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EDITOR'S PICK
`Kai
Po Che`: Marvellously-made coming-of-age account
Rating:
****
It really can`t get any better than this, can it? The year has just begun and we
have one of the finest, most vibrant and fulfilling coming-of-age films in
living memory.
"Kai Po Che" (the war-call uttered during kite-flying in Gujarat) is
not about kite-flying. In fact there is just one fleeting sequence, very
effectively positioned in the meticulously structured narrative, where the
characters actually fly kites.
"Kai Po Che" is about spirits soaring skywards, as the characters -
each one so vividly etched into the compact narrative that you come away with
people whom you will probably carry with you for keeps - let their spirits roam
wild and free, soaking in the sunlight of desire, longing, aspiring, stumbling
and getting back on the feet.
Set in Gujarat during times of peace and unimaginable stress, "Kai Po Che"
takes Chetan Bhagat`s engaging novel about friendship among three dissimilar
young people struggling to find their voices in Gujarat in and around the year
2000, and converts the written word into an enrapturing entity far beyond just a
story well told.
The three, joined by a fourth - a girl who happens to be the sister of one of
the heroes secretly involved with the hero`s best friend - bring to life a world
where the accidents of existence collide gently but powerfully with man-made and
natural calamities that shake the very existence of an Indian middle class,
living on an edge where toppling over the abyss is a real possibility.
Sure enough, by the end of the film one of heroes Omi (Amit Sadh) does fall into
the abyss of bigotry. Though he is finally given a chance to redeem himself,
it`s too late. A dream has already died, though another one is reborn.
"Kai Po Che" is about the shared aspirations of three friends: the
reckless and devil-may-care cricketer Ishaan (Sushant Singh Rajput in a
remarkable film debut), his cautious, shy friend Govind (Raj Kumar Yadav) and
their somewhat confused friend Omi, the son of a liberal temple priest who tilts
towards Hindu radicalism more out of an economic necessity than a ideological
imperative.
Into these lives, screenplay writers Abhishek Kapoor, Chetan Bhagat, Pubali
Chaudhuri and Supratik Sen introduce a socio-political perspective that is rare
in mainstream Hindi cinema.
There are many reasons why "Kai Po Che" is one of the most compelling
products of the post-renaissance era in Indian cinema. To my mind its greatest
achievement is its fusion of "cinema" and "history", a
synthesis that filmmakers today would consider unpalatable for viewers. Hence
they serve up the junk-food equivalent of cinema. Quickly ingested and easily
forgotten.
Not this time!
In "Kai Po Che", the characters and situations created to bring out
the personality conflicts emerge from the two crises points in Gujarat`s history
- the 2001 earthquake and the post-Godhra carnage in 2002.
The sustained palpable tension of the riots towards the concluding lap of this
riveting tale is the stuff that great cinema is made of.
The virtues of the film are many: songs (Amit Trivedi) and background music (Hitesh
Sonik) that seem to echo the protagonists` inner world without making a song and
dance, cinematography by Anay Goswami and editing by Deepa Bhatia that says it
all without a single shot being redundant, and most of all, a terrific gallery
of actors who make the brotherly bonding look so real you feel other celebrated
films about male bonding (including Abhishek Kapoor`s "Rock On") were
mere teasers.
And yet to describe "Kai Po Che" as a film on male bonding would be
akin to treating "Dr Zhivago" as a film on the medical profession.
Taking the core idea from Bhagat`s novel, Kapoor weaves together a tapestry of
thoughts, characters and lives that embrace an entire ethos and culture without
sacrificing individuality.
Fearless and almost flawless, "Kai Po Che" bubbles over with the
warmth of lived-in experiences and with central performances that are so
unstudied you suspect the actors were born to play these parts.
Among the trio, Amit Sadh as the fence-sitter turned Hindu radical gets into the
skin of his character and remains there till the end, and not for the first
time. He was also admirable as a narrator-journalist in Kabeer Kaushik`s
"Maximum". Here`s an actor who deserves a lot more.
Raj Kumar Yadav as the voice of reason among the trio of friends yet again
displays his amazing ability to come to grips with the body language, speech and
inner world of the people he plays. I`ve not seen any actor deliver his lines in
recent memory so naturally without artificial punctuation. Raj Kumar`s triumph
is the triumph of refined acting in Hindi cinema.
And let`s not talented the spontaneous Amrita Puri as Ishaan`s sister. She is at
the periphery of the pivotal axis and yet makes her presence felt with such an
endearing lack of vanity.
As for Sushant Singh Rajput, the script favours his character. And he repays the
compliment right back, with bonus. With his compelling screen presence and an
ability to render restless energy in a restrained pattern, he immediately
establishes himself as one of the most articulate actors of the post-Ranbir
Kapoor generation.
His relationship with the cricketing prodigy Ali (Digvijay Deshmukh) is in many
ways the core issue of the multifarious plot. You cheer for Ishaan`s streetwise
heroism in a way you haven`t cheered in a long while.
Take a bow, Abhishek Kapoor. You have proven that "Rock On" was no
flash in the pan. "Kai Po Che" takes the theme of friendship to
another level.
Yeh dosti hum nahin todenge, indeed. Sometimes the best of friendships get swept
away in politics and history. It takes a master storyteller to remind us that
cinema is finally a mirror of forces which have a bearing on life.
"Kai Po Che" just tempts me to tell the escapist merchants of
Bollywood to go fly a kite.
Bollywood powerhouse Sushant Singh Rajput, who was fondly known for portraying diverse roles with perfection, passed away in June 2020 but his unforgettable charm lives on.Read More
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Best friends Ishaan, Omi and Govind - young, ambitious and restless - are trying to make a mark in the India of the early 2000`s. These are exciting times - a new millennium has just dawned, India is a nuclear power and ostensibly shining - a perfect place for the 3 Ahmedabad boys to start a business that could be their ticket to fame and riches. In a country where cricket is religion, they hit upon a brilliant plan - to start a training academy that could produce India`s next sporting superstars! What follows is without doubt the greatest adventure of their lives, as they attempt to navigate the big hurdles in the path of fulfilling their dreams. Based on Chetan Bhagat`s bestselling novel �The Three Mistakes of My Life�, Kai Po Che (meaning a triumphant yell in Gujarati) is an unforgettable ode to friendship and the magical moments one shares with one`s closest pals - celebrating festivals, drunken dancing, watching cricket matches together, strategizing on how to catch the attention of the cute neighborhood girl, being there to watch each other`s back in troubled times and to celebrate one`s successes by screaming Kai Po Che!