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Release
date:
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October 5, 2018
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Director:
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Sriram Raghavan
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Cast:
Language:
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Tabu, Ayushmann
Khurrana, Radhika Apte, Anil Dhawan, Manav Vij, Chhaya Kadam, Ashwini
Kalsekar, Zakir Hussain, Pawan Singh, Kabir Sajid
Hindi
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In 2016,
Priyadarshan made a Malayalam film about a blind man (played by Mohanlal) who
becomes an unwitting ‘eyewitness’ to a murder. The hero’s visual disability in Oppam was accompanied by a heightened
sense of hearing and smell that made him a potential threat to the killer.
Now what happens if
a killer’s self-preservation instinct causes them to not care that the ‘witness’
is sightless? That question was the starting point of an intriguing French
13-minuter titled L’accordeur (The Piano Tuner) from 2010 directed by Oliver Treiner.
Writer-director
Sriram Raghavan draws on an atom of just a single element from the French short
(which is acknowledged here in the credits), turning it into a full-length
Hindi feature that should rank among the most fascinating, fun, funny suspense
thrillers ever to emerge from Bollywood. If you are determined to find out what
that one element is, you could watch L’accordeur
on the Net. You could, but why would you? Because even discovering
that secret in the opening half hour of Raghavan’s Andhadhun (The Blind Melody)
is a pleasurable experience.
Here is what little
can be revealed of the plot. Ayushmann Khurrana plays Andhadhun’s Akash, a pianist in Pune who is introduced to us as a
blind musician trying desperately to complete a tune. Akash is frustrated with
the stereotypical expectation that a disability sharpens the creative mind,
since he just cannot find the inspiration to wrap up that damned melody. His
new friend Sophie (Radhika Apte) is unmoved by his struggle: incompleteness,
she tells him, is what gives certain things their finish.
In the posher
quarters of the metropolis live the glamorous Simi (Tabu) and her wealthy, much
older husband, the forgotten Hindi film star Pramod Sinha (Anil Dhawan). Pramod
a.k.a. Pammi is stuck in a time warp in which he keeps rewatching his hits,
causing considerable irritation to Simi. Her ambition is a career in films
and she wants Pammi to use his network to help her.
From these
unconnected strands is born a black comedy that is breathless in its pace and
breathtaking in the scope of its imagination, linking seemingly random occurrences in the cosmos, and with all its entertainment value,
arriving at an unexpectedly thoughtful study of both kismet and human nature.
People tend to let their guard down with those who cannot see or hear and with
children, fear also often causes us to appear guilty of more than what we have
done, and the writers play around gleefully with these truths.
The premise is
completely wacko, a what-if to beat all what-ifs. It is also familiar terrain
for Raghavan whose films Ek Hasina Thi,
Johnny Gaddaar and Badlapur are a testament to his fixation
on evil crackpots and cold-hearted criminality. The story by Hemanth Rao and
Raghavan himself has been expanded into a multi-layered screenplay by the
latter with Arijit Biswas, Pooja Ladha Surti (also the film’s editor) and
Yogesh Chandekar. At one level, the result of their collaboration is a hugely
enjoyable, fast-paced thriller, but at another it is a quietly observant tale
reminding us that however convinced we may be that we have outsmarted fate, the
universe is always the boss of our lives.
It takes a bunch of
nutty, unfettered actors to put their faith in this nutty, impertinent script.
As it happens, the cast and writing of Andhadhun
are made for each other.
Very often, a
character’s disability becomes a crutch that actors lean on, letting that
aspect of the part overshadow their entire performance. Khurrana is not that
kind of artiste. While he does not stumble even once in playing blind, he is
just as effective in conveying Akash’s amorality, affections, aspirations and
fears.
In a smaller role,
Apte exemplifies guilelessness and innocence that are a refreshing contrast to
the machinations all around her. The supporting cast is impeccable, never once
faltering when the storyline takes them to places that lesser actors could have
reduced to a farce. Kabir Sajid – the darling little boy from Secret Superstar – beautifully, albeit
briefly, plays a child in Andhadhun
who epitomises the moral ambivalence of most characters in the story.
The queen of all
she surveys in this film though is the tremendously gifted Tabu, whose
chameleonesque talent is put to great use here as she plays a woman with many
faces, a creature with a steely grit, capable of vileness, yet in possession of
very human vulnerabilities, still yet capable of discussing the foulest of her
actions with such casualness that it is impossible not to laugh. The manner in
which Simi/Tabu switches from one emotion to the next to the next, at one point
her face and voice conveying completely different feelings,
is a sight to behold.
Terrible things
happen in this film, yet it manages to tread lightly throughout. This overall
effect and the build-up of suspense are a consequence of the smooth interplay
between Raghavan’s purposefulness, K.U. Mohanan’s clever camerawork (what he
hides being as important as what he chooses to show), and the intricate sound
design by Madhu Apsara. The weave is tied in by Amit Trivedi’s
well-conceptualised soundtrack, the thoughtful mix of original songs and
re-runs of classics, and Daniel B. George’s background score.
Few musical
instruments can match the piano in its ability to build up an atmosphere of
intrigue. Soulful, robust and sharp, it is a constant companion to the twists
and turns in this madcap movie.
The music, like the
film in its entirety, is a tribute to 1970s Hindi cinema, the point driven home
all the more sharply by the decision to cast Anil Dhawan as Pammi. Dhawan shone
fleetingly on the big screen in real life in that very decade. Snatches of
scenes from his actual films are played in Andhadhun,
lending an air of poignance to his character’s journey and nostalgia to the
film as a whole.
If you plan to
watch Andhadhun, make sure you arrive
early so that you do not miss the prologue or the old-fashioned credits, along
with the bizarre statement accompanying them on screen, plus the tribute to
Vividh Bharti’s Chhaya Geet and
Doordarshan’s Chitrahaar. It all
counts, as does every minute, second and milli-second of the unpredictable,
crazy ride that follows.
Rating (out of five stars): ****1/2
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CBFC Rating (India):
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UA
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Running time:
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140 minutes
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A version of this review has also been published on Firstpost:
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