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steveblack2006
Reviews
Guzaarish (2010)
A self indulgent director's fetish of a movie
Sanjay Leela Bansali is among those who feature predominantly at every award ceremony for the kind of hype they create around their work and self promotion they indulge in than for the quality of their work. Most popular Indian award ceremonies are farcical at best and the films & people who win such awards seldom represent the best of the year. I expect Guzaarish and Bansali to be at award ceremonies this year too making words lose their meaning by basking in unworthy praise.
If Sanjay Leela Bansali's previous duds like Devdas and Saawariya made you cringe, Guzaarish outdo both in that aspect. What saved an average movie like Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam or Khamoshi was the music, but here the audience are even denied that reprieve and Bansali scores music that is as dead as the movie. Like the protagonist of the movie who is dead below the neck, the movie itself is dead from head to toe and smells decomposed.
Hrithik Roshan and Aishwarya Rai are not known for their histrionics, but even that cannot excuse them for this performance. To be fair, Hrithik could be excused in that he at least makes an effort to cast off the weight this pitiful characterization, but Aishwarya in her Gothic costumes and grotesque make-up cuts such a sorry figure that you feel more pity for Aishwarya the actor than Hrithik's character.
As with Devdas or Sawariya or Black, it is clear that the most effort has gone to the look of the movie than its soul. Nothing wrong with that, if it succeeds or elevates the film. Alas that is not the case here. Even Priyadarshan packages his inane movies very well, but he makes no bones about it and do not take his movies seriously. However Bansali's fetish with the look & color of the movies goes so overboard that we unintentionally share Hritik's relief at being outdoor when the camera leaves the interiors and ventures out on his way to the court. The whole movie has the look of a vain fat ugly man dressed up in very expensive cloths that absolutely do not suit him.
Spoiler alert -------------
So for a man who is bankrupt with no money even to pay his nurse, Hritik lives in a house that would fit a king with some funny taste in interior decoration. He has no money, but there are three dedicated live in staff at least. For someone suffering all kinds organ failure and needs periodic dialysis, there is not even trace of puffiness to his face. He look like a model in a furniture shop Ad. Even the constant reminder about his quadriplegia does little to evoke any sympathy or feeling for his state because of the way Ethan is presented. Watching this movie is like flipping through a interior decor magazine while waiting at the dentist- there is no emotional attachment. The only difference could be that you will happily chose the dentist over this movie any time.
At a time when Bollywood is finally coming out of its formulaic past, at time when a novice director like Zoya Akthar makes a thoroughly assured directorial venture with Zindagi Na Milegi Dubara, a veteran like Bansali is fast digging up his creative nadir. There are still worse movies than Guzaarish, but such movies are under no illusion of what they actually are. Bansali's preoccupation and fetish of confusing package with the product has come to stage where he honestly believes he is doing something great. I am sure Bansali will soon handle the camera, art direction and all aspects of film making himself as he will find his vision at odds with rest of the creative team. Producing his own movies and watching the movies himself will be the logical conclusion this preoccupation.