the 1990s onwards, the community virtually disappeared
from Hindi films which is how it remains even today, apart from rare exceptions
like Homi Adajania’s Cocktail in 2012
in which the overtly Christian name Veronica was sneakily given to Deepika Padukone’s
heavy-drinking, heavy-smoking, drug-taking, sexually promiscuous character to
be contrasted with the overtly Hindu Meera (played by Diana Penty) who does not
drink, does not smoke, does not take drugs and does not have sex. Genuine
concerns of India’s Christians have almost always been ignored by Bollywood.
What makes David unusual is that it
takes a position on the canard of “forced conversions” that has been spread
against Indian Christians by communal propagandists, and the violence and intimidation
the community has faced in several states that is rarely covered by the
national media.
This crucial issue merited a separate film. The London
episode in David too could have been another film. Why Bejoy Nambiar chose to force all three stories into
one celluloid venture is a mystery. Their intersection in the end feels
contrived; the common name for the three men, as it turns out, has no
particular significance; and the editing, especially of the Goa story, is
surprisingly lax considering that the man on the job is the highly respected Sreekar
Prasad. The result: David is so
tedious that it’s hard to focus on its very unusual pluses. This is a film that
does not seem to know where it’s going.
Rating
(out of five): **1/4
CBFC Rating (India):
|
U/A
|
Running time:
|
159 minutes
|
I cannot quite agree to this review, especially about the Goan part featuring Vikram, Tabu, Isha & others. It was an earnest part, with good perfo's & witty scenarios, from all the people. The part played by Vikram, if not exceptional like say, an Anniyan or a Raavan, was good in the sense that he was totally convincing. Bejoy nambiar has made a very different/unconventional movie, moving away from the traditional and orthodox storytelling styles, and i think it was quite an enjoyable watch.
ReplyDelete