Mohandas:Movie starts with a quote on silver screen which most of us have forgotten by now. The Quote was the Talisman given by father of Indian nation i.e. Mohandas K. Gandhi.
He said “I will give you a talisman. Whenever you are in doubt, or when the self becomes too much with you, apply the following test. Recall the face of the poorest and the weakest man [woman] whom you may have seen, and ask yourself, if the step you contemplate is going to be of any use to him [her].
Will he [she] gain anything by it? Will it restore him [her] to a control over his [her] own life and destiny? In other words, will it lead to swaraj [freedom] for the hungry and spiritually starving millions? Then you will find your doubts and your self melt away."
This movie revolved around the believers and non-believers of this talisman. After seeing this movie, you will feel that now-a-days this talisman is just a cluster of words once uttered by an immortal soul in 1940’s.
Time for reviews now:
Story, Plot or Script:
Will give 10 on 10 as here Mazhar Kamran, Director of Movie, has shown that he is also one of those who can think out of box. Story was good one showing that how a poor boy “Mohandas” from lower caste studies hard to be successful in future. He later becomes the topper in studies at college and tries hard for a job. One day he finally gets selected for a job of Depot Manager in a coal mine. But, thanks to whole system and bureaucrats who are corrupt from top to bottom, they easily make a fool of him and take away his identity, his all credentials and certificates in lieu of a job in a coal mines. After his continuous tracking in Sarkari Daftars and listening from Babus, one day after almost 3 years he come to know that somebody else is working in coal mine using his name and credentials. Then, he tries for justice but nobody listen to him. But, Few Good Men are there who helps Mohandas in his fight. But, as I said ONLY FEW GOOD MEN are there thus this shrewd world sidelined those Good ones in this battle of truth. At last the real Mohandas realizes that “He Is Not Mohandas” as he will be never able to proof his own identity. One issue with the movie was the pace which some time got very slow as if same scene is there for long time. This may create boredom for public in general and may lead to disappointment to viewer.
Acting:
Rating 9 out of 10. Kudos for Mazhar for trying to get best out of every actor. In terms of star faces, movie really lacked behind but actors in movie never gave an impression that they needed any star face at all. Coming down to main characters:
• Nakul Vaid, the On Screen Mohandas, brilliantly showed his emotions while he was dealing the trauma to proof his own identity. Shrabani Mukherjee (Kasturi, Mohandas’s Wife) has very little to do in terms of dialogue and did somewhat justice with it. She was better then her role in Border movie (Sunil Shetty’s wife) where she hardly had a single dialogue.
• One of the FEW GOOD MEN role was played by Sonali Kulkarni as Journalist and she did a good job. But, Good men’s who acted really well were Aditya Shrivastava as a lawyer (Impressive performance) and Govind Namdeo as a honest Judge.
• Sushant Singh (Vishwanath alias Fake Mohandas) looked perfect in his role as he never showed a sign that he has done anything wrong. He was very well complemented by akhilendra mishra as his father.
• Other characters who also complemented the movie very well were Parents of Mohandas, Police friend of Sushant Singh or cameos played as Babus and bureaucrats. Only disappointment in acting was person who tried to over act from first scene itself i.e. Anil Yadav (assistant journalist to Sonali Kulkarni), .
Music:
Music by Vivek Priyadarshan is light, soothing and totally complementing the situation as well as lyrics of VK Sonakia. There is a romantic song “Nadi mein ye chanda” on occasion of love between Mohandas and his wife. Then, a song full of sarcasm “Bol tu Kaun hai be” was like theme of movie as it was played whenever Mohandas find himself caught in a trauma to prove his own identity. One brilliant song sung by Kailash Kher i.e. “Apni Khoyo Hui Pehchan” is one of the USP’s of music. Overall music and lyrics are good and will recommend this for all those sensible souls who have a heart to think for a person going thru such kind of trauma. I will rate the album as 7 out of 10.
Cinematography:
More than 60 percent of scenes are hand shoot as one can easily feel the panning of camera in most of the scenes. This panning generally degrades the quality of scene but here it was going well. This was so because movie has a background of Media and Journalism and a journalist always uses a Hand Camera to grab such incidences or news. Thus, I think that here Hand shooting was an additional advantage. If Mazhar has done this deliberately then hat’s off to his thinking. But, if was done due to low budgeting of movie then I will say that luck was on his side in this point. As, most of the characters were shot from very near that might be also a reason for hand shoot. So, whatever may be the reason the gamble played off in this case. Rating for this point is 9 out of 10.
Location:
Research on this aspect really made a perfect base to complement the movie. The decision to choose Anuppur village, using names of Utkal Train in conversation, shopping at Shipra mall Ghaziabad these were one of those things which really gave a notion that what is going on is happening somewhere near you and known to you. It helps audience to indulge in the movie.
Overall movie is very good and I will rate it 7 out of 10. I may give 8 but one problem was the pace of film which may create resistance in its commercial success. But I will sincerely recommend this movie to only those who have a heart for some serious issues and evils prevailing in our nation. The dhoom-dhadaka gang will surely don’t like it.
Best Part of Movie: A dialogue in despair by Mohandas “Ek haad maas ka aadmi inke saamne baitha hai aur kya sabot dun mein is cheez ka ki mein hi Mohandas hun. Woh kagaz kahan se laun jo yeh sabit kar paye ki mein hi mein hun”.
So, end of one more review. BBye and enjoi till next review.
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