November 12, 2011

Rockstar: Misses more than a few notes

Rockstar is one those movies, which had the potential to change the course of cinema in 'bollywood', but didn't. One of the most prominent storyline, excellent director, brilliant music, ace cinematographper, pretty decent performances but the movie just seems to be incomplete. Every chapter seems incomplete. The whole movie seems to pass in the 'ab kuch hoga' hope, but the chapter gets over and you are like. Bass, ho gya. Itna eech? And you move onto the next chapter and the same thing is repeated. Though not to mention, it is definitely not a bad movie. Pretty Gripping throughout its 2 hour 40 minute length. You do get bored a couple of times, but then it comes on track pretty quickly. Good performance by Ranbir and 4-5 absolutely amazing songs make it a definite watch, but yes, if you are expecting a Dev D. You'll be disappointed. Watch it nonetheless.

Rockstar is the story of Janardan Jakhad (Jordan) who wants be a singer but is not able to, since he hasn't felt pain in life or love. So he wants that pain in the heart. He goes and gets his heart broken but doesn't work. He becomes friends with Heer (Nargis Fakhri). Then the usual, friends falling in love. The girl gets married. He wants to meer her again. They meet again. Ger separated again. Then Meet again. During, this milna bichadna Jordan becomes a rockstar. Now he has everything but nothing since Heer is not there. And the movie revolves around this theme till the end.

First, the goods. Ranbir delivers a pretty good performance. No Award winning material here, but he doesn't Not look the part. He absolutely feels like a rockstar in his avatar. Though his north indian jaat thing didn't work for me (may be coz I am from North Campus and can relate to these types and trust me Ranbir didn't come close) and hams in a few scenes, he absolutely rocked in the rockstar sequences especially when he is struggling with his dilemma. He does well in his limitations and you feel him playing the part pretty close to what it was supposed to be. Rahman's music (espeicially Kun Faaya Kun, Sadda Haq, Jo bhi Main) and Mohit Chauhan's vocals are a definite asset to the narrative. These songs typically make you ignore some of the silly hiccups in the scripts. You forget the problems here and there, and move on after one of these songs are played. Imtiaz does a pretty good job in the 'treatment' of the script especially when he uses the back and forth technique. He goes back to a scene and then explains what happened. Though it is kinda confusing because when the scene was supposed to take place, he just takes it forward and explains it later when he actually comes back. Though interesting way of telling a story but Too Experimental sometimes it gets and you are like 'Pehle hi dikha deta bhai'.

Now the bads. The Biggest problem i found with the movie was the incompleteness of the plots. Whenever a chapter is going on. You are like, 'Ab kuch hoga. Ab kuch hoga' and it doesn't happen. When it does, it happens so abruptly that you are like 'Arey aise kaise?' Every chapter does not seem to complete itself and the movie moves on to the next one. For eg. Janardan is attending Heer's wedding and suddenly he is back in delhi and the chapter ends. He is not 'heartbroken' and suddenly becomes attains this demi-god rockstar status. He is angry with the people at large but the movie does not provide sufficient reason or heightened hatred as a push towards the same. You are like, 'he was pretty alright in the last scene right? Then suddenly what happened?' There are too many 'Whys' in the audience's mind which can never be good. Every Chapter should end at a particular height and doesn't. You will understand once you watch it.

Second problem is Nargis Fakhri. She can't act to save her life and to be honest, i don't understand this rage about her hotness. To be honest, she is just like another kashmiri girl and i'm sure you'll find a million of such girls in colleges across the country. Nothing special either about her looks and especially about her acting. She makes Katrina Kaif look like Meena Kumari. Almost Irritating throughout the movie. Thirdly, though i mentioned 4-5 songs are amazing, but there are 4-5 other songs which have neither relevant to the narrative nor are any good to listen to. They seem to take up around 30 minutes of your time and had they not been there, Imtiaz could have ended the chapters smoothly.

Overall: A Decent One Time Watch But do not expect anything pathbreaking or coming of age bollywood stuff.

Feel-O-Meter: 5/10