Hi , this is me, Mr. Midhun, an Engg. Student , writing a review for the very first time in mouthshut.com. If there are any drawbacks , which are sure to be there, please do pardon me.
Mangal Pandey- THE RISING , kickstarts with the protogonist , Pandey( Aamir Khan) on his way to getting executed. Just before his proposed hour of death, a news comes that the executor won’t turn up. It is at this juncture that the captain William Gordon ( Toby Stevens) thinks of all those past things .The flashback, which begins with the war in Afghan(1853), where he got badly injured and gets himself saved by Mangal, goes through the sessions of acquaintance of Pandey and Gordon .Gordon is portrayed as a British officer , who is always willing to provide a helping hand to the Indians in the miseries. The story gets unraveled when the rumours spread the the new rifles introduced by the British by the Indian sepoys were made from the meat of cows and pigs. The cartridges were to be first bitten off before loading it into the rifle. As cow’s meat was considered offensive to Hindus and pig’s meat to Muslims, it naturally rouses the religious sentiments of Indian sepoys .No Indian sepoy obeys the order of British officers to load the rifles with the newly introduced cartridges. But once Mangal heard Gordon proclaiming that the cartridges contained nothing offensive, he just does it. However, he feels betrayed when he watches in disbelief in Zorabji’s factory, new cartridges being made using the leather of cows and pigs. The real twist in the story starts here.
There are a several plus points to the movie. But the woeful fact remains that an equal number of negatives are also there.
The soul, the essence , the everything of this movie is Aamir and he looks more handsome with his new moustaches on. He has once again proved his mettle and I think he is the real King Khan of bollywood. He has just delivered an awesome performance in this film and provided a grand fiesta , which they had been eagerly waiting for 4 years.It is utmost challenging to perform a lead role in a semi fictional and semi historic film. But he once again he has delivered the goods, when it mattered the most.
The role of Mr. William Gordon to was just fitting for Mr. Toby Stevens.He just demonstrates what a thorough professional he was and how much he is dedicated to work. His display seemed to provide an answer to the query, ‘why he was always getting international projects?’ The silhouette of Toby as Captain.Gordon is an
artistic one and he can for sure take pride for his performance in the film.
Rani Mukherji, for her it was the first assignment in which she had to play a brothel.Eventhough the opportunities to display her histrionic talents were exceedingly limited, she did justice to her role.She was really successful in playing a slut, with her new looks and attire. As per the script, her part as Pandey’s love interest is least bit significant.
I don’t think there is any need to mention the role of Amisha Patel in the flick. She had absolutely nothing to do in this movie, except some household work and some masala scenes with an international star.
The film has its share of demerits also. I thought editing was not up to the mark and this sort of shabby works are not what we expect from an international production. It becomes quite boring when you get to hear four- five songs within the opening hour itself, particularly as the songs are not up to the Rahman standards .After watching the movie, what I imbibe is that Mr. Ketan Mehta is a staunch advocate of too much exposure in films. The camera work just adds to my suspicion. About the music, it was no way one of the better works of the music sorcerer, Mr. A.R.Rahman.Atlast, but not the least the biggest mistakes are done in the area of script writing for such serious distortion of history , just to suit the bollywood blockbuster formula concepts. There is little evidence that the British had vandalized any village in India for cultivating or trading opium. I don’t think there are any records about any of the brothels run by the Indian whores, exclusively for Britishers. Now a days , the moviemakers are so cunning, they know nothing sells better than patriotism.
This will be a an enjoyable and exciting movie if you are a patriotic Indian .But if u are a person of deep knowledge in Indian history or a Briton, I seriously doubt whether you will like the movie