REVIEW 244: HASEE TOH PHASEE

Release date:	February 8, 2014
Director:	Vinil Matthew
Cast: Language:	Parineeti Chopra, Sidharth Malhotra, Adah Sharma, Manoj Joshi, Neena Kulkarni, Sharat Saxena Hindi

Hasee Toh Phasee is an unusual Bollywood romantic comedy that uses the clichés of the genre as a mere backdrop to give us two characters of the sort we rarely meet in Hindi cinema. So yes, there’s a large, very rich joint family, there are bodies laden with heavy jewellery and expensive clothes in the run-up to a shaadi, and there are happy parivaars singing and dancing on grandly conceived set pieces. None of that though is allowed to overshadow the young couple at the centre of it all: Meeta and Nikhil.

Parineeti Chopra plays Meeta, a drug addict and scientific genius with questionable moral values who fits into the chor-ke-bhi-usool-hotey-hai category of people: she steals without pangs of conscience but will only steal from her dad because that’s her principle, she explains. At the start of the film she briefly meets Nikhil (Sidharth Malhotra). Seven years later, she is back in the home from where she stole money to fund her student research, armed now with a supply of anti-depressants and a plan to steal once again to repay a debt for a lab she started in China. This time when she meets Nikhil, he is engaged to her sister Karishma (Adah Sharma).

Nikhil and Karishma are in a relationship of a kind often seen. They’re fond of each other but clearly not in love. She keeps breaking up with him or threatening to do so, and each time he desperately tries to gain her forgiveness. He is yet to make anything of himself professionally so her constant anger is not unjustified, but her repeated break-up threats and haranguing render her charmless. Why does he not call it quits when being with her is so stressful? Well, because they’ve been together for seven years which in his book is a commitment.

So far so good. The lead characters seem credible and their relationships believable. The acting is pleasantly low-pitched. The songs too are likeable though Zehnaseeb is the only one that truly lingers. The film is visually pretty from A-Z (Karan Johar is a co-producer so that’s a given, I guess) but unlike some of KJo’s own directorial ventures, the prettiness does not threaten to overwhelm its soul. Director Vinil Matthew adopts a storytelling style reminiscent of the low-key tone and tenor of Shakun Batra’s 2012 film Ek Main Aur Ekk Tu which was produced by Johar. That film was about whether a friendship is possible when unrequited love is in the picture. Hasee Toh Phasee, on the other hand, is about a completely mismatched pair who you cannot help but root for even as you wonder whether they’re right for each other.

HTP’s screenplay by Harshavardhan Kulkarni is peppered with under-stated humour and unexpectedly sensitive situations. Meeta’s emotionally charged first encounter after seven years with her father (played sweetly by Manoj Joshi) and the references to TV's C.I.D. during a comical family investigation by Nikhil’s father (Sharat Saxena as a retired police officer) stay on in the mind. However, the writing leaves many questions unanswered. How, for instance, does a girl so deeply fond of her father leave him for seven years without once looking back?

That’s not the only unconvincing portion in the film. Yet, so palpable is the chemistry between the lead pair that all the inconsistencies seem secondary in comparison. From their first meeting, there is an instant connect. Later, as their friendship blossoms in the run-up to his wedding, two scenes wrench the heart: the one in which he discovers her sleeping peacefully in a filthy, run-down building; another in which he forgets her in a locked room. Their bond is electric with empathy. Such chemistry is possible only when good acting, writing and direction come together and in that regard, it’s hard to believe that Vinil Matthew is a director on debut.

That little sparkler called Parineeti we first encountered in Ladies vs Ricky Bahl in 2011 is in fine fettle here as a woman who doesn’t bat an eyelid before telling a fellow that he should dump her sister because it’s they – Meeta and Nikhil, not Nikhil and Karishma – who are made for each other. The manner in which she pulls off Meeta’s disarming, child-like frankness though can’t excuse her inconsistency with the physical quirks she gives her character – attributable to her penchant for pills, one assumes. If the intention was to convey the highs and lows between doses, the point is not effectively made. 

Sidharth is to Parineeti in Hasee Toh Phasee what Shahid Kapoor was to Kareena Kapoor in Jab We Met: a perfect foil to a female co-star’s more energetic presence and role. That he is gorgeous was evident in his first film Student Of The Year (2013). HTP is a reminder that there’s more to him than the arresting face. There’s a well of sensitivity in those speaking eyes, and he’d be wise to seek out directors who tap that aspect of his personality rather than just his handsomeness. Of the rest of the cast, a special word must go to the ever-dependable Neena Kulkarni as Nikhil’s watchful mother. The jarring element of the lot is the actor playing Nikhil’s cousin, the one with the disturbingly lecherous eyes that we discover in the end were inappropriate for his role.

Hasee Toh Phasee is not without flaws – the dry title being one of them – but it’s unusual and fun overall. Besides, when was the last time Bollywood served us an important female character who is a chemical engineer from IIT? Hindi film women who are not home makers tend to be in the glamour business (models, designers actors) or of a vague, indeterminate profession. Over and above everything else in HTP though, there are the sparks between Parineeti and Sidharth. By the end, as a viewer I felt an overpowering desire to do everything in my power to get those two together. It’s not often that a film can make you feel that way.

Rating (out of five): *** (stars out of 5)

CBFC Rating (India):	U/A
Running time:	142 minutes

Poster courtesy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hasee_Toh_Phasee

REVIEW 119: SAHI DHANDHE GALAT BANDE

Release date:	August 19, 2011
Director:	Parvin Dabas
Cast:	Parvin Dabas, Kuldip Ruhil, Vansh Bhardwaj, Ashish Nayyar, Sharat Saxena, Neena Kulkarni, Anupam Kher, Kiron Juneja Sippy, Yashpal Sharma, Tena Desae, Udit Khurana, Preeti Jhangiani

Opening scene ... A voiceover tells us that when gangsters want to finish off a member of a rival gang, there’s no better time to choose than the day of his incarceration or release from jail. You can’t be sure of the person’s location at any other time. The camera takes us to Rajbir (Parvin Dabas) who is leaving jail. While Narendra Pehelwan’s people wait for him at the front gate, he exits from the back where his friends are waiting for him. “Rajbirbhai, pichhwaade ke raaste se nikalne ke liye kitna diya?” one of them asks. “Bas, pichhwaada hi nahin diya,” he replies.

The tone is set. Actor Parvin Dabas makes a remarkably assured debut as the writer-director of Sahi Dhandhe Galat Bande produced by Preeti Jhangiani. This is the story of four small-time gangsters operating in the village of Kanjhawla on the outskirts of Delhi – Rajbir and his friends who are nicknamed Doctor (Kuldip Ruhil), Ambani (Ashish Nayyar) and Sexy (Vansh Bhardwaj). Rajbir’s release from jail coincides with an agitation taking place in Kanjhawla in protest against the acquisition of farmers’ land by the Delhi government under Chief Minister Jaya Gulati (Kiron Juneja Sippy) for a factory being built by industrialist Aggarwal (Anupam Kher).

I’d recommend that you pick up a DVD of Sahi Dhandhe to find out how the bad guys try to do the right thing for their people. What’s most appealing about this film is its simplicity and Dabas’ no-frills approach to his story that lends it a quality of realism despite being entertaining. Every episode in this film had the potential to go over-the-top, but at no point does Dabas cross that invisible line. And though the issue at hand is grave, Sahi Dhandhe has an understated and appropriate sense of humour, clever dialogues that don’t sound like dialoguebaazi or the kind of clichéd crudity that we’ve come to expect in all gangster flicks, and just enough elements to keep it both enjoyable and meaningful, emotional yet light.

My favourite scene involves Rajbir trying to make a speech to the farmers, which had me chuckling at the start but left me with a lump in my throat. Later, in one of the film’s most telling moments, a TV journalist from the city sticks her mike into a villager’s face and asks, “Aapke hisaab se Land Acquisition Act mein kya tabdeeli honi chahiye?” to which she gets silence and a blank stare in response. And one night during a boisterous drinking session, when the gang is trying to figure out ways of helping the villagers who don’t want their help, Ambani laments farmer leader Malik’s insistence that he will keep the movement non-violent and apolitical. “Na politics na thod-phod. Yeh toh saale sharaafat mein hi mar jayenge,” he says. Nice.

The unusually long actors’ list (above) that I’ve given in this review is my way of saluting casting director Honey Trehan. The gang of four are remarkable though I’m torn between Ashish Nayyar and Kuldip Ruhil as my pick of the quartet. Among the talented supporting cast, a special word needs to be said for Neena Kulkarni who looks, talks and feels the part of Rajbir’s foster mother who does not want him anywhere near her agitation; Kher who metamorphoses from the faintly oily fellow chatting with the CM on the phone to the dignified businessman imperceptibly making a pass at a troublesome female journalist; Sippy as the politician whose son is her weakness; Sharat Saxena as Rajbir’s boss Fauji in a role that is a departure from the slimy villain he’s played a zillion times; and Yashpal Sharma (Malik) thankfully playing something other than a bad cop or goon here.

Cinematographer Anshul Choubey matches the tone of subtlety that Dabas evidently wanted to achieve with this film. His camera moves from a suburban village to the CM’s upmarket residence to Delhi University and back without giving us any grand sweeping shots of the city, yet managing to capture its feel. I wish the lyrics of the film’s songs were a little clearer, but I enjoyed the unobtrusive use of the background score by Siddhartth-Suhas. And the sound design by Subash Sahoo is so clean that we actually hear Malik’s nails scratching his stubble in one scene.

Sahi Dhandhe is not without its flaws. The end struck me as too simplistic and not entirely credible considering what we’ve witnessed in Singur, Bhatta Parsaul and other long-drawn-out farmers’ struggles. And once the lead four had arrived at a decision about their exact strategy, I felt the film should have approached its climax more rapidly, for a greater impact. Also, while most of the primary characters have shades of gray, the farmers are all painted as uniformly good folk which to me was a jarring reminder of the regular Hindi film stereotype about big bad city folk and bechare kisaan. Still, Sahi Dhandhe Galat Bande is a gently engaging film, and I hope Parvin Dabas gets to write and direct many more films in the future.

Rating (out of five): ***

 CBFC Rating:                      U/A with three audio cuts (The Censor Board really needs to stop reading casteism into the inoffensive use of words describing professions. They actually got the film maker to remove the word “dhobi” from a song!)

Running time:                        120 Minutes

Language:                              Hindi

Photograph courtesy: http://www.facebook.com/galatbande