The Dirty Picture is yet another example of a good story wasted by
not being true to the product but bothering too much about the masala to
make it a success. The movie has a very solid performance by Vidya
Balan (sans her ample and absolutely not hot cleavage show) but offers
almost nothing else. The sleaze is over done. The dialogues are Jhel.
The pace is slow and does not do justice to the 'emotional appeal' of
the movie. The director just trivialized the subject due to
incorporating too much bollywood masala and lost the soul of the movie
in all the hulla gulla. Give it a miss. Wait for it to release on Tata
Sky instead.
TDP is loosely based on Silk Smitha's life as
a south siren who attained a cult status in regional movies due to her
'bindaas' attitude, her relationship with men and her downfall later.
The plot in itself is pretty interesting given the lack of 'inspired
from real life' scripts in bollywood and obviously you have some
expectations while walking in the cinema hall. Add to it, Vidya Balan
and all the ho halla around her weight gain and the sleazy avatar she
adorns. Add Naseeruddin Shah and Milan Luthria and the expectations rise
even further. But the movie hardly delivers on any counts.
Vidya
does a fabulous job especially in the last 15 minutes of the movie
portraying a 'once the hottest property in south' falling into
depression and spending her life in loneliness. Naseeruddin Shah is
just his old reflection of good work. Tusshar is as pathetic as his
earlier work and Emraan is as intolerable as earlier. But you can't have
a single actor take all the burden no matter how strong the shoulders
are (yes, we are talking literally here). Also, only in the last 15
minutes you seem to start connecting with the lead character and it's
too late. Those 10-15 minutes are the only few minutes worth watching
but since you have spent 2 hours tolerating the non sense, you are not
in a mood to appreciate anything and ya, those last moments also have a
stupid sufi song cropping from god knows where. May be the director
suddenly recalled, he had to tick the 'Put a Sufi Song in the CD'
checkbox and put the song in the movie at the last moment.
The
biggest problem for me, was not being true to the story and just losing
in the sleaze for majority of the length. Full first half is wasted in
showing Vidya's Cleavage and trust me, it ain't a treat to watch. Every
single shot, she is bending over to leave nothing to one's imagination,
courtesy a high fat diet for the past 6 months and a bulk shipment of
wonderbra. There is nothing taking you away from it, no matter how hard
you try and it IS irritating after the first 10 minutes. Dear Milan, you
need to understand that we get the point of her going to any lengths
(except prostitution. which i guess is only to avoid any legal battles)
and using her assets to bag roles in the movies, pretty early in the
narrative. You don't have to keep harping on the same thing for full
first half. The movie just doesn't move anywhere. There is just shot
after shot of her sleazy item songs and nothing else.
The
director falls into the same trap that the directors that he portrays in
the movie. Though he is trying to criticize the directors for
portraying women as sex objects, he does exactly the same here as well.
Scene After Scene, Shot after Shot and it doesn't help that its Vidya
too. Had there been any other 'actual' hot property, may be it could
have worked, but not in her case. Secondly, once you understand that she
herself took her decisions and was not forced into this lustful world
of stardom, you don't seem to empathize with her as well. Once the
emotional connect is lost, you don't really care what happens with her.
Even if the director wanted to engross the audience through the 'oh poor
girl' card, he couldn't because the story wouldn't have allowed him to.
Overall,
A could have been much better movie, lost in the sleaze trap with no
emotional connect with the lead actor, no support from the co-actors,
very few 'moving' sequences and snail paced narrative. Not Recommended.
Feel-O-Meter: 4/10