Whenever I go for pixar movies I make a point not to miss short animation film they use to show before movie starts. So I decided to give Dus Kahaniya a try, another movie with multiple stories.
Here, all stories are totally independent. Let’s see each one of them one by one:
*1. MATRIMONY
*This is the story of a corporate honcho n his successful but lonely wife. She has an affair with army officer whom she meets once every week. As army officer has been posted in Asam, he gives her a diamond necklace. She couldn’t take it with her so she made a plan which got executed as she thaught but outcome is totally different.
Watchout for this one for its surprize element.
*Cast: Arbaaz Khan, Mandira Bedi, Sudhanshu Pandey
Director: Sanjay Gupta
Rating: 2.5/5*
*2. HIGH ON THE HIGHWAY
*This is the story of a couple who are about to finish their college. They always drink, drug, party basically aimless. They behave irresponsibally and suffer due to that.
This story has a message for today’s youth but it is encrypted(Remember, No Smoking). This one is relatively weaker of a lot.
*Cast: Jimmy Shergil, Masumi
Director: Hansal Mehta
Rating: 2/5*
*3. PURANMASHI
*This story is set in a village of Punjab. This is a story of a mother, her daughter n mother’s lover. One mistake made by mother costs her daughter dearly.
This is very sensatively directed and well acted story. Full marks to Meghna.
*Cast: Amrita Singh, Minisha Lamba, Parmeet Shethi
Director: Meghna Gulzar
Rating 3.5/5
- STRANGERS IN THE NIGHT
*Another story of a couple who use to share a hidden secret of their respective lives which left everlasting effect on them. Husband once cheated his wife(you know how) after getting drunk. This time wife tells her story, one night in Railway waiting room.
This story is not about lust but some other emotion. However, this one could have been better.
*Cast: Neha Dhupia, Mahesh Manjarekar
Director: Sanjay Gupta
Rating: 2.5/5
*5. ZAHIR
*This is a story of a Banker turned Writer and his next-door neighbor. They got along well, he decided to went ahead, got rejected, found out dark secret about her, did dreadful mistake and got punished.
Again, this story has a surprize element but not all surprizes are pleasent. Good to see Manoj Bajpayee after a while. Dia looks beautiful as always.
*Cast: Manoj Bajpayee, Dia Mirza
Director: Sanjay Gupta
Rating: 3/5*
*6. LOVEDALE
*LOVEDALE is a name of a station. She was travelling by train, met fellow passenger, received something from that passenger. She wanted to return it and in order to do so, she got down at Lovedale. Here, she met a painter, hang around for a while with him. She again met him in a party but she is engaged to someone else.
This is a lovestory with supernatural element. It is good to see Anuradha Patel(who is still so beautiful) after such a long time, though this story is just average.
*Cast: Neha Oberoi, Aftab, Anuradha Patel, Anupam Kher
Director: Jasmeet Dhodi
Rating: 2.5/5*
*7. SEX ON THE BEACH
*A guy was listening to music, found a book, wrote his name on the first page, saw a girl, had fun with her. She invited him at her place in the evening. He went fully prepared(!) and they finished what they started. and she continues.
While watching this story, I was thinking this one must be made by RGV. Below Average.
*Cast: Dino Morea, Tareena Patel
Director: Apoorva Lakhia
Rating: 2/5*
*8. RICEPLATE
*This is a story of south Indian Amma who stays in Mumbai and is on her way to meet her relatives at Pune. She has memory problem, she is very religious and avoids people from other religion like plague. She met a person, faught with him over riceplate n learnt a lesson of humanity.
Excellent perfomance from Shabana Azmi. Naseeruddin Shah is a man of few words, just expressions. This is one of the best stories messaging about communal harmony. Impressive directoral debut from Rohit Roy.
*Cast: Shabana Azmi, Naseeruddin Shah
Director: Rohit Roy
Rating: 4/5
*9. GUBBARE
*A newly wed couple is travelling by bus. They used to fight over small things, wife decided to sit in back row where she found a man carrying lot of balloons. This man shared experiences of his married life with her n she learnt a lesson.
Another sensitive story handled very well by the director. Nana Patekar is complete natural and touches your heart. Message is "Life is too short to fight over small small things".
*Cast: Nana Patekar, Anita, Rohit Roy
Director: Sanjay Gupta
Rating: 4/5*
*10. RISE AND FALL
*Baba and Nawab are underworld kings of Mumbai. Someone is out there to kill Baba, Nawab requested him to leave country. Baba told him who is the real who gave supari for him. He told him how painful betrayel is.
This story is again all about style over substance. Sanju and Suniel always look good together but treatment is disappointing. This one is got inspired from Godfather-2.
*Cast: Sanjay Dutt, Suniel Shetty
Director: Sanjay Gupta
Rating: 3/5*
*Pluses:
*Stories: Puranmashi, Riceplate, Gubbare
Performances: Shabana Azmi, Nana Patekar, Manoj Bajpayee, Amrita Singh, Naseeruddin Shah
Music of the movie is very good. My personal favorites are kaala-peela, Mushkil kusha, Bin Tum and Bhula diya. Background music is also good.
Sanjay Gupta movies are always stylishly shoot, never original and full of rich music. Dus Kahaniya is not an exception, only difference this time is the source which is not any hollywood dvd but different short stories from the ocean of litreture. But it is very challenging task to pick real gems n mould them into short film format.
*Minuses:
*Format of the movie can be proved as the biggest minus point of this film. I mean Indian audiance is not that fond of short films. Moreover, it would be more advisable to wait to see good stories among the bunch on dvd.
*My View:
*Advantage with short films is that makers can’t drag them beyond a point, so they can’t bore you much with a bad treatment and you can always look forward for the next one. Disadvantage is that some real good stories come to immature end, characters lack depth, so this format is double-edge sword for both viewers n makers.
This is more of an experimental film and it would be interesting to see whether it works commercially.
God Bless all,
nayan