Mani Sir...where's your script? . Review on Guru (2007)

Mani Rathnam may shout from the rooftops that "Guru" is not inspired by Dhirubhai Ambani's life, but the fact remains that the character of "Guru" aka Gurukant Desai IS inspired by Dhirubhai, and "Shakti" industries is a poor pseudonym for Reliance Industries.

Having established that, there are a couple of ways to make a biopic (movie inspired by the life of a famous person). One way is to research the person's life and activities thoroughly and have an air-tight, factual screenplay. The other is to forget about facts and make the character really human and interesting. What does Mani Rathnam do with "Guru"?

PLOT-

Gurukant Desai (Abhishek Bachchan) is a school teacher's son from Gujrat. Not being very adept at studies, he decides to quit academics very early, and gets into business. To this end, he goes to Turkey for a couple of years, and returns a somewhat well off man, inspired to start his own business empire in India. To get the start up capital he needs, Guru marries a rich mans daughter (Aishwarya Rai) and moves to Mumbai. He struggles somewhat to get a foothold in the business world, but is assisted by an established newspaperman, "Nanaji" (Mithun Chakraborty).

Guru attains success rather quickly and is not too concerned about the means he uses to get to the pinnacle of his ambitions. However, others, like his erstwhile mentor Nanaji, are bothered by his tactics. From then on, the story of "Guru" is essentially about the conflicted relations between Guru and the media, headed by Nanaji and another young reporter (Madhavan).

Is Guru really wrong in doing what he does? If he is, does he pay a price for his actions?

MY TAKE-

To answer the question I posed in the beginning, Mani Rathnam tries to make the first half of the movie as factual as possible, in terms of establishing the characters in the movie quickly, as well as establishing Guru's meteoric rise to fame and wealth....and he fails miserably. The second half of the movie is not so frenetically paced, it slows down and focusses on "Guru" the character a bit more. I thought the second half was more effective.

From my perspective, these are the flaws I could spot in the movie:

Screenplay/Script-This is by far the worst screenplay Mani Rathnam has come up with thus far in his career. It leaves many unanswered questions like...What makes Guru successful in Turkey? What exactly does Guru do so well that he attains success so soon in India? What is SO WRONG with Guru's tactics that his former mentor goes off him and becomes an implaceable enemy?

Poor Characterisation-I never thought I would ever accuse the great director of this, but "Guru" is full of characters that havent been done justice to...be it Vidya Balan's, Madhavan's, or even Mithun's character. Mithunda is actually a brilliant actor, and Madhavan lights up the screen with his undeniable niceness...but are they allowed the space in "Guru" to display their talents....I dont think so.

Song Picturisation-I dont know if AR Rahman's seen this movie, but if he has, he must be seething at the poor treatment his songs have gotten in the movie. Not a single song stood out positively for the way it was placed or choreographed in the movie, although the music is good otherwise. This again is very unusual in a Mani Rathnam movie, who is known for shooting his songs well, and actually using them to take his movie/script forward.

Wont take the movie apart any further! What I liked about the movie was:

Abhishek's performance as Guru-Abhishek did the best that he could with the role given to him. I liked the second half of the movie because it allowed Abhishek to embrace the character of Guru and give it his all. With a better screenplay, it could have been the role of his lifetime...

Abhishek-Ash's chemistry-I never thought I'll actually say this, but Ash and Abhishek have FINALLY started looking like a pair with "Guru",especially as they mature as a couple in the movie. Ash looks lovely and is suitably restrained and mature, as her role demands, and leaves the annoying after taste of Dhoom 2's "Sunehri" way behind!

Thats it...I dont have a lot more to say. I just have a bitter taste of disappoinment coz I am such a huge fan of Mani Rathnam and wish I could have written a glowing review of this movie. As it is, I'm going to watch "Roja" for the umpteenth time tomorrow and remind myself as to why I like the director so much.