Join WhatsApp Channel
If Anurag Kashyap cannot be deviant, who else can? If he cannot show depraved content, like convicts forced to eat human excreta or smoke a concoction made from a dead lizard, who else can?
The story is that this grotesque 2 hour-plus film was a short movie titled Monkey in a Cage that got the expected ‘Rah Rahs’ at an international festival egging him to expand the story to its current length, thus making the pseudo-intellectuals who always go ga-ga on Hindi film’s enfant terrible’s work fall all over him.
I recall the nationally and internationally applauded filmmaker accepting my enquiry among a media group just a few months back about his dishing out such weird cinema mainly or only because he cannot make ‘normal’ films. But do we have to endure such cinematic excrescences in the name of filmmaking? Ahh, that reminds me! The man once actually told me during an interview, “I make family films!” When I expressed surprise, he explained, “Every member of a family watches it separately!”
I rest my case on this high-priest of cinematic degeneracy!
Here’s the story. Samar Mehra (Bobby Deol), a struggling actor-performer at 50, is accused of rape by Gayatri (Sapna Pabbi) and so picked up one night by the cops. He has just had a row with present girlfriend Khushi (Saba Azad) and has apologized on phone. The rest of the film is about his tenure in jail as his bail keeps getting postponed and he gets depressed and frustrated by the day. Gayatri is an obsessed soul with the fury of a “wronged” woman and the help of an unscrupulous counsel (Aurobindo Bhatacharjee), who manufactures evidence.
The inmates with whom Samar interacts as an undertrial are men used to the sadistic atmosphere in the overcrowded, filthy cells full of assorted men, many of whom claim innocence while others boast of their crimes. The worst of humanity is seen as we have ‘chosen’ inmates charging exorbitantly for simple goodies like a packet of chips, or for posting letters. There is also violent groupism.
The cops, initially dead against Samar, turn sympathetic when they come to know that he is truly innocent—but then, is he? Kashyap creates a grey tone for Samar, even as his sister (Sanya Malhotra) and lawyer (Riddhi Sen) face adversity boldly but with decreasing patience.
From a young age, we all have been taught that every story we read or hear must have a beginning, middle and end. Over here, the middle occupies a neat 70 percent of the length, and there is no end! Wow, go the pseudo tribes, what a novel touch! But that’s certainly not my idea of a film. An open end and a confused culmination, where the director seems to say that one can never predict about life’s vicissitudes, are, methinks, poles apart! It’s as if Mr. Kashyap had to choose between logic (not always present here—despite the “searing, gritty, unflinching realism” as per some colleagues’ raves) and his own trademark weird style, and chose the latter.
If Bandar is merely excruciatingly stretched and stops short of being completely unbearable, a lot of the credit needs to go to the performances. Bobby Deol, who is attracted to gray-black zones of late, delivers a wonderful performance as the tormented and psychologically-tortured Samar. He makes us feel for him much more than the script designs, and his first outburst in tears with his sister is a revelation indeed of an actor who does his iconic and underestimated father Dharmendra proud.
Sanya Malhotra is fantastic in the brief role of the concerned yet non-nonsense sister, and another scene-stealer is Jitendra Joshi as Inspector Deol, whose initial interaction with the newly brought-in prisoner Samar brings the house down. (With this scene, my hopes of a balanced thriller shot up, but to no avail!).
Sapna Pabbi aces the vengeful woman perfectly and the acting by most of the jail inmates is excellent, special mention being needed of Vijay Gupta, the old man dumped by his scheming daughter-in-law, Sukant Goel as the well-meaning Aatish, Indrajit Sukumaran as the ruthless Lijo, Raj B. Shetty as the ‘lizard man’ and Ankush Gedam. Nagesh Bhosle as Papa Jacob is wasted. And Uday Tikekar as the judge overacts.
The music is ho-hum, and the background score (Shivahari Varma) quite jarring. The production design (Prashant Bidkar) is amazing and the camerawork by Shaaz Rizvi intentionally dark and depressing as per the mood of the film. The dialogues are no-holds-barred.
The film is depressing, deviant and depraved as well—no holds barred too. Watch it at your peril if you are a normal Indian filmgoer. And who’s this individual I mention? Someone who likes a Dhurandhar as well as All The Best, a Delhi Belly, a Bajrangi Bhaijaan, a Sitaare Zameen Par, Bajirao Mastani, RRR and films as varied as those of Manmohan Desai, Subhash Ghai, Mahesh Bhatt, Aditya Chopra or Priyadarshan and has loved the works of V. Shantaram, Raj Kapoor and Hrishikesh Mukherjee.
In short, someone who watches wholesome cinema of all kinds by paying hard-earned money for his ticket.
Rating: ** (Just About)
Saffron Magicworks’ Bandar Produced by: Anurag Kashyap, Nikhil Dwivedi, Shivie Pandit & Gaurie Pandit Directed by: Anurag Kashyap Written by: Anurag Kashyap, Sudip Sharma & Abhishek Banerjee Music: Sapan-Jagmohan, Amit Trivedi, Vishal Mishra, Payal Dev–Aditya Dev, Sickflip, Blurface & Shivahari Varma Starring: Bobby Deol, Sanya Malhotra, Saba Azad, Sapna Pabbi, Jitendra Joshi, Nagesh Bhosle, Vijay Gupta, Sukant Goel, Indrajit Sukumaran, Raj B. Shetty, Ankush Gedam. Nagesh Bhosle, Uday Tikekar, Joju George, Riddhi Sen & others
