Friday, December 26, 2008
Lagle Bolben
The chief feature of the drama is the minimum use of background score and thus the actors are to be congratulated for their excellent performances and the nice comedy that is completely devoid of malice. Also each act finishes in a unique way, a style that is quite new to me. Also slight drift from the main concept occurs at intervals to reveal the true nature of each character, without which the story would have remained incomplete. Thus my Christmas evening was nicely spent watching the play, which I had long been waiting for.
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Sajano Bagan
Manoj Mitra was just superb. His acting, voice modulation, expressions, gestures, everything was perfect. Also the other actors that worked with him did a splendid job and the lighting of the stage was another classic piece of art that deserves special mention. The entire play is hilarious and filled with witty dialogues and slangs.
The story in not new to those who have watched 'Bancharam's Bagan'. The plot involves the aged Bancha Kapali, the lone gardener of a large plot of land and the local Zamindar, Nakur, who wish to get hold of this land. So he makes a legal contract with Bancha that states that Bancha is to receive a monthly salary of Rs.200 from the former on the condition that in the event of the latter's death the land will pass to the possession of Nakur. The ailing Bancha, who had already driven away his grandson when he came to know that he wished to sale the garden at Rs.12000, readily accepts the offer.
The evil Nakur had actually made this contract observing the frail condition of the gardener as he thought that Bancha's days were already numbered. But his frustration heightens when he finds Bancha to regain his health as each month passes by. The play then becomes a game where Nakur's each and every attempt to gain the land quickly gets foiled in one way or the other.
Parabola Sir
But trully speaking, if a character like Satyaban Chakrabarty nicknamed 'Parabola' Sir (by his students) would have really been my educator, then with all the petty sins that I commit regularly, I would have been forced to maintain a safe distance from this person radiating an aura of truthfulness.
Yes, Narayan Sanyal's 'Parabola' Sir can be considered as the ultimate symbol of truth and honesty who never compromised with truth even if that cost him his social life and had inflicted great pains on him continuously. So it is not a mystery that this man should be a maths teacher as obsession to something devoid of cowardice, emotions and solely based on logic can be his only way of venting his passions.
Narayan Sanyal's portrayal of the fictitious Satyaban Chakrabarty is also the work of a skilled writer who never misses the minutest detail. One of my friends had once commented that each of Narayna Sanyal's work is the result of an extensive research and really while going through this piece, I found how true his comment was. The whole story is full of mathematical expressions and quotations from theorems that is dexterously used to reflect the appropriate mood of the various situations and to cap it all the chapter numbers have been replaced by excerpts from mathematical proofs though the latter is just for ornamentation and bears no meaning to the actual context of the sections. As a whole this piece is a fine specimen of Narayan Sanya's ability of character analysis but a little less emotion could have been considered to give it a more realistic touch.
Monday, December 15, 2008
Tintoretor Jishu
The story starts with the arrival of a stranger in Baikunthapur’s Neogi family, introducing himself as Rudrashekhar, son of late Chandrasekhar who is brother to Soumyasekhar, the current head of Neogi family. Chandra was an artist who died in foreign lands after being married to an Italian lady. It was there that he received a painting of Jesus Christ by a famous Renaissance painter, Tintoretto. Rudra is wholeheartedly welcomed by Soumyasekhar but along came the news of death of Thumri, Soumya’s pet golden retriever. Then, following a chance meeting with Soumya’s son, Naba, the three musketeers, Feluda, Topshe and Jatayu, gets invited to Baikunthapur to have a look at the famous painting and also to offer some clues to the dog’s killers. Though the case was proposed in a light-hearted manner, but Feluda smells rat and starts some investigation on his own. His hunch of something fishy proves correct following a failed attempt to steal the picture. Feluda learns an international buyer called Krikorian got information of the painting from an article by Bhagwangarh’s Bhudev Singh, a friend to Chandra and tries to buy it through a villainous art dealer Hiralal Somani. The story gathers a sudden momentum as Bankim, manager to Soumya gets murdered and Rudra gets missing while the painting gets replaced by a fake one. Now the chase begins with Feluda and his companions trying to foil the art deal between Krikorian and Hiralal at Hong Kong and the stage is set for the final showdown that keeps the audience glued to their seats.
The story has been followed with some modifications that have never felt damaging to the original plot and the wonderful fusion of oriental tunes with the traditional Feluda tune really deserves applause as do the use of witty dialogues that adds humorous flavour of the movie. As to the suspense account, it must be admitted that foretelling a part of the criminal's approach damps the thrill a bit but the use of action and chase sequences compensate them to a great extent. While the fictional portrait of Jesus by Sagar Bhowmick provides the much needed realistic touch to the historical part but Feluda's explanation while unravelling minute but important points could well have been enhanced by using flashbacks as those who have not read the book will be kept searching for the missed portions especially while revealing the true identity of an important character. But the thing that I disliked most was the transformation of the period to the 21st century as I feel that the story had all the materials for a grand success without cell phones, lappys and modern vehicles (Lalmohan’s ambassador converted to indica was not required as such). Just imagine Holmes dressed in modern outfit or Poirot losing his fussiness over symmetry or Marple without her stitching set or Father Brown without the meek appearance or watching Byomkesh searching for clues wearing jeans! It is not that the period transformation produces giggles among the audience but it was an adjustment quite uncalled for.
As to the detailing I think two glaring errors are very much apparent. Firstly while Feluda, Topshe and Jatayu were seen sleeping at the Neogi’s, they didn’t even change their dresses! Secondly while following a footstep in the house at night, Feluda is wearing shoes, that is so unlike a proper detective.
Hirok Rajar Deshe
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Ashray
This was probably the final work of Mr. Mukherjee and probably one of his best according to me. The intricate web of emotions that the author has woven not only shows his mastery with words but also it reflects how deep his study was of the human nature and the social bounds that shape it.
The story involves Nandita Bose, the only daughter of a barrister father and a writer mother, who suddenly finds herself a victim of an impending separation between her parents. Torn between the love for her father and hatred for her mother, she gets involved in a strange battle of principles that not only affects her family but also her personal life and ends in an unique style that can only be described as a copybook short story ending with the reader left to conceive the final chapters of the life of each character.
With the frequent use of contrasting perspectives in consecutive chapters, the author has forced readers to be overwhelmed with the various emotions ranging from hatred to love and fury to tranquility and his passionate zeal of expressing the plot, according to Sarbani Mukherjee’s introduction, is vividly felt as the story unfolds its various hues.
The 3 Mistakes of My Life
The story is about three friends in Ahmedabad, Govind, a practical minded youth whose passion was maths and who dreamt of a flourishing business of his own, Ishan a passionate guy whose chief obsession was cricket and who believed his freinds blindly and Omi, the son of a priest to whom religion was the first priority. Govind, in trying to shape his future, convinced his friends to open a business in sports good and stationeries and they opened the same in the premises of a temple, where Omi's family lived.The guys struggled with the business and it initially flourished and profitted. They started two parallel small scale projects with Govind tutoring the local school goers and Ishan giving cricket coaching to those interested. But all of a sudden when everything was running smooth and they were looking forward to shift business in a modern mall, Govind made the 1st mistake of his life that cost him his confidence. From this point onwards the story becomes much more involved where business gets mixed with social issues, religions and politics and how these three cope with them.
The story is told from Govind's point of view and how his three vital mistakes became crucial to his business and his personal and social life. The emotions have been richly painted and nowhere it had turned out of the ordinary but Mr. Bhagat's trend of a signature Hindi movie style finish seemed to mar the end IMO. Also a slight discrepancy that I noted was that though the author has used the 1st person in two ways, one while describing his own conversation with Govind and secondly in the flashback mode with Govind as the 1st person, the style of both seemed the same. Maybe a slight different way of expressing feelings would have been more appealing to the reader.