Impressive ‘Deool’ ends without suitable climax
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Rating: na
Producer: Abhijit Gholap, Devisha Films Director: Umesh Vinayak Kulkarni Screenplay, Dialogues: Girish Kulkarni Music: Mangesh Dhakade Lyrics: Swanand Kirkire, Sudhir Moghe Cast: Dilip Prabhavalkar, Nana Patekar, Girish Kulkarni, Mohan Agashe, Atisha Naik, Sonali Kulkarni, Kishor Kadam, Jyoti Subhash, Hrishikesh Joshi, Vibhavari Deshpande Movie Review by: Ulhas Shirke |
After two sensible films ‘Valu’ and ‘Vihir’, the team of Umesh Kulkarni and Girish Kulkarni unite once again with their artistic work, through their latest released film ‘Deool’.
Besides perfect presentation of a village life supported by superb portrayal of characters by versatile artistes,’Deool’ successfully manages to depict the image of today’s rural India and the effect of globalisation on the lives of the people living there.
The film revolves around one such village Umbra in Maharashtra, which is otherwise peaceful and slow moving in progress, having been exploited by a local politician Bhau ( Nana Patekar), who is a tool at the hands of his party chief ( Mohan Agashe). Bhau cleverly manages the people from the village, including the lady Sarpanch (Atisha Naik) and proves how liberal he is, in treating the women folks. He also keeps his wife (Sonali Kulkarni) happy but sends his two daughters to Boarding school to keep them away from village life.
Bhau, respects the only educated and sensible senior citizen Anna( Dilip Prabhavalkar) , who lives all alone with his son and his family living in Bangaluru. When Anna comes up with a hospital project for the benefit of villagers, Bhau supports his idea and agrees to find finance through his party chief. In the meanwhile, a young labourer Keshav, working at Bhau’s house sees Lord Dattaguru in his dreams, while he takes a nap in the deserted place below a tree, after searching for his missing cow. When he wakes up, he is all excited and starts disclosing this miracle to whoever he comes across, on his way back home.
When Keshav narrates this incidence to Anna, he advises him not to disclose it to anyone and suggests him to keep his faith to his own self. But, the news spreads to the village and a Journalist who is a friend of the youths from the village including the nephew of Bhau, suggests them to sensationalize this matter. He convinces Bhau’s nephew and other friends the importance of this news and suggests them to turn this villlgae into a pilgrim centre. Bhau’s nephew goes one step ahead of his uncle and takes the Party chief into confidence. Bhau has no other way left but to take alongwith him the youth of the village and succumb to their demands. Fed up with this politics Anna decides to leave the village and moves to Bangaluru to join his son. Even Keshav desists himself from the materialistic living of the villagers, especially after the death of his cow.
The excellent realistic presentation of the film in the first half, manages to keep the audience engrossed into their daily life; but after interval slows down a bit with irrelevant scenes. It picks up after those breaks, only to conclude with unexpected climax, which is open ended for the audience to decide.
The most sensible person in this film- Anna deciding to quit the village, itself shows the helplessness of sensible people living in this country. The film had ample scope to show that there is law which does not spare those into corrupt practices, as suggested by the character of Anna to Bhau, in one of the scenes; but that does not happen in this film’s climax. There was also scope to show the villagers realising how important it was to have a Hospital project for their village, rather than playing with the sentiments of the devotees. But, that too does not happen in the climax.
The only young man Keshav does his best in his own way, but his efforts don’t bring the desired results. The film therefore does not succeed totally in removing blind faith, but only keeps the reality before the audience. There is no doubt that the selection of artistes for the respective characters is a perfect choice and so are the well written dialogues. Wonderful photography, perfect editing and best sound effect makes this film more presentable technically . Music by Magesh Dhakade is just appropriate for this film.
Direction of Umesh Kulkarni clearly shows, how perfect he has been with his study of village life.There has been lot of hard work during the film’s making, managing such a big team of talented artistes. Lead actor -Nana Patekar rocks in the role of Bhau; but it is Girish Kulkarni, who in the role of Keshav is more impressive. With excellent support coming from a big team of artistes, the film is more like a performance oriented film. Watch the expressions of Mohan Agashe, playing a shrewd politician, watch the body language of Usha Nadkarni, simple but perfect housewife played by Sonali Kulkarni and that guest apperance by Naseeruddin Shah, as a stranger coming to the village; they all are extraordinary!
The one and only one…. Nana Patekar
Born as Vishwanath Patekar on the 1st day of the year in Murud – Janjira, Maharashtra, he perhaps indicated that he was born to lead others. Nana, as he is popularly known, is a very common name in Maharashtrian families, but Vishwanath alias Nana Patekar turned out to be a different person with tremendous creativity hidden within his self. He found an opportunity to explore his talent when he joined Mumbai’s J.J. School of Arts. Those days, for a commercial artist, it was not a well paying job. So, Nana switched over to another creative job of acting. He performed on stage and soon became a popular performer with his spontaneous reactions through body language supported by his rich dialogue delivery.
It did take some time for him to establish himself in this field and then started receiving offers also from films. His negative role as a local politician, who rapes a social activist in the popular Marathi play ‘Purush’ invited the attention of Bollywood personalities and Nana soon landed in Hindi films, demanding meaty roles well suited to his image. Muzaffar Ali, B.R. Chopra and N. Chandra gave him the recognition of an actor, with suitable roles and thereafter there was no stopping for this talented actor. There was a time, when he demanded almost the same amount that was paid to some of the heroes of the films. But, then he deserved it. Nana was very choosy about the roles and gave his 100% in whatever role he played. Whether it was standing opposite bigwigs like Raaj Kumar or Amitabh Bachchan, he always made his own impression on the screen.
In the year 2001 Nana was back on stage and even attempted the Hindi version of ‘Purush’ with Ayesha Jhulka playing the social activist. He also played a different character in a Marathi film ‘Pak Pak Pakak’, which only he could have played. Some of his films like ‘Krantiveer’ ‘Gulaam E Mustafa’, ‘Agnisakshi’, ‘Khamoshi’, ‘Yashwant’, ‘Hum Dono’, ‘Apharan’ and ‘Ab Tak Chhappan’ fully exploited his potential as an actor. Watching him in the recently released films like ‘Welcome’ and ‘Raajniti’ clearly shows how an actor can make his presence felt in every scene of which he is part of. Nana has that ability to pull the crowds at the theatres, with his name in the cast of the film. Now that he will be back to Marathi cinema, is itself a good news for all of us. Everybody is eagerly awaiting for his film ‘Natasamraat’ which has been announced by Mahesh Manjrekar, with Nana playing the title role. At least, it will help to draw big attendance for Marathi cinema.
When you ask Nana for an interview, he would always say, “What interview yaar, asech Gappa maru”. It is very difficult to extract many things from his intelligent mind. But, one thing is very clear that he is very frank and honest to himself. In the past, he was asked about his favourite film and Nana had taken the name of ‘Gulaam-E-Mustafa’. “I liked the script of Mangesh Kulkarni,” he had said. Nana’s memory is simply amazing. He may forget the name of the person, but he would perfectly recollect the place and period of last meeting with that person. There are so many people whom he has helped and his donations to charity are known to all.
Today, he is a contented person, having earned sufficient for his simple living and has received honours with the top awards in the film industry. Instead of living a stress filled life in the city of Mumbai, he has preferred to live a simple life in Pune, growing vegetables at his farm house. It is only for shooting schedules, he makes himself available in city. Staying aloof from crowded places, perhaps, gives him happiness. But, that does not mean that he is cut off from his social responsibility of expressing his opinion in this democratic country. Many a times, he reacts sharply in a humourous way, giving his frank opinion to the media from time to time, about rise in corruption and other social issues. And, that really shows, how much he is socially aware about the ill effects of corruption on the society. Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world. Indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has. And, Nana is certainly doing his bit.
Marathi Movie world take this opportunity to wish him a very happy birthday which coincides with the opening of the new year.
‘PAK PAK PAKAAK’ REVIEW
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Rating: na
Producer: Ashish Remo Story: Sai Paranjpe Director: Gautam Joglekar Cast: Nana Patekar, Saksham Kulkarni, Narayani Shastri, Jyoti Subhash… Movie Review by: Pradip Patil |
Think of movies for children and I am sure many inane and childish movies will flood your mind. But not any more!
“Pak Pak Pakaak” is the movie that breaks the stereotype associated with children’s movies. This is the movie that will entertain and enlighten the grown ups and kids equally. Pak Pak Pakaak, directed by Gautam Jogalekar and based on stroy created by his mother Sai Paranjape is a refreshing change from the usual marathi movies.
Pak Pak Pakaak has very solid storyline. The plot revolves around a village, a boy (Saksham Kulkarni) living with his grandmother and an outcast (Nana Patekar) living in the forest outside the village. Chiklu is a spoilt brat who lives with his grandmother and derives pleasure from playing pranks on everyone without caring for anybody’s feelings. Even the only two people he cares about can not change him! The whole village seems to be afraid of his pranks. To add to the villager’s woes there are rumors of a ghost called bhutya. It is said that he resides in the forrest and haunts anybody who venture inside the forrest.
One day, Chiklu slips into forrest inadvertently and stumbles upon bhutya. He realises that Bhutya is not a ghost but a normal human being who has decided to outcast himself from the society and protect the forrest. Bhutya and Chiklu soon strike a chord and become best of pals. How they both help each other to overcome the hirdles in their life forms the rest of the story.
When it comes to fine performances, this movie has plenty of them. But it’s the youngest of them all, Sakhsham Kulkarni who steals the show. He portays the innocence and the curiosity of a young mind with such an ease. Very natural performance. Nana Patekar gives very controlled performance. There are moments when you can see why he is considered as one of the best. The way he utilises his hypnotic gaze and his voice to get into the character is simply awesome. The duo has a such chemistry between them. The performances by Jyoti Shubhash(Grandma) and Narayani Shastri(Salu) are very effective.
Music is another strong point of Pak Pak Pakaak. The songs are part of the narrative and help the story move forward instead of being common dance and singing routine. The song picturisation is excellent, especially “Salu ga salu” and “Dhipadi Dhipang”. The movie captures the feel of a village very well. The supporting actors, their getups and dialogues are very natural and authentic. The cinematographer does the job of capturing various shades of the forrest very well.
This movie has social messages in it like “Education is good”, “Protect the Nature” and “Don’t be superstitious”. But instead of preachinbg them, the movie conveys them very subtely and that’s what makes this movie different from the others.
our word is that you should not miss this movie and once you watch this movie, I am sure you will keep coming back for more.