Published On : Fri, Nov 27th, 2015

Tamasha : Movie Review by Prashen H. Kyawal

Advertisement

Tamasha : Not a love story

tamashaa

Imtiyaz Ali is master of convoluted love stories. His protagonists generally meet while they are travelling, they gel together as friend. When they depart, one of them feel that he/she is incomplete without the other. Then he/she travels back again to get her only to find that she/he is into some other situation of thought process. Then the journey to reconciliation. His earlier movies from “Socha Na Tha”, “Jab We Met”, “Love Aaj Kal” and even Cocktail (as a writer) follow the similar template and patterns. With “Rockstar”, he added the “Coming of age” story track of the rockstar and here in “Tamasha”, it is about a story teller. So basically Imitiyaz created a template which he used multiple times and then updated it with some changes and reusing it again.

But even if he is telling his same stories repeatedly, he tells them so differently and creatively that it becomes an engaging film. With Tamasha also, he follows the template of convoluted love story + coming of age artist. This time the artist is a storyteller.

Two strangers, Ved (Ranbir Kapoor) and Tara (Deepika Padukone) meet at Corsica and decide to hide their real identities to be what they can be. And to avoid regular girl meets boy and they fall in love story, they decide to not meet each other again in life. Tara gets fascinated by the idea and tags along happily. But unlike Ved she gets attracted to him.

She goes back to India. Many years pass by and she can’t get over him…. she goes to Delhi and tries to find him out at the only real life place he had told her. Fortunately, she finds him and pours her heart out….. he happily accepts…. They start going out…. but she misses something…. he is not the same guy she met in Corsica. What happens after that forms the real story of Tamasha.

Written and Directed by Imtiyaz Ali, Tamasha is a true Imtiyaz Ali film. It has a gripping screenplay, creatively engaging narrative and something that lifts it to the level of art. Though there are many Deja Vu moments which are similar to portions of movies by Imtiyaz himself, the way it is woven and presented is very engaging and entertaining.

The way the protagonists wander and do unusual and unconventional things in Corsica is similar to what the protagonists of Rockstar do. The scene where Ranbir is shown stuck in repetitiveness of routine looks similar to the similar sequence filmed on Saif Ali Khan in Love Aaj Kal. Also the way the little Ved gets his mind imbibed with different stories is similar to Ranbir in Rockstar getting imbibed by music from all sources. Also it is a similar story which Vikramaditya Motwane’s “Udaan” has but with completely different settings.

Another thing which does not work is the supposed fun which the lead pair has in the first half. Many times we do not have a connect with it. Also it seems like the Director is trying to say the same point again and again and we feel like when will the story move ahead. If the editor Aarti Bajaj could have made a shorter movie, it would have been better.

Imtiyaz seems to be in love with journey more than the destination. Once he proves the coming of age point, he does not tell us how Ved achieves his dream and why he bows down to Deepika in the end except the fact that she was the catalyst in shaking him and waking him up from his deep slumber. It would have been better if there was something regarding this than the repetitiveness in explaining the point the movie is talking about.

That is why I would say it is NOT a love story which Imtiyaz Ali is famous for making. From pure love stories to Rockstar where the journey of the singer is equally happening as the love story to Tamasha where the love story takes back seat when Ved’s story takes up the narrative. And hence there is lesser and lesser Deepika as the climax approaches.

Even after explaining so many cons, I would say that this is a movie which will engross you and will grow on you as it progresses with an impactful second half. You will come out of the theatre with happy smiles after shedding one or two tears.

Another big factor which works with the movie is performances. Ranbeer Kapoor as Ved and Deepika Padukone as Tara has excelled themselves and lived the characters on the screen. Specially Ranbeer’s performance is spellbinding and we can not praise the actor enough. He shows the transformations of his characters flawlessly. Deepika is equally good.

Vivek Mushran and Ved’s boss and Piyush Mishra as the storyteller baba leave an impact in their roles. Everyone else do their jobs perfectly. Casting by Mukesh Chhabra is apt.

Coming to the Music which is generally soul to Imtiyaz’s movies, this time it is not as good as Rockstar’s was. But still there are 2-3 fabulous songs with superb lyrics. One of the strength of the movie is background music. It just lifts the movie to another level altogether.

Technically the movie is flawless except the old age make up of Piyush Mishra in the pre-climax. It looks fake. Cinematography by S. Ravi Varman is impeccably beautiful and breath taking. Production Design by our Nagpurian Rajnish Hedao is superb.

Overall, this is another gem from Imtiyaz even though the cuts are similar to the earlier ones. There is much art, literature, music and creativity in the movie which would be loved by the audience. Only request to Imitiyaz will be to get out of his own templates and signature styles. Because when signature becomes a template, audience will ask you “Why always the same story?”

Rating: 4 stars
Recommendation : Go watch the movie. It is fabulous except all the cons mentioned above. Caution: If you did not like “Rockstar”, you will definitely not like this one.