|

|
EDITOR'S PICK
JTHJ:
Fall in love with love again
Rating: ****
Flawed but fabulous, the pasha of romance Yash Chopra`s swan song -- may god
rest his rhapsodic soul -- is a swoon-worthy ode to that achy-breaky feeling
called love. Reams of poetry and volumes of prose have been writttn on it. But
no poet no author has come close to unraveling the mystery of the heart.
Yash Chopra spent most of his adult years peering passionately into the heart.
Jab Tak Hai Jaan (JTHJ) is not his best work. The last 35 minutes
when Shah Rukh Khan loses his memory is best forgotten. Miraculously the entire
end-piece of this fractured symphony co-written by Aditya Chopra and Devita
Bhagat, doesn`t take away from the sublime beauty of the work.
JTHJ is like an elaborate work of art that offers many different kinds of guilty
pleasures for all those diehard fans of Yash Chopra`s romance who grew up, grew
wise and even grew old watching Daag, Silsila, Chandni
and the doyen`s best work, Lamhe.
His latest and sadly his last work could keep you enthralled trying to play the
game of spot-the-earlier-Yash-Chopra-referenced. You will catch Daag
in the way Katrika Kaif returns into Shah Rukh Khan`s fractured life. You can
catch many shades of Karisma Kapoor from Dil To Pagal Hai in Anushka
Sharma`s girl-madly-in-unrequited-love act. You will see Kabhi Kabhie
in the way Katrina comes to search for her fugitive mother (played by Neetu
Singh, who had played the girl in search of mom in Kabhi Kabhie) and
you can spot Silsila in Katrina`s scenes with Anushka in London.
Both the ladies are madly in love with the same man, much the way Sharmila
Tagore and Raakhee loved Rajesh Khanna in Yash Chopra`s Daag.
Indeed, there are perceptible shades of Rajesh Khanna`s poetic romanticism from
Daag in Shah Rukh`s loner death-defying soldier`s character.
Shah Rukh imbues the part of solider Samar with a great deal of heart. Never
since Sanjay Leela Bhansali`s Devdas has he expressed the pain of
lost love so eloquently. That his lady love happens to be Katrina Kaif helps us
in sharing his pain. Yup, it`s possible to fall hard in love with this tragic
beauty of elaborate elegance and spend the rest of one`s life pining for her.
Luckily fate and the scripwriters plan a happy ending for the soldier love
story. But not before a sassy spunky bindaas photo-journalist Akira(Anushka
Sharma) sweeps into the traumatized Samar`s life. The Shah Rukh-Anushka
sequences in the second-half shot in the stunning Ladakh and Kashmir valleys
blends the war-time urgency of army life with a seminal spot of sunshine. It`s a
pleasing blend of the valorous and the romantic that turns the Shah Rukh-Anushka
chemistry from Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi on its head. There he craved for
her attention. Now it`s her turn.
Comeuppance, anyone? Fate, as imagined in JTHJ is a flimsy mistress,
hard to please and very high-maintenance. Katrina`s Meera is a bit of a silly
romantic masquerading as an in-charge woman entrepreneur.She makes ludicrous
deals with god and pays heavily for her trade practices with an unequal partner
(god). Meera is a woman of today captivated by outdated beliefs.
In some ways this exquisitely mounted work of art belongs to Katrina. She owns
Meera`s role in the way Sridevi and Raakhee owned Chandni and Kabhi
Kabhie, respectively. Shot in pristine colours by cinematographer Anil
Mehta whose camera evidently loves Katrina`s face as much as Samar, Katrina
emerges as an actress who feels her character`s pain in anguished close-ups.
Yup, Yash Chopra couldn`t have chosen better. All the three protagonists seem
assembly-built for their characters. And they are never short of support from
every department of film`s making.
It`s the script that intermittently turns villain showering unexpected blows on
the tender romance that the director so meticulously carves out of the lead
pair`s unflinching commitment to delineating the doomed dimensions of an
ill-fated love that finally conquers even fate.
While we applaud the film`s visual and emotional velocity Meera`s dumb deals
with god are plainly not the stuff great love stories are made of. And yet, we
can`t help cheer for the lovers when they finally embrace in strife-torn
militant Kashmir. Devdas had it easier. His explosive mine-fields were only in
his mind.
And he could`ve never imagined his Chandramukhi would ever be as persistent as
Anushka Sharma.
Kya karoon, ishq ho gaya hay tere se, she blurts out in a tragic
confession of one-sided love. Ah, love! What a fall it causes even for the
cynics. We don`t quite fall in love with the film the way Akira falls for Samar.
But we come close.
JTHJ is an ambrosial autumn sonata done in colours and moods that
redefine Yash Chopra`s legendary levels of aesthetics while sharpening and
polishing the contours of his characteristic preoccupations. There is the
elusive search for love and of course the unattainable beauty played by Katrina
who miraculously manages to take her character beyond her porcelain features.
When she dances in an underground London pub she forgets the world around her is
watching. Then there is Shah Rukh Khan standing tall as a soldier who defuses
bombs but can`t seem to defuse the love catastrophe in his life.
Jab Tak Hai Jaan makes you fall in love with love all over again.
We will miss you, Yashji.
Superstar Shah Rukh Khan says he is loving and enjoying the making of his upcoming film "Zero".Shah Rukh on Thursday took to Twitter to thank the film's director Aanand L. Rai for it."I am loving and living making 'Zero' the Film. Thanks Aanand L. Rai and the whole team for this. Only way to describe it is ‘I am growing up very fast into a child...very fast'," he wrote. Read More
Anushka Sharma in Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia 2018 listBollywood actress-producer Anushka Sharma features in the Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia 2018 list, which includes innovators and disruptors who are reshaping their industries and changing Asia for the better.Anushka, one of Indian film industry's highest paid actresses, is all of 29.She started out her career as a model in 2007, making her acting debut in 2008 in the hugely successful "Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi," which won her a Filmfare award for Best Actress.Read More