Desi Train

Tunna tunna. Tak tak tunna. Tunna tunna…

Somewhere in the corporate world an industrialist, Mr. Ringu goes, “Which ring should I wear today Guruji?”,… meanwhile at the other cornor, another big shot enters the house of a TV journalist, slash, pimp, slash, “this world has used me” crying auntyjee (Lillete Dubey, please stop accepting such shit). The big shot enters Ms. Pimp’s bedroom to meet a “I brush my nails for a living” call kudi. You did rather have paani puri. Oops so sorry.

Life is tough in this Car-porate. From stealing business information from the laptop of a CEO who’s in the snore zone after a marathon with a model slash call girl, to selling a contaminated drink call something something mint. Hint, Hint.

Tunna tunna. Tak tak tunna. Tunna tunna…

Churning in between this chukki (Hinglish : grinder) is, Ms. Nishigandha leading the war from her corn-porate quarters Sehgal industries against their competitor Mr. Ringu’s Marwah Industries (Raj Babbar, surprisingly restrained. Please thank Bhandarkar the next time you see him for achieving the impossible).

Not forgetting the sequences where the office helpers talk about the inner world of this Curry-porate,… “Page 3″ part duex?

And knowing Mr. Bhandarkar’s affinity for the political kitsch, the curr-porate enemies have a politician (Vinay Apte, aces this one) in between them. No points for guessing Mr. Politiko is sleazy, cheesy and pays 500,000 to sleep with Ms. Bollywood Item Number,… aaoooo it ej cho easy.

The I barbad (Hinglish : destroy) you slash you barbad me game continues, which of course is the bottom line for this Can-porate.

Tunna tunna. Tak tak tunna. Tunna tunna… - so why am I humming this song? Because my last take on Bhandarkar was right on target.

As mentioned in a past post, Bhandarkar always comes to the table with enough meat to create a Mahabharata Part Two. Yet weaving it into a gripping story line, does not seem to be his department.

Really, someone should ring up the World Documentary Association, (if there is something of that sort), and give them Bhandarkar’s number and show them his works.

Picking up every lime, pickle and onion on his way to the checkout counter is Bhandarkar’s style. So you have a multiple series of anecdotes picked up from newspapers, journalists, hearsay, parties or even personal experiences to build a Corporate. Excluding Chandni Bar, seeing a Madhur Bhandarkar product, is similar to picking up a newspaper, and reading it from Page one to Page ten. Skip the classifieds, ads and the movie page, please.

And therein lies Bhandarkar’s two problems.

One. He may have a collection of stories, that he and his writers have viewed in society, but the art of telling a story is one that has been eluding them. God knows how he managed it in Chandni Bar.

Two. The episodes are yet to cut deeper into the flesh. Characters are mostly black and white and the stories don’t go beyond what is read in the print media.

If you thought Corporate would be Bollywood’s answer to the hard hitting Wall Street, your expectations are about to be shattered. This was an excellent opportunity to build a Gordon Gekko, but it doesn’t happen.

And seriously after four/five(?) films, you would expect Bhandarkar to wipe out the amateurishness observed in parts of his movie. (Were the other reviewers sleeping or aren’t they adept enough to point these out?)

For goodness sakes, Bhandarkar needs a crash course in sorting out his shot divisions and the cues, actors on his sets provide to each other. A scene shot from two angles, has actors ridiculously pausing to move on with their dialogues.

And horror of horrors, some cardboard expression shots look straight out of the Discovery/History Channels, where stage actors, with Mr. Spock’s emotional quotient, recreate the past, while the background voice reads out the history. WTF???

Bhandarkar needs to brush his cinematography skill sets. Technically, he is still way behind the polished products, we now take for granted from Bollywood.

Dialogues by Manoj Tyagi and Ajay Monga are nothing to talk about. Personal Question : Ajay Monga? Younger brother of Sanjay Monga - the wildlife conservationist? (ahem… if you are the one I’m thinking of, then,… ahem,… I, as a kid in nylon shorts, have had many delicious lunches with you guys, on your dining table… and no I’m not telling who am I :) though it wouldn’t be too hard to guess).

Of the cast, Minissha Lamba is a let down. If you thought you saw a spark of talent in her first “Yahaan”, you can hit the bottle or perhaps hit yourself with the bottle. Here’s a prime example of Acting Unlearned. Kay Kay has nothing much to do except smile, groan, grind and cry.

In it’s basketful of characters jumping in and out, Corporate has a few that stand out including Vinay Apte, Sandeep Mehta (the lusting CEO) and Rajat Kapoor as the leader of Sehgal Industries. Kapoor surprisingly gets the second most screen time and comes up with a fine, held back performance as the industrialist who digs himself into a hole and is desperate to get out of it.

In the end, it’s Bipasha Basu, who plays the character of Nishigandha, with a grip, tighter than, her Allen Solly suits.

B Minus. An okey dokey companion for a Sunday afternoon, with samosas and tea. Have no great expectations. This is no Wall Street where the teeth dig deep and within.

This entry was posted on Saturday, July 8th, 2006 at 5:56 pm
Filed under Bollywood, Movie Reactions
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