7 Khoon Maaf

*Spoiler alert.

Expectations always make it harder and especially if you happen to be Vishal Bhardwaj. Since Maqbool, every Vishal Bhardwaj film has been looked at with great expectations and to be honest the filmmaker hasn’t really disappointed. But nothing lasts forever and perhaps for the first time really Bhardwaj lets you down with 7 Khoon Maaf.

Susanna Anna-Marie Johannes (Priyanka Chopra) has been really unlucky in love but while people move on Susanna knows only one way to end a relationship. Susanna marries Major Rodriques (Neil Nitin Mukesh) and hopes that life on her farm with a maid (Usha Uthup) along with two men Friday and Amar (Vivaan Shah), an orphan she practically adopts, would be a bed of roses but life doesn’t end up the way one imagines. Tired of her possessive husband who becomes worse after losing a leg in the line of duty, she along with her bunch of cronies kills him in accidental circumstances. During Edwin’s funeral she notices Jimmy (John Abraham), a singer in the choir, and before she knows it Jimmy becomes husband number two. She helps Jimmy to become a rock star but her beau’s persistent drug problem and roving eye becomes too much to handle. So once Jimmy dies in strange circumstances she moves to Kashmir. She meets the soft hearted poet Wasiullah Khan (Irrfan) and becomes Sultana but bad luck seems to be her constant partner. The shy poet happens to be one big sadistic freak who beings out the ‘Susanna’ in Sultana and you know what happens when Susanna gets going. She reluctantly gives love yet another chance with Nocolai Vronsky (Aleksandr Dyachenko), a Russian scientist, who lies about his family and children and what follows is a regular day for Susanna at work. Life comes a full cycle and Keemat Lal (Annu Kapoor), the investigating officer who suspected foul play with Jimmy’s murder, is now a high ranking official who yet again saves Susanna from the gallows but in the bargain becomes husband number five. He dies of a heart attack while making love to his wife and finally Susanna decides enough is enough. When Amar walks out of her life as she tries to seduce him, Susanna tries to end her life only to be saved by Dr. Modhusudhon Tarafdar (Naseeruddin Shah). Life’s not fair to Susanna as she realizes that the shy doctor is prescribing death and then…you know what ensues. Finally fate shines on her and gives her a second chance but can Susanna change?

Loosely based on Ruskin Bond’s short story, this should have been familiar turf for Bhardwaj as he’s very comfortable with adaptations but 7 Khoon Maaf ends up being highly disjointed. Right from the moment it takes off the blocks, the film’s ponderous as if it’s prepping you for some interesting juncture but sadly that point never comes. Bhardwaj compels you to keep looking at the drama that unfolds on the screen with baited breath hoping for some sort of an aha moment but there’s no real payoff. The somber mood that he creates helps generate the viewer’s interest levels but with each murder you just stop caring.

The interesting thing about 7 Khoon Maaf is how Matthew Robbins’ screenplay tries to root such a fantastical tale in reality. The production design, the costumes and a whole lot of detailing makes 7 Khoon Maaf visually a very convincing exercise. Also the manner in which the passage of time is shown- Edwin being decorated for his bravado during Operation Blue Star, Jimmy’s dealer tells him that just as the world has moved on from the Berlin Wall and VP Singh government he should move on to bigger drugs and Nicolai being around her at the time India becomes a nuclear state, etc.- is nice touch to show the 45 year period in Susanna’s life.

One wouldn’t think that with someone like Priyanka Chopra killing seven husbands that include the likes of Irrfan and Naseeruddin Shah, a film could be boring but that’s what a major portion of 7 Khoon Maaf ends up being. Chopra sinks her teeth very well into the character and systematically checks the boxes with skills that one would expect of such a chameleon but it’s the script that lets her down. Irrfan with his poet is the only surprise in the lot and as one’s not expecting Wasiullah to be a sadist the segment is by far the best. Naseeruddin Shah for some strange reason plays Tarafdar as Amitabh Bachchan would; Annu Kapoor gets the laughs and might just get a second lease of life much like Pankaj Kapur post Maqbool; Neil Nitin Mukesh gets to play a much older character and is quite interesting while John Abraham is well…just plain old John. But the weakest link of 7 Khoon Maaf is Vivaan Shah, who is highly unconvincing and really bad as Arun. The only one who perhaps understood Susanna to some extent, Arun is as important as the lady but Shah’s boyish looks and flat voice is a mood kill.

Rating: 2 ½ out of 5

Cast: Priyanka Chopra, Neil Nitin Mukesh, John Abraham, Irrfan, Aleksandr Dyachenko, Annu Kapoor, Naseeruddin Shah and Vivaan Shah

Written by: Screenplay: Matthew Robbins based on Susanna's Seven Husbands by Ruskin Bond

Directed by: Vishal Bhardwaj

Image: www.wikipedia.com

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Ishqiya

From the looks of it one would place Ishqiya in the Omkara territory but Vishal Bhardwaj’s erstwhile assistant isn’t inspired by just one Vishal Bhardwaj film. Rather Chaubey sets a Kaminey like film in Omkara country to come up with Ishqiya a tale of two small time thives Khalujaan and Babban who are on the run after robbing Mushtaq.

With all doors closed and no where to go Babban and his Uncle decide to cross over into Nepal with the help of their friend but upon landing up at his place they are greeted by his widow Krishna. Their sojourn gets sour when Mushtaq finds them and to make matter worse Babban manages to lose the loot. Mushtaq gives them one month to come up with the lost 25 lacs and warns them that he won’t hesitate to kill Krishna along with them. Taking matter in her hand Krishna uses her charm to convince both Khalujaan and Babban to join her in kidnapping a local industrialist in order to recover Mushtaq’s money. With each one falling head over heels for Krishna, both the uncle and nephew readily agree but with each passing minute starts revealing ugly secrets of Krishna’s past.

There is some strange fascination that the current lot of Mumbai directors seem to have with the classic Western genre of Hollywood. Take Kaminey for instance; while the premise was very urban and very pulp the execution was very western especially the climax. Here too as Ishqiya trudges into the final act the cutting pattern, the narrative, the music, the sound design and just about everything resembles a Western and while this isn’t some thing that sticks out keeping the execution of the film, it does, at times, feel like a very convenient way out. There is some thing funny about the way directors approach the climax in this new found Pulpy-Curry-Western Tashan had a balls to the wall neurotic action sequence in the end, Kaminey had get-every-character-living-or-dead in a crazy roller-coaster ride in the end. Ishqiya suffers from a far too familiar too Kamineyesque feel towards the end but thankfully jumps to the conclusion. Forget action sequences even characters in these curry westerns have started looking like Eli Wallach wannabes. Like Anil Kapoor’s Bhaiyaji act in Tashan, Salman Shahid, the actor who plays Mushtaq is just too much by the end.

What works for Ishqiya is the backdrop against which it is set. While one has seen a similar place in Omakra and Seher, Ishqiya ventures deeper into the hinterland. Forget knowing such a place, this is a part of India that a very few from the city could ever imagine. It is against this fantastic City of God like set-up that the drama unfolds. At times Ishqiya has too much happening- two thieves on the run, city slicker gangster chasing, a Maoist like revolution in the villager, illegal arms smuggling, casteism- but the screenplay maintains a light flavor and things never get too serious.

The acting in the film is sure to talked about and rightfully so to a very large extent. Excellently cast the leads don’t fall short of mark for a large part of the film but one wondered why didn’t Vidya Balan work on her accent? She supposedly plays a woman who is based out of Gorakhpur but her pronunciation, which would put Pakeezah or Umrao Jaan Ada to shame, manages to convince you otherwise. Barring this odd omission Balan delivers. The only person who seems to be having a blast looking at Arshad Warsi’s Babban would undoubtedly have to be Warsi himself. He has been given the best lines in the film and makes most of it. But it’s the wily Naseeruddin Shah who surprises the most with his man-child number as the elder half of the scheming duo making full use of every opportunity Chaubey’s script offers.

Bound to be compared to Kaminey and Omkara, Ishqiya’s premise has a lot going for it but unlike some Kaminey it doesn’t get complicated and manages to maintain a healthy black humor unlike the overtly theatrical Omkara. Don’t rate this film higher than the two it owes its birth to but Ishqiya has its highs. Like many recent films, this too has a great basis; it is blessed with good production design, fluid camerawork, and nice songs but doesn’t deliver the gourmet fare it teases you with.

Peppered with some really crude dialogues, which are bound to join the merry list of memorable film one-liners, Ishqiya’s first half sets the bar a tad too high for it’s own good. Ishqiya This is a film that can be enjoyed once for all lovers of curry western genre and is a close look at a fascinating world but some where one can’t help but feel that Chaubey uses a telescope to look into it.

Image Courtesy: Reuters

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