Satyagrah is Prakash Jha’s best movie till date. It will break all box office records and touch 300 crores of business. Its an outstanding movie with great storyline and best ever acting by Amitabh. You have to watch it to believe it ! You just need to remember one thing before going to the theatre. And the thing to remember is - leave your brains behind !! In fact to enjoy the film better leave everything behind and let your ghost see the movie :-P Its a great movie where AB has given his best performance, Ajay and Arjun have also given their best performances and if Bebo is a bit underexposed...err understated its because the role demands it. The movie is so good...so good... that it made me weep !! I’d have given it 5 stars but I have given only 3 since I did not weep enough :-P
OK, lets cut the crap and get on with the real Review. After watching Chakravyuh, I kinda developed a liking for Prakash Jha. Not becuase he makes great films but because of his choice of topics. The topic of corruption though, howsoever hackneyed it may be, its still very relevant and something which all of us have been grappling with more and more as the Nation "progresses". Satyagrah is just an extension of his previous movie with the idelogies changed - from the Leftist bend to the Gandhian. But if he thought it would bring more money than Chakravyuh, it probably wont help any.
The first half is tight enough to keep you hooked but the 2nd half laxes a bit and the climax is lame. But thats to be expected of any movie dealing with corruption. Jha drops in subtle hints all the time as to the root of corruption and this is where he does a great job. Bribery exists because we are willing to bribe. Corruption exists because we ourselves are corrupt. Just to illustrate this point - the Buswallah stops at every inch of its route because we prefer waiting ANYWHERE & EVERYWHERE for it. The day we get into the habit of walking to the nearest stop to board the Bus, the Bus wont have an option but to stop only at designated stops !! And to think that we invariably always end up cursing the driver/conductor !
There is no New or even credible solution that Jha offers to India’s problems. But what he does do is to force the viewer to think. Sorry I forgot to mention that you are NOT required to leave your brains behind for this one. That is if you have one. If you dont, we have hundreds of movies made these days for the mentally impaired :-P
The storyline is pretty run of the mill. Initially I thought Bebo’s role as a high-profile reporter would be developed into grey/black shades. Just to highlight the politics-media-capitalist nexus that has knocked the wind out of the Nation. But Jha has spared us of a stark portrayal of these holocaustic truths and chosen to paint a much more optimistic scenario. He has chosen the much maligned Govt. offices to showcase corruption rather than the Media which perpetrates corruption in forms far more heinous. But again in a subtle way he has demonstrated how campaigns are erected or how data is fudged with the help of social "engines" like Facebook.
There are a couple of songs, however, worth talking about. First is the "inspired" version of Raghupati Raghav Raja Ram which is meant to kinda shake up our countrymen from stupor and the second is a romantic song between Ajay & Bebo which is a bit of fusion of music styles and something that deserves more time by the composer to potentially develop into a great piece of music.
I wouldnt watch movies like Satyagrah for performances. Though most of the cast has turned in acceptable to good performances with Manoj Bajpai perhaps standing out, thats not the selling point.
I’d watch it for ideas and ideologies.
Or perhaps, just to humor myself that a country like ours can still be saved !!