Thursday, January 16, 2014

Dedh Ishqiya

I'm a big fan of Vishal Bharadwaj & although this isn't a movie directed by him, it sure has borrowed his style. It's an entertainer, its funny, witty, layered & insane.

Set in the nawabi mileui of UP, the language is difficult to grasp - both the shayari & the profanities - so thank god for the subtitles! What a brilliant job though writing those lines & verses - they range from crass (in characterstic style of what you would imagine from UP conmen) to sublime (in high-brow urdu). The jabs at Italian DNA ensuring royalty & puppeteering the fake-nawab; the jokes on the 6 stages of love - all pretty hilarious. The lyrics of those songs are gorgeous. And Madhuri Dixit - as a fading beauty, broke royal, a glorious dancer, a frail begum - is amazing. 

I love the actor who plays the baddie (I remember him as  Dubeyji from Monsoon Wedding, although I've made many attempts to remember his real name, his Dubeyji character sticks). He is a guy who owns his wierdness- he stands out in any role he does. I wonder if he can play a man on the street as convincingly as he plays the quirky outlandish characters he usually does.

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