Rating: na Banner: Tanishq Digital Eye Producer: Baburao Bhor Director: Gajendra Ahire Story, Screenplay, Dialogues, Lyrics: Gajendra Ahire Music: Chaitanya Adkar Cast: Makrand Anaspure, Chandrakant Kulkarni, Ravi Kale, Ramesh Dev, Kranti Redkar, Vaibhav Mangale, Satish Taare, Bharat Ganeshpure, Hemangi Kavi Dhumal, Vikas Samudre Movie Review by: Ulhas Shirke

We are all aware that India is agriculture based country with around 60% of its population directly or indirectly dependent on agriculture, as their income. But, in India, Agriculture is often attributed as gambling with seasonal monsoon. The failure of seasonal monsoon, leads to a series of droughts. But, sometimes, un-seasonal monsoon showers, also creates havoc on crop with heavy loss, resulting in lack of better prices to farmers. But, mainly, it is the exploitation by the Middlemen, the main cause of a series of suicides committed by farmers across India.

It is said that on an average, one farmer commits suicide every 30 minutes in India. And, the state of Maharashtra is among the leading states reporting such tragedies. Latest released film ‘Pipani’ is all about this tragic situation in our country, which has been shot on the backdrop of a village in Vidarbha region in Maharashtra. Now, to highlight the situation, film maker Gajendra Ahire has used a plot, where a Hollywood film maker Freda Russel (Kristin Piesker) is shown making a feature film, to invite the attention of the world to this tragic state of farmers in this region and the reality behind it.

The film opens with a narrator Dnyaneshwar Tembhre (Chandrakant Kulkarni) a Circle officer of the Block, posted by the State Government. When he receives a request from his department to offer all the help to the visiting foreigner, he obliges by deputing Popat Jhadbuke (Makarand Anaspure) his most trusted man, to help the lady. Popat arranges her meetings with different people, beginning with Nanda (Hemangi Kavi), a widow, whose farmer husband has recently committed suicide.

Highly impressed with the location, when Freda returns with her unit team to shoot a film, her female character Kranti (an actress) seeks help from Nanda to be more realistic through her body language. The film also shows actor Ravi kale playing her husband and veteran actor Ramesh Deo playing her father in law. A Film which has been shot in this film, focuses more on the emotional part of the artistes and tries to show how the middlemen cheat the farmers from getting their dues. The scenes cover damage to crop due to un-seasonal rains and the helplessness of the farmers, forcing them to commit suicide.

But, what is more important is director Gajendra Ahire throwing light on other aspects; such as the effect of the happenings during the shooting, on the real life of the local villagers and how the middlemen in the film production department exploit the villagers. The director has tried to create humour through the character of Popat, who makes hard hitting statements in his typical style, blaming the administration for their apathy to uplift the lives of farmers with schemes and packages to boost their morale. There is one character who is shown as a helper to Popal (Vikas Samudre), who keeps on reminding him about the schemes.

Some form of humour is also created in one of the scenes, where Ravi kale, in an attempt to show his superiority to the actress kranti, tells her that he is a big actor, having worked with Mr. Amitabh Bachchan, when the veteran actor Ramesh Deo playing his old father is shown reacting, “So what ? I have performed with Rajesh Khanna and Amitabh Bachchan together.” There are many such humour filled sequences, which openly point out the neglect by the Government department, in finding the solution towards development of the Block. The transfer of the SDO to Pune, clearly goes on to say everything, after the shoot of the film is over.

The film conveys a strong message to the entire world about the ground level situation in this so called progressive nation. When Danny Boyle could make a film like ‘Slumdog Millionnaire’ projecting the slums of Mumbai in a cheap mediocre style, ‘Pipani’ has rightly concluded indicating that the film made by Freda Russel reflecting the real situation of the village can also win Oscars award. When Popat tells this news to an old villager, he replies, “What have we got?”. And, that delivers the film’s message. The film has openly used the advertisements of the sponsors, when Popat calls it an official break, before the commercial scene was played.

As a Hollywood director Kristin Piesker from Germany has done a good job. She is very much at ease, in her debut film. Makarand Anaspure is best suited in the role of Popat. Kranti Redkar finds the best opportunity to display her talent as an actress in search of a role, to win national award. Ravi kale, Chandrakant Kulkarni and Ramesh Deo look very natural in their respective roles. Vaibhav Mangle, Bharat Ganeshpure and Vikas Samudre have little to their share; but their presence counts. But, it is Hemangi Kavi, who invites all the attention. She presents a perfect village woman with her body language and excellent spontaneous expressions. Chaitanya Adkar’s music is well suited to this subject and backdrop and Chandrashekar Aiyer’s cinematography captures some of the realistic emotion filled scenes. Editing by Santosh Gothoskar is perfect. ‘Pipani’ produced by Baburao Bhor, is a sincere attempt to present reality through a cinematic format. You may call it a Black comedy.