An artiste gone wrong. Review on Sanjay Leela Bhansali

When I think of Sanjay Leela Bhansali, I envision an artiste sitting in front of a blank canvas, ready to paint pictures never seen before.

When he paints them with his heart, they are stunning and speak volumes. When he paints them according to what he thinks people like and would accept, he paints strange, repetitive patterns which are gaudy and loud.

Isn’t that like you or me ? Isn’t that like every person who walks the tight rope between straight-from-the heart and what-the-public likes ?

Should I just blame this artist ? After all, he is just reflecting all that he receives.

His first movie, Khamoshi is his best movie so far. A sensitive autobiographical portrayal of a young girl’s journey from childhood to motherhood touched the chords of my heart. Rich in content and style, this movie reminds one of the old, beautiful movies of the yesteryears. He had handpicked the best actors for this saga of a normal child of a deaf and dumb couple. Nana Patekar, Manisha Koirala, Seema Biswas and Salman Khan (yes, he made even Salman act ). Though this movie was not a big hit, I was convinced that an original director had arrived at Bollywood and we can look forward to many such superb movies from him.

What spoilt the show was a certain Ms. Aishwarya Rai and his tendency to kow-tow to the typical Bollywood success formula.

And sure enough, his next movie, ‘Hum dil de chuke sanam’ was loaded on a big canvas by this artist and became a big hit. Gone was the daring to be different and gone was the marching to a different beat. He got mass public adulation and wah-wahs but also the message that more he will make his sets colorful and dress his cast in designer clothes, the more successful he would get. Success got into him and he started ‘Devdas’.

I remember cringing while watching ‘Devdas’.It was comical in some places, unfortunately where it was not supposed to be. Aishwarya did the best she could though her best always falls short. Massive sets, riot of colours, high on style and low on substance, the movie did not do as well as it was expected. Bhansali probably concentrated more on the colors of the walls of the havelis and the color coordination between Devdas’ kurta and Paro’s saree than the actual dialogue delivery between them.

As usual, we had Aishwarya running in big havelis, with her saree and hair flowing in the wind, opening zillion doors and then collapsing on beds and closed doors. The lavishness of sets and the fluidity of dance movements of Madhuri and Aishwarya were definitely appreciable but what about the performances, the dialogues, the direction and the editing ?

Just when Bhansali was announcing another such extravaganza (Bajirao Mastani), a bombshell dropped !

Aishwarya refused to work in this movie and went public with her denial. The reason ? The hero of the flick : Salman. Aish put her pretty foot down and then there was silence. Though Bhansali spoke about replacing her with Kareena, the movie was shelved thereafter.

In my opinion, (but then my opinion may be flawed), this is the best thing that could have happened to Bhansali. He promptly followed this confusion with ‘Black’. No Aishwarya, no extravagant sets costing 50 lakhs, no dress designers and miracles of miracles…. No songs ! Rani Mukherjee and Amitabh Bachchan – Sounds like a dream cast.

So, it appears that Bhansali is back to doing what he does best – making movies the way he wants to with sensible actors and off-beat themes.

Here’s wishing this artiste the most beautiful paintings ever….