Year: 2009
I can't really say whether a release close behind the heels of the very successful Dev D has been good or bad for Gulaal. It has been good in a way, because most people, who would have ordinarily avoided this extremely violent & grim movie, have flocked to the theaters to see what Kashyap has done next. The Indian movie going audience is till date largely composed of people looking for some entertainment & feel good movies work best here, there's nothing to feel good about in Gulaal. Yet it has been given almost 6-7 shows per day at the multiplexes third week into it's release, & the occupancy & response among the audience was surprisingly good even on a Monday afternoon.
And here probably also lies the loss of the movie. Dev D has left the audience confused about the directors intentions. For me at least,it was kind of weird to have a large group of middle aged ladies sitting in the row ahead, laughing away to glory at puns, which were, well, i suppose meant to be funny only in a sardonic, ironic sort of way. Add to it a story line rather difficult to figure out & you can bet people are going to be glad to break into nervous laughter at each opportunity they get, especially with people being shot every other minute at every minor pretext & dialogue corny enough to make the God fearing mommy loving Indian boy shit in his pants.
Gulaal starts out extremely well and stays quite that way throughout it's length, though i have to list out things about it i did not quite like.
Firstly, i felt that the climax was a bit too hurried, unexpected, now that's a good thing generally, but somehow it did not quite satisfy me. But then that could only be me.
Then there is the music of the film, especially towards the end, the songs are not worked well into the shots & stand out & sound rather jarring. But then, that too could be just me.
Thirdly, a few of the characters that started out well, could have been made more significant & meaningful but are only half done. Like Jesse Randhawa's character of the lady proffessor abused by the rowdy students, or the John Lennon worshipping Prithvi Singh & his eunuch sidekick. They are built up a bit & then abandoned as if in haste. Particularly the latter, the little bits of falshback don't go too far to make crystal clear. All the marijuana smoking & twisted song writing does not lead to any end in itself after all, as one may expect early on.
Lastly, i hate to say this, but some scenes toward the end (Dilip spiralling into insanity on being dumped by Kiran) are shot in the Dev D like psychedelic style, but that doesn't fit in too well over here. It becomes too heady a cocktail to be appealing. More so if a different approach is being introduced so late into a film which has progressed in a certain way for the first 1&1/2 hours or so.
(Then again i might be wrong, for i myself loved the sudden digression into absurdity in Magnolia, but somehow i failed to take this one this).
The good things about the movie... well, everything else. The acting, of course, everybody does an award worthy job (don't ask which award, the good ones, lol). Quite a watchable film, a very good film to be precise, in spite of all my criticism, i only criticize because i deem it worthy of being analyzed as serious cinema. Anurag Kashyap is for sure one of the few learned & talented directors in mainstream Hindi films these days, a guy to watch out for. I'll sure be watching out, eagerly for his next.
