This post was supposed to be the link to complete the essence of an earlier post here.
However, such is the magic that this movie's encore has on you, that you are driven to near irrepressible ecstasies, and remain content going continuously gaga for hours on end. And not to mention, throw all other issues to the backburner, till this little matter is "out of the way".
And thus, dear blogspot, we meet once again...
Given my great fascination for colours and their potential for rich expression, at a very basic level, the first thing to strike me as exceptional in this work of art, has to be its generous, yet very, very tasteful use of an infinitely many hues. While I maintain that Black & White has its own distinctive feel and flavour (still photos in particular), this is perhaps one movie where the colours make a roaring comeback! :)Moving beyond what some may discard as trivialties of a toddler's fascination (which, by the way, is truly unfathomable, with potential for elemental intelligence in its most powerful form).
Dev.D is an honest, unhindered, and truly free piece of art (Statuatory Disclaimer: Given my disadvantaged position for determining and commenting on the freedom exercised by Sir Kashyap, the previous statement may be taken as relative to other contemporaries of the day, and subject to the humble, yet strongly worded voice of one's self).
What this movie gives to you is 2.x hours of pure and absolute, life; life, in all its passion, reality, love, morbidity and bondages (as also the lack of them!). Everything is perfect, in its glorious imperfection of incredibly accurate human-ness. Right from the childhood days, to the overt, mad(dening for some it seems!) lust of the opening half an hour, to the common man's (by insanely orchestrated Bollywood fairytale standards) idiosyncrasies that punctuated every facet of the plot.
The drugs and alcohol that play a pivotal role in the entire scheme have been handled deliciously well; Not cheap, not exalted, not impassioned, just similar to a cold, hard stare from an eye that misses no detail.
In another plane, perhaps from another eye that the observer possesses, the treatment meted out to them is comparable to that which a family of royalty lays out for their son returning from a distant battle; flawless, elaborate, and perfect in all respects. One can only watch as the very soul of the invoked high spirits plays itself out, through the clockwork acting, the scintillating cameramanship, and music tailor-made for the roller coaster ride.
As always, music remains one of the key drivers for me to love a movie. And this movie leaves you wanting to run off to Google for "Amit Trivedi", and feast on this little piece.
The music is plain and simply put, perfect.
Doing justice to such a script, that freely juggles between decadence, insanity, contempt, anguish, innocent love flirting with mad lust, and even hope, is quite a task. And one feels exceedingly elated (almost high!) basking in the brilliantly varied offerings of Sir Trivedi. And what one observes during the 2nd viewing is the genius with which he (and the cinematographer et al) gleefully cut between different tracks, so as to continue a previously started piece, whenever the pulse returns to the original feel/colour/pace/intensity/insanity.
Beyond any arcane technicalities of the music and its great potential to inspire awe, one can safely say, that above all else, the music is very alive; very perceptive of the changes that take shape around it; very intelligent, and discreet in its decisions on just when to drop news of the impending bombs; very nicely fitting with the curves of the love child of the script and the acting.
And as if this deranged-ly awesome kaleidoscope were not enough, one is continually pushed to feel for poor old Dev, a strange cocktail of emotions; quite aptly shaded in hues of psychedelia, tinged with a hint of sinking melancholia, and sprinkled gently with some disdain, alternately for him and the self.
To say that the other 2 roles were subsidiary to Dev's, would be harsh, to say the least. Paro, with all her unbridled passion, devotion, love, anger and setting maturity of being, and Chanda with her own domain of tragedy, escape, innocence, "growing up" and love, co-fathered the theme more or less equally with Dev. That such an intricate mutual equation required quality acting goes without saying, and one heaves several sighs of relief on realizing that nothing lets anything down. And one then feels high, observing how endorphins and the like also find use in the time, such is the magic of all that graces the big screen those 171 minutes.
In all, Dev.D remains in one's consciousness, as the single embodiment of nearly all the good that one aspires to observe in cinema, which in turn has become woefully rare in today's times.
For those who can't quite digest an opinion without figures to better quantify everything sundry, the following are my ratings (out of 10):
(Edit-1: The ratings below stand 'rationalized', in light of the author recovering from "the heat of the moment"..)
Story: 8.00
Direction, Screenplay: 9.00
Script: 9.00
Music 9.00
Acting: 8.75
Overall: 9.00
To put things in some form of perspective, as also to give an idea of where I come from on such issues, some more "overall ratings":
Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham - 5.50
Mumbai Meri Jaan - 7.00
Dasvidaniya - 8.00
Requiem for a Dream - 9.25
Wall-E - 8.75
That is that.
My song of praise for Dev.D, the people behind it, and all that it symbolizes, must end here. Messrs Kashyap, Trivedi & Co. - a pleasure, privilege and honour it has been.
"Tauba tera jalwa, tauba tera pyaar..."The one that started it all! :)
6 comments:
"Everything is perfect, in its glorious imperfection of incredibly accurate human-ness." - totally agree with this. Even i saw the movie twice (both times at a hall) and am poised to have a third outing soon. As rightly mentioned, the music is not just awesome (and my savior at office)but also has been used in a brilliant manner - no song seemed extra baggage. For me, the penultimate scene when Dev has this near miss is the highlight..It represents that one split second in our lives when we realize how we are wasting ourselves, or to put it in hindi 'akkal aa jaati hai'. This realization comes very suddenly, or atleast it comes suddenly in a split second for me, which i feel Sir Kashyap has captured beautifully. With Dev D, Indian cinema has made a paradigm shift from the irritating 'larger than life' Shahrukh Kahn type of movies to make may for the common man with his insecurities and vulnerabilities.
Generally, commoners like me cannot actually understand why masterpieces are actually called masterpieces. For instance, I still havent reached the level to actually appreciate the paintings of Hussain or the writings of Shakespeare. I just believe that they are great coz they are works of men regarded as great by people who supposedly have a great taste in great works (used too many greats!!!).
Dev D, in turn is a masterpiece which every commoner can realize and appreciate - which does not require great men to tell us abt its greatness - it is a masterpiece of the commoners, for the commoners and by the commoners!
bahut saara likh diya..im tired now!!!!
"it is a masterpiece of the commoners, for the commoners and by the commoners!"
very well put! :)
and yes, that penultimate scene really was amazing.. coz just wen u were giving up on the obnoxious dev ever gaining any sort of perspective, balance et al, uske "akkal thikaane lag jaate hain", in a manner thats not too filmy, not too convenient.. and very relat-able as well i felt..
while that scene was THE moment perhaps, in terms of pure art et al, i'll take u back to the scene wen dev throws the glass for the 2nd time (with chunni clinging on to a pillow! :-)
that scene:
1. was funny of course..
2. IMMEDIATELY cut to that rotating camera sequence, identical to wen chunni and dev had 1st 'relayed' on their 1st visit to the underground bar, the nigt b4 he ended up sleeping in chanda's room..
3. was followed by the conclusion of the emosional atyachaar rock version track (which was last used in the scene where dev pictures paro getting laid).. the last charge kicks off the moment the glass from dev's hand shatters on the wall, and mixes AWESOMELY with the video thereafter (rotating et al)..
in terms of pure creative magic, i found this to be THE scene.. hope u recall the details, else catch them wen u go for the 3rd time :)
Cheeers!
Hey Justin.
Read your blog on Dev D(of course..). May be I can see cinema the way you see it. For me, its more entertainment than art. From my point of view, the movie delivers what it was set out to. It entertains (barring some portions where, with the repeated scenes of the underground pub and the drug orgy, I felt that if they showed it once more I would be bored to death). The best parts of the movie for me were the real scenes of Delhi, esp that area paharganj. I have actually grown up there (there is a big and decent residential area there which mainly constitutes of people who came from Pak after partition). I was delighted to see that area.
second thing I loved about the movie was good sense finally prevails upon our Dev das.I used to hate the part where devdas dies in the original story. It was the practical element that people have developed now.
as far as story goes, the theme was old, other than the twist that Dev Das doesnt die. But it was thought of really well. dont know if it is called screenplay or story or whatever. The idea of small town girl from punjab and the MMS scandal. I loved their creativity.
I feel too shallow posting this alongwith your deep analysis of the art in the movie, but then..never mind!
Commoner? Perfect ? Accurate ?
I grossly disagree with the usage of words for the movie.
I personally hated the characters, though the treatment of the movie is good. The movie aroused the feelings of irritation, anger and confusion at many points of time. However, the music is a great relief and delhi scenes almost made me homesick.
@Chhavi..
Hmmm... interesting point on us perhaps sharing different views on cinema.. and looking for different things from it..
and yes.. i too felt pretty homesick after watching the movie..
finally, the movie was just, plain and simple, very nicely done i felt (to encompass all the jargonics of cinematography, screenplay et al..)
and dont feel shallow! we're all just children after all.. :)
@Deeps...
(Ok, now you asked for it! ;-)
Personally you are of course free to hate the characters. What caused irritation, anger and confusion to you, filled me with awe, awe and more awe.
The 3 words used, are elaborated upon below:
1. Commoner: You never saw any of the characters as belonging to that league of super-macho/sexy, perfectly sculpted gods/goddesses, who smile at any problem, and somehow always have the answer to the questions in front of them. there was no extraordinary foresight in any of the characters, as they played by instinct, and conformed to Simon's theory of bounded rationality.
2. Perfect: The movie eradicated all signs of the "larger-than-life" roles that plagues much of indian cinema today. Moreover, it does not shy away from elaborating on the demons that haunt normal human beings. Such is the genius of creation in humanity, that the noblest of beings is prone to becoming the vilest of monsters, in the blink of an eye. while the entire spectrum may not have been shown, a great part of it has been, which im sure was enuff to unsettle many...
3. Accurate: This was with reference to the many shades associated with every single character. There is nobody who is a monolithic "hero", "villain" etc. Everyone is simply human; everyone gets their own epiphanies, and everyone falls prey to self-doubt, and the vagaries of an average human existence..
The imperfections of human-ness have been captured well, and more accurately than usually accomplished in our cinema..
Yes, the protagonist's path of choice, on his journey to self-destruction was drugs n alcohol, which was shown nice and graphically.. (anger, irritation, confusion causing perhaps).
But id like to point out, that any path he may have chosen, would've been equally potent in that direction.. a stalker unrelentingly behind someone, a poet who gives up all else in search of his muse, a saint who foresakes the world, so he may find Him in himself... I think at some level, these 3, dev, and infinitely many others, should converge to one, common point; and thus be worthy of a similar degree of respect.. again i reiterate, at some level..
The specifics we'll think about later! For now, chillo, and go watch devd again! :P
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