Fanaa

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Fanaa: * and 1/2

Let's fake one last hug, shall we?

 

This is exactly what happens when an otherwise decent romcom director ventures to handle complex themes of national security, terrorism and physical handicap. The royal mess that he and his braindead script-writer create hurts all the more because Aamir and Kajol are the immediate victims. And its just downright painful for an ardent 90s Bollywood fan like me, watching them lend meaning to utterly spineless characters and B-grade Bollywood sequences.

The real reciever of all the brickbats should be Kunal Kohli, the director. Not a single honest, unseen moment in the whole frig*ing film. Now that's a feat. Neither is there even a remotest sense of plausibility in how the blind girl falls for the first guy she meets in the city (a tour guide who keeps on dropping not-so-subtle hints about having a penchant to bang girls and move on) nor is there any sense of thrill or dread in the army espionage bits. Jumping from one banal filmi sequence to the other, the film reaches a godawfully predictable finale, which is dealt so immaturely and shoddily you really wish you hadn't bothered spending £8 on this crap.

Seems like no critic can gush enough about Kajol's performance, but to be honest, she's woefully miscast. Kunal Kohli is no Prakash Jha or Aditya Chopra who can carve out the quieter nuances of Kads' head-strong wizened persona (remember Dil Kya Kare and DDLJ?) which means she ends up looking very lost mouthing corny dialogues and Urdu shero-shayari. All through the 90s, her contemporaries like Madhuri and Juhi played far more unbelievable characters in the trashiest of movies but with a zing that won us over. Why we loved Kajol back then was for her girl-next-door, urbane, natural charm and wit she lent to all her characters– and that is really where her range as an actor ended (watch K3G or Hamara Dil Aapke Paas Hai for proof). As the still-wet-behind-the-ears town virgin belle, neither has she gone that extra mile to make Zooni Ali Beg stand out from the plethora of characters she's played on-screen already (even Preity-with her cosmopolitan looks-managed to pull off Kashmiri girl characters in Hero and Mission Kashmir far more admirably) nor are there ANY sequences that'd bring out something unseen from her–making her comeback quite forgettable.

She has tried, oh yes she has, but in a film as unbelievable and trashy as this, one needed a far more dynamic actor to transcend the audience's disbelief. Watching her do the typical Bollywood heroine routine in Fanaa is just a bit… boring.

But mark my words, she'd be up there at the Filmfare Best Actress slugging it out with far more accomplished performances and who knows, might even manage to grab some more undeserving trophies.

Aamir's in for an even more lifeless character (something which'd have been lapped up by Anil Kapoor or Sunny Deol 5-6 years back) and it is such an apathetically sketched cut-out that even his Raja Hindustani would anyday be more identifiable. Rishi Kapoor's the only actor with some graph in the character while the rest oblige with their generic Bollywood sidekick/innocuous-hammy child routine. Tabu manages to turn in a below average performance (maybe they gave her the script after she'd signed on the dotted line… its a Yashraj venture after all!)

Granted, the idea wasn't to create something street smart but all the shero-shayari and the self-congratulatory background score after every "sher" that Aamir cracks on the spot makes your nerves grate. Mothers saying goodbyes to their daughters with advice like "tere dil mein meri saanson ko panaah mil jaaye, tere ishq mein meri jaan fanaa ho jaaye" (an answer to what if the blind daughter finds the man she loves) are unintentionally funny.

Unlike what I've read elsewhere, there's no sense of place at all. There isn't a single person except the actors populating the screen for the whole of second half (apparently, to get around this, an excuse of a snow-storm is in place) , its all too isolated and lifeless to transport the viewer to anywhere. Maybe it was a conscious decision to focus on the characters, but who'd give a toss for these done-to-death Bollywood versions of "real" people? I wouldn't and I didn't. The action scenes are probably there for comic relief and sure enough, each of them will have you rolling with laughter. There's also an attempt to comment on the Kashmiris and nuclear missiles which makes even Veer Zaara's in-your-face banter on Hindustan-Pakistan bhai bhai seem intellectual.

If there really is any respite, its for 5 whole minutes of a ditty "Mere Haath Mein". A superb haunting rendition by Sonu-Sunidhi is brought to life by some amazing cinematography and a duskily lit-and-made up Kajol (finally someone manages to shoot her more beautifully than in Suraj Hua Maddham). The song's shot with passion and instinct- two words that sadly can't be used for the rest of the 130 or so running minutes.

Please avoid this de-caffeinated, tasteless concoction of Satya meets Hero meets 80s Bollywood melodrama. Its kitsch of the most inferior variety.
More to come,

Cheers!