Review of "Bhaag Milkha Bhaag" by Dipashri Bardhan
(A Winsome Story Of Discipline & Hard Work !!)
FLASHBACK: Sometime around the year 1992, Kolkata ;
Question: Who was the first president of Independent India?
Answer: Rajendra Prasad.
Question: Which cloud is responsible for rain?
Answer: Nimbus Clouds.
Question: Lemon is the source of which Vitamin?
Answer: Vitamin C.
Question: Who is called 'Flying Sikh' ?
Answer: Milkha Singh.
I stopped for a while.Was reading General Knowledge for an upcoming exam in school, when I was in 5th Standard.Closed the book, looked outside the window & started thinking that how can a man be termed as 'flying' ? Is he an expert pilot or loves to jump all the time, so that he can stay in the air as much as he can? Opened the book again to get a clue, but, that small general knowledge book was only full of questions which were written in a sentence & their respective answers, written in a word or two words maximum.
Had to wait till night, when my father returned home from office.Asked him the same.He solved the mystery with a smiling face, "Here the word 'fly' stands for 'run'.Milkha Singh can run with such a great speed, that it looks like as if he is flying like a bird, almost as fast as a stormy wind.Thats why he won most of the races he ran & rightly termed as Flying Sikh" !!
MOVIE: Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra Pictures & Viacom 18 Motion Pictures' 'Bhaag Milkha Bhaag' mesmerizes the audience with the dramatic life of India's legendary athlete Milkha Singh.Being a biopic, this cinematic sparkle glitters with several shades of human expressions-Pain + Happiness + Romance + Anger + Frustration + Defeat & Victory !! Thanks to all the promotions (especially that teaser trailer which was released on 29th November, 2012) that the expectation encircling this movie enviably crossed the barrier.However, such expectation always comes accompanied by it's two offsprings-
1) Great possibility to score high at Box Office collections in the opening weekend & 2) If the story fails to click at public's heart, then a probability of the same success graph falling down miserably, in the next or following weekends !!
So, let me assemble the positive & negative points of 'Bhaag Milkha Bhaag' to find out whether the film is value for money or not !!
'LIKE's: The movie marked a fascinating impression terms of;
1) Story-Screenplay-Dialogue-Lyrics: Prasoon Joshi
2) Music: Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy
3) Cinematography: Binod Pradhan
4) Hair Design: B.Blunt
5) Set Design: Sumit Basu
6) Appropriate selection of all the actors/actresses: Aadore Mukherjee & Dilip Shankar (Casting Directors)
7) Choreography: Ganesh Acharya, Shiamak Davar & Vaibhavi Merchant Costume Design: Dolly Ahluwalia
9) Action sequences: Allan Amin
10) Acting: Standing Ovation to Farhan Akhtar for giving a clap worthy performance.Besides, Divya Dutta, Sonam Kapoor, Prakash Raj, Yograj Singh, Jabtej Singh, Meesha Shafi, Pawan Malhotra etc. also supported the script well.
11) Direction: Finally, Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra's masterly narration glittered the entire photoplay with three key ingredients:
a) EARTH: In many scenes,for example: The speedy running sequences or, Romancing in a sandy sea beach or Simply falling on ground after an extensive physical exhaustion, the smooth & rough particles of Earth have been aesthetically used to bring that 'earthy' touch in the lens of camera !!
b) WATER: Scenes like: Depicting a large mug or a bucket being filled up gradually with Milkha's sweat, thereby conveying the range of his dedication toward exercise + When a ball stuffed with Milkha/Biro's love letter dropped into a container full of water, then as an after effect the water droplets rose like a mini-fountain from that small container, along with portraying several colors defining each watery lines and attributing to the visual delight of the show !!
c) MASCULINITY: The outstanding representation of a well-built male figure through Farhan Akhtar's physique surely makes a great impact.Surprisingly, maximum people consider a flawless female figure as the last word of art (sculpture or painting). On the contrary, I have seen many people standing like a statue for hours in front of the replica of David (the sculptural masterpiece made by Michelangelo in 1504) in Victoria & Albert Museum, London.Also heard that the original one (kept in Florence, Italy) is so beautiful that people often start crying by merely staring at it.
The unique arrangement of Biceps + Triceps + Deltoid + Trapezius + Extensor + Sternocleidomastoid + Rectus Abdominus + Brachialis + Serratus Anterior & Pectoralis Major (male muscular system of upper body) can arguably contribute to a better level of seductivity through machismo & thats again proved through Farhan Akhtar in 'Bhaag Milkha Bhaag'.
'DISLIKE's: 1) At times, the length (188 minutes) of the movie bores people.Saw some of the audience babbling or checking messages in their mobile at a few repetitive scenes.
2) Editing by P.S.Bharathi disappoints in first half of the film.
3) Make up design by Vikram Gaikwad is impressive barring those two close up shots of Sonam Kapoor where her eyebrows looked as neatly trimmed as a modern urban girl (for the absence of unwanted extra hair) + eyes quoted with kajal in her upper eyelids.That obviously added to her beauty but took away that required rustic appeal for village girls of that era (1950s) did not know how to trim eyebrow or used to paint kajal only in the lower eyelid.
CLOSURE: All said and done, 'Bhaag Milkha Bhaag' entrancingly upheld those lines of Roman Polanski: "Cinema should make you forget you are sitting in a theater".Such a wondrous filmic experience it is !!
Undoubtedly, it is Absolutely Recommended !!
Review by: Dipashri Bardhan
