Saturday, December 08, 2007

Aaja Nachle - The review


"Aaja Nachle" is the come back movie of heartthrob of 90s , Madhuri Dixit, the dancing diva the dhak dhak queen ..but sadly Aaja Nachle turns out to be a mediocre movie which is definitely below the mark. I am sure Madhuri Dixit deserves better than this..


The movie starts in NY where Dia( Madhuri) a successful aerobic instructor or dance teacher is informed about her dying Guru. She immediately flies to India to meet her teacher, who i mite add is clearly the most irritating character in the movie. On her way she recollects all the memories of her life in India, where she learnt how to dance and LIVE.
The flashback part is the hardest to bear..Madhuri is clearly nt a bubbly teenager nemore..n its a torture to c a 40-smthing jumping arnd the city merrily..her Guru addresses her as "chudail"..n thts wen u realise tht nt all dialogues in the movie r meaningless.. Coming back to the story,
Dia elopes to NY with her firang boyfriend Steve (how he falls in luv with this old woman is a mystery!!)when her parents forcefully try to marry her to Mohan (ranvir). She leaves behind a hostile town, few broken hearts and a close friend. Once in NY she realizes that it was a bad decision.
Now aftr all these yrs..She is coming back
to Shamli. She reaches India but by the time she is here her guruji is already dead (thankfully!!) but master ji manages to torture by means of a video he leaves behind where he tells her that Ajanta the theater faces demolition because MP (Akshay Khanna) wants to build a SHAPPIN MAAL there. Dia decides to revive Ajanta by doing a show with the people of Shamli within 2 months and hence save it.

I love underdogs movies, its a genre which forms its foundation on hope, aspirations, motivation and courage. Sadly Aaja Nachle fails to embark these emotions.

As told by Guruji “ Jo dil se nikalta hai who Kala (art) hota hai jodil mein reh jata hai who Kaala(Black) hota hai”. Aaja Nachle also fails to inspire, it fails to indulge you into the lives of the characters. The journey for Dia that seems so difficult in the beginning turns out to be a cake walk. She hardly struggles to achieve the success.

“ Naach Gana nahin Nritya sangeet choudhari sahib” is enuff to convince the rowdy politician Choudhary Sahab(akhilender Mishra). “Aapke jaise modern jamaane ke foreign educted MP se” convinces Akshay Khanna. The whole town which hates Dia is pouring in for auditions. Madhuri dixit gets tons of extras, huge sets, costumes Funds to do all that and there is not even one single scene which shows her intense struggle or tries to explain how. Definitely these things can be left as cinematic liberty but a few explanations would have made the story more believable.

One thing which will impress anybody is the star cast of the movie. Ranvir Shourie as the tea stall owner Mohan who is madly in love with dia clearly stands out in terms of performance. This guy speaks from his eyes and when he says “Chai bhi aapki main bhi aapka he moves the screen; Vinay pathak looks cute and definitely acts well. Kunal Kapur, Irfan khan divya dutta Konkana Sen, : luks like the Director spent all his time on casting..

But the problem lies with the script which hardly leaves any scope for brilliance by any of these actors. Irfan Khan is wasted, Divya dutta has just one good scene and she does a great job. Dia tries to convince Shamli’s junta to support her in her struggle to save ajanta by saying “Jab tak suraj Chaand Rahega Shamli mein Ajanta ka Naam rahega”. Clearly Shamli is not convinced and definitely not you...Aftr the dialogues i hav quoted so far it wudnt require lot of brains to gauge another sad fact..the dialogues of the movie are uninspiring to say the least..

Another shortcoming is the music, you expect mind blowing music the kind of music which will make you jump off your seat and shake a bit. But Aaja Nachle’s music is anything but great. It’s an average soundtrack with few moments of thrust. Another shortcoming is Vaibhavi merchant. This movie was offered on a platter to her..she cudnt hav asked for more than madhuri.. I was wondering if this was the same woman who gave us Kajra re. After a horrible performance in saawariya Miss Merchant again fails to impress. I know its not that bad a job but for a movie like this you expect choreography which is out of this world. The last 20 minutes of the movie in which the play is shown, clearly stand out but with stupid moments like

“na maaro chot lagti hai na maaro,

Chunmun si hatheliyan hai POOCHKAARO”

It leaves you with mixed emotions.

Anil Mehta never tries to go into details. He didn’t explore any single character he fails to put forward the emotions of any character and how the transformation is taking place. IF only he would have tried to put the characters of lives on the celluloid the end result would have been different.

Yash raj has given us great movies but something is missing now. Chak de is the only movie coming out of this production house which comes out as a winner. “tara ra rum pum, Jhoom Barabar, Laga chunari mein Daag and Aaja nachle also fails to live up to the expectation.

2/5

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