Being Cyrus. Review on Being Cyrus

A lot of directors these days are taking the non – conventional route of film making ,while some fall flat on their face while some come out with a winner.In the case of Being Cyrus,Homi Adjania definitely has a winner up his hands.

I had gone for the premiere of the movie on Tuesday night expecting something different and some interesting stuff from the movie and after watching the movie I knew that I was a satisfied movie buff.

Being Cyrus snakes into an intriguing psychological drama, but unravels almost like a quaint comedy. The tale revolves around the rather dysfunctional Sethna family and swings between Panchgani Katy & Dinshaw Sethna’s home (Dimple Kapadia & Naseeruddin Shah) and an old dilapidated building in Mumbai (where Dinshaw’s aged father, Fardoonjee Sethna (Honey Chhaya), his brother, Farokh(Boman Irani), and Farokh’s wife, Tina(Simone Singh), live in apparent conflict. Dinshaw Sethna is a dope-smoking retired sculptor, who lives in the secluded hills around a small hill station called Panchgani. Dinshaw opens his house to a stranger, Cyrus(Saif Ali Khan), who gratefully accepts his invitation as well as his wife, Katy Sethna. As Cyrus befriends and enters into the family as Dinshaw’s sculpting apprentice, all the cracks begin to open. The layers unfold and things do not seem quite right. What’s more is that nothing about Cyrus seems quite right either. The six colorful characters play against each other in a bizarre opus of repartee.

The backbone of Being Cyrus primarily along with the story is also the powerful performances of the main characters.Saif is in rocking form in the role of the mysterious Cyrus.Its good to see him in such different kind of roles after his routine acts in Hum Tum & Salaam Namaste.Naseeruddin Shah as the ever smoking pothead is a class act & truly enacts like a typical parsi.Dimple as the hot,loud & bitchy Katy Sethna is truly amazing.Boman Irani is exceptional in the role of the grouchy,loud & the cranky farookh sethna,this I feel is one of his best performances(check out the scene when he’s bitten by the dog & the argument which follows with the owner of the dog….simply hilarious).

Honey Chhaya & Simone Singh fill up the rest of the family & both play their characters to the tee.

Being Cyrus is not a movie for masses for sure since its in English & partly in parsi gujrati,which may not appeal to a lot of people.It will mostly appeal to the elite class & especially to the parsi community.

I feel such kind of movies really make cinema interesting & different,hope to see a lot more movies like Being Cyrus in future.