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Wednesday, April 17, 2024
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BOLLYWOOD BLACKMAIL
EDITOR'S PICK
'Blackmail' is wickedly funny (Review By Subhash K Jha : Rating
****)
If I didn't know about Irrfan's health issue I'd still be shaken by his hangdog
unenthusiastic expression as he plods through his chosen life of a born loser in
this savagely funny satire on adultery and blackmail.
In the strikingly shot (by cinematographer Jay Oza) opening we see Irrfan (Dev)
struggling to stay afloat through his office hours, fighting shy of going home
because the spark has gone from his marriage and wife who watches cheesy song
sequences on television to while away her time.
Actually, it was never there, the spark I mean. In a wedding song that comes on
at the end of the film taken from Dev's marriage to Reena (Kirti Kulhari) seven
years earlier, we see how mismatched and ill-at-ease the couple was.
This is a marriage where adultery is waiting to happen. And it does sooner than
we expect. The takeoff point for the comedy is so steeply damning and done in
the film with such humorous indulgence that we left pretty dazed by the
absurdity of it all.
From the adulterous episode "Blackmail" builds into an edifice of outrageous
eventualities all bursting at the seams but never getting out of control, such
is the director Abhinay Deo's control over his characters, all victims of a scam
that boggles the mind, tickles the senses and sets our imagination on the
wildest wackiest ride since Abhinay Deo's "Delhi Belly".
While the writing sparkles with a roguish splendor, and the director fills the
frames with a fiendish glee. The narrative does spark off a distant pensiveness
in indicating the breach of modern urban marriages. While Irrfan's marital
bedroom is shattered by Arundoy's presence, Arunodoy's own marriage with the
bully wife played with splendid spleen by Divya Dutta, is no laughing matter.
She treats him like her dog. He doesn't mind as long as his monthly allowance
keeps coming. Arunodoy sets aside his ego to make the husband a henpecked
gold-digger.
I found the scenes of domestic disharmony as enacted by Arunodoy and Divya to be
far more vivid and representational of an urban despair than the Irrfan-Kirti
marriage which is shown to be far quieter in its incongruities.
Arunodoy and Dutta are a riot together. Watching these two underrated actors
imbue life and zest into their parts is a major part of the pleasure derived in
viewing this bitterly dark comedy. Other exceptionally persuasive performances
come from Praduman Singh as Irrfan's shifty cheesy office colleague and Anuja
Sathe as a timid office co-worker who transforms into an avaricious money
monster in no time at all.
Every actor gets the point. "Blackmail" is a film that celebrates the sheer
lunacy of the marital equation when pushed against betrayal. Its strength lies
in generating laughter out of the most meditative mishaps of marriage. The sheer
preposterousness of making adultery into an occasion of a serial blackmail is
used to invoke a sense of unabashed boisterousness.
"Blackmail" is a virgin territory in the comedy genre. It is heady and
hedonistic, cocky and compelling in the way the comedies of Hrishikesh Mukherjee
and Basu Chatterjee used to be. If only these veterans could see the sexiness
that underlines all gender wars. "Blackmail" is a closeted Hrishikesh Mukherjee
comedy with oodles of extra voluptuousness.
After sustaining a career of over two decades in the Hindi film industry, actress Divya Dutta feels encouraged for more with her National Award win. With nearly 10 films in the pipeline, she is counting her blessings and says it's a very special year for her as an artiste."This is a very special year for me. With all the films that are coming up, the audience will see me in a variety of roles. Each one is very different from another," Divya told IANS in an interview.Read More
Bollywood underrates me: Arunoday SinghActor Arunoday Singh, who has been a part of the Hindi film industry since 2009, feels his talent is under-utilised, and says Bollywood underrates him.Arunoday made his acting debut with "Sikandar" and later featured in films like "Yeh Saali Zindagi", "Mirch", Aisha", "Jism 2", "Main Tera Hero" and "Mohenjo Daro". He says it's very difficult to get films in which he plays the lead because he is not "wildly famous".Read More
