Paheli can have dual meanings as a word in Hindi, and the film"Paheli" lived up to both of them.
Based on a Marathi play, Paheli was the first of its type offilm, but it also leaves the audience more inclined to itslatter meaning (though the more common usage of the word isthis).
Paheli (riddle) is set in Rajasthan in God knows what year, andis basically the story of Lachi (Rani Mukherji) who gets marriedto Krishan (Shah Rukh Khan), a money-minded businessman, wholeaves the day after his marriage to pursue a business venturefor his father's sake for 5 years. A ghost then takes his placesince this ghost had apparently fallen in love with Lachi at oneof the water breaks her wedding convoy had made.Lachi too falls in love with the ghost since he is more what shehad dreamed her husband to be like.Upon the real Krishan's return is when the real crisis arises,and what then happens forms the crux of Paheli.The story sounds pretty straightforward, and actually verynon-cerebral. Well it is.
I think Paheli probably fared better as a stage play (which itwas originally) because the identity of the ghost could havebeen concealed more easily and somehow the folk tale nature ofthe story makes it sound like an enjoyable play but a disastrousfilm.
Yesteryear funny man Amol Palekar directs and he has done acredible job. He has paid great attention to detail, and heleaves his mark in the first half using colors, costumes, andnarration as part of his arsenal.But alas Paheli falls flat on his face in the extremely boring,predictable and formality of a second half.The end could not have come sooner. When it did it will leaveyou with an incomplete feeling. There will be questions on yourlips and yet the answers wouldn't be easily available nor willthey make sense. Maybe that's why its called Paheli.
Cutting a long story short, Shah Rukh breezes through his doublerole. Even though his wife is producing it, he looks boredthroughout most of the film. One can tell from his effort (orlack thereof) that he wasn't getting paid much, if anything.
Rani Mukherji is brilliant as the woman torn between herhusband, family, and ammmmm a ghost. Her acting has improvedleaps and bounds and I think she is clearly in the top 3actresses if not THE best actress in Bollywood.
Juhi Chawla makes no impression and one wonders why she was inthe film to start with. Even better in that department is SunilShetty's 84 second cameo. What a waste of dialogues, time, andcharacters!!
Amitabh Bachan (him again??) makes a sensational guestappearance, and definitely injected much needed life in thesecond half.
MM Kreem's music is really nice, understandably folkish.The famous puppet dance came during the end credits and that wasa disservice to the choreography which I think was very, verynice.
Naseerudhin Shah's voice was well used as one of the puppet'sobserving the movie from, shall we say, a closer seat.
Palekar succeeds in showing a colorful, light-hearted movie setin the wondrous state of Rajasthan, but parallel to his acting,the film turns bland in the second-half, and will have many apatron checking the time to see how much more of the "Paheli"needs to solved.Palekar did somewhat try to show what a woman really is yearningfor and hoping for in a marriage, but that topic is only touched in bits and pieces and very superficially at that.
The lack ofdepth and substance of anything from story, plot, characters,and eventually ending make this film something you just mightn'trelate to.
My recommendation is to wait for it on DVD, and even then it canbe easily passed, you wouldn't miss anything. This is one"Paheli" best left unsolved!
Based on a Marathi play, Paheli was the first of its type offilm, but it also leaves the audience more inclined to itslatter meaning (though the more common usage of the word isthis).
Paheli (riddle) is set in Rajasthan in God knows what year, andis basically the story of Lachi (Rani Mukherji) who gets marriedto Krishan (Shah Rukh Khan), a money-minded businessman, wholeaves the day after his marriage to pursue a business venturefor his father's sake for 5 years. A ghost then takes his placesince this ghost had apparently fallen in love with Lachi at oneof the water breaks her wedding convoy had made.Lachi too falls in love with the ghost since he is more what shehad dreamed her husband to be like.Upon the real Krishan's return is when the real crisis arises,and what then happens forms the crux of Paheli.The story sounds pretty straightforward, and actually verynon-cerebral. Well it is.
I think Paheli probably fared better as a stage play (which itwas originally) because the identity of the ghost could havebeen concealed more easily and somehow the folk tale nature ofthe story makes it sound like an enjoyable play but a disastrousfilm.
Yesteryear funny man Amol Palekar directs and he has done acredible job. He has paid great attention to detail, and heleaves his mark in the first half using colors, costumes, andnarration as part of his arsenal.But alas Paheli falls flat on his face in the extremely boring,predictable and formality of a second half.The end could not have come sooner. When it did it will leaveyou with an incomplete feeling. There will be questions on yourlips and yet the answers wouldn't be easily available nor willthey make sense. Maybe that's why its called Paheli.
Cutting a long story short, Shah Rukh breezes through his doublerole. Even though his wife is producing it, he looks boredthroughout most of the film. One can tell from his effort (orlack thereof) that he wasn't getting paid much, if anything.
Rani Mukherji is brilliant as the woman torn between herhusband, family, and ammmmm a ghost. Her acting has improvedleaps and bounds and I think she is clearly in the top 3actresses if not THE best actress in Bollywood.
Juhi Chawla makes no impression and one wonders why she was inthe film to start with. Even better in that department is SunilShetty's 84 second cameo. What a waste of dialogues, time, andcharacters!!
Amitabh Bachan (him again??) makes a sensational guestappearance, and definitely injected much needed life in thesecond half.
MM Kreem's music is really nice, understandably folkish.The famous puppet dance came during the end credits and that wasa disservice to the choreography which I think was very, verynice.
Naseerudhin Shah's voice was well used as one of the puppet'sobserving the movie from, shall we say, a closer seat.
Palekar succeeds in showing a colorful, light-hearted movie setin the wondrous state of Rajasthan, but parallel to his acting,the film turns bland in the second-half, and will have many apatron checking the time to see how much more of the "Paheli"needs to solved.Palekar did somewhat try to show what a woman really is yearningfor and hoping for in a marriage, but that topic is only touched in bits and pieces and very superficially at that.
The lack ofdepth and substance of anything from story, plot, characters,and eventually ending make this film something you just mightn'trelate to.
My recommendation is to wait for it on DVD, and even then it canbe easily passed, you wouldn't miss anything. This is one"Paheli" best left unsolved!
posted by SIAII at 7:13 PM
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