Finally!!!! After the mega blockbusters that Bollywood's hottest directors had been handing out with great conceit and even greater hype, comes along a small budget movie that is such a breath of fresh air and and provides a much needed break from the ennui & scorn that I started to carry along each time I went to catch a Bollywood flick, almost like my very own special offer combo pack!
Simplicity is the glory of expression, said American poet, Walt Whitman. And that is what Peepli Live celebrates!! It is simple without becoming simplistic, it is poignant without turning into a distress-fest, it is humorous without being a comical farce and it is satirical without being intellectual or gloomy.
The movie looks at a pertinent issue plaguing our society - that of farmers' suicide due to poverty. Unfortunately, to be brutally honest, it is also an issue light years away from our world of MP3 downloads & Ipads & Twitter. But such is the beauty and brilliance of the movie, that it manages to draw us into the world of the protagonists and keep us riveted. It is brutal in tearing apart the circus called media, politics and bureaucracy and yet never strays from being funny; it is comical and yet it manages to touch your heart and make its point. It glorifies stereotypes and also breaks them to one's great delight.
You cannot help but fondly smile at the brothers, their preoccupation with ganja and fascination with boiled eggs when their lives and land are at stake. And you cannot help but guffaw in the scene where the cameras go chasing Natha when he is out in the great open to answer Nature's call & when the reporters do insightful reporting on this phenomenon, when they solemnly dish out the percentages of people who follow this ritual on a daily basis, when they call in experts to analyse this phenomenon and its implications. This is satire at its best and most incisive!!!
Other than a sharp & witty story and some superb acting, the movie also has a surpise up its sleeve - watch out for some really, really good music; "Des mera rangrez hai babu" is a splendid and fitting tribute to the chaos called India while my other favourite song "Mehngai dayan" is absolutely droll and hilarious and is a song each of us can identify with!
Finally would like to end by saying that this first attempt of writer-director Anusha Rizvi's is a slap in the face of all the Aditya Chopras & KJos & Sanjay Leela Bhansalis & Gadhvis that planet Bollywood is replete with. It shows how a good movie can be made without a superstar or for that matter, a superstar couple or a superstar family, without a director too puffed up with his own importance, without foreign locales that we would all like to have on our '100 places to see before you die' list, without skimpily clad women gyrating to a Hinglish half rap-half bhangra item number, without high speed car/bike/boat chases, and without the hero romancing the heroine in designer wear and in atleast 10 different picturesque locations!
Do watch Peepli Live! It is one movie you where you will find your money and time have been truly well spent!
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