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Reviews
Angaar (1992)
Gritty and Atmospheric
Large empty spaces...fore-grounded sound effects...minimal background score...unusual song picturizations...brutal violence and dystopian atmosphere are just a few of the elements which makes this familiar underworld tale by K Shashilal Nayar, a minor masterpiece.
Jehangir Khan (loosely based on Haji Mastan played aptly by Kadar Khan) and his sons; the gangster Farid Khan (Mazhar Khan) and the white collar builder Majid Khan (with an Hafeez Contractor agenda of 'Bombay should be clean!' played by Nana Patekar with a nervous calm) dominates the matters of the city. Jehangir Khan, the mafia ruler of the city since the last 40 years now proclaims himself as the messiah of poor and just like the Mughal king Jehangir promises justice in an open personal court. Whereas, Farid's men create havoc in poor slums by eve teasing and other illicit activities.
One such slum is 'Asha Colony' whose unofficial leader is Jaikishan alias Jaggu (Jackie Shroff) who is a graduate and a job seeker and an occasional street musician. World's of Jehangir and Jaggu collide when Majid gets determined to wipe off Asha Colony to make multistoried buildings there.
The cinema of Angaar is gritty and atmospheric...the death scene of Jaggu's father and Jaggu's torture in the state mental asylum are pretty hardcore. Most of all, the climax where multistoried buildings are blown off is both spectacular and a form of unique vengeance to the old 'Basti' problem.
Nayar's real cinematic achievement comes with his ability of unique treatment of spaces, both visual and aural. Visually, most of the times the spaces were either kept very empty or overpopulated with people which presents the city of Bombay as a city of extreme opposites. Aurally, in the key scenes one crucial sound is kept in the foreground instead of always resorting to the mundane background score which provide the scenes with necessary tension and urgency like in the scene where Jaggu first meets Majid at a construction site. Except the dialogue only one sound can be heard which is that of Jaggu's motorcycle.
Performances in the film are truly A-class, especially those of Jackie Shroff, Kadar Khan and Nana Patekar. Even minor characters like those played by Nina Gupta, Achyut Potdar and Kiran Kumar leave their mark.
Saathi (1991)
Solid piece of 90's film-making!
Last week, I just happen to rediscover this film directed by Mahesh Bhatt and I must confess that I still can't get the film out of my mind. To me, it's a solid piece of 90's film-making in India. The film is loosely based on the film Scarface (1983) which was directed by Brian De Palma and was written by Oliver Stone. Though, the similarity between the two films is just restricted to the 'rise of a gangster' part. Saathi, essentially is the story of Suraj (Aditya Pancholi) and Amar (Mohsin Khan) and their friendship which also reminds me of Sholay's Jai and Veeru in a vague manner, especially the earlier part.
The film chronicles the journey of both the friends together from street urchins to petty thieves to life of some serious crime. At a certain point Amar refuses to tread this path of crime and Suraj is hell bent on going on and on. The characterizations of Amar and Suraj also share similarities with Ravi and Vicky respectively from Bhatt's previous film Naam (1986), incidentally written by Salim Khan.
The strength of the film lies in its brisk and relentless narrative, good performances and good music. The way Bhatt has used the songs to take the narrative further is also commendable. Every song adds up to the narrative in its own way despite of there being six songs in the film. 'Yaarana Yaar Ka', 'Aisa Bhi Dekho Waqt Jeeven Mein Aata Hai' and 'Zindagi Ki Talash Mein' are among the best of the songs in the film.
Aditya Pancholi's Suraj and Mohsin Khan's Amar balance each other quite well. Aditya's reckless, impulsive and nervous portrayal of Suraj is one of the actor's best till date. Mohsin's mature, restrained and underplayed interpretation of Amar compliments Suraj quite well. The highlight of the film is the scene where Suraj goes way out of control and shoots the policeman who was responsible for his father's death.
The explicitness of violence and drugs portrayed in the film is typically 80's-early 90's which was very much required by the film to make its point regarding connections between poverty, crime and class conflict.