Road, Movie: The Dev B
This is Abhay Deol’s “Dev B”. The very well shot, acted film falls yet again in the not for the masses grey area. Worth a watch.
Tejal Johri
10.03.2010
Movies
Director: Dev Benegal
Cast: Abhay Deol, Tannishtha Chatterjee, Satish Kaushik
Music: Michael Brook
TTS Rating: 4.5/5
From the director of August (1994) and Split Wide Open (1999) comes a soul-stirring fable magically woven in the rough and exotic terrains of the desert regions of Kutch and Rajasthan. Produced by Ross Katz (in the Bedroom and Lost in Translation fame), Susan B. Landan in collaboration with Studio 18, Road movie is an exclusively indigenous story directed in a style that is incredibly universal.
Road Movie is the story of a young, passionate and restless boy Vishnu played by Abhay Deol. The character is agitated, yet not openly defiant about his father’s business. In the hope of helping a friend he falls upon an old rusted truck of the 40’s era that must have been a magnificent beast during its time but now barely splutters to life. Vishnu, driven by wanderlust, ventures to escape his bleak fate at home.
His six-day journey in the battered run-down vehicle to its final destination – a sea-side museum across the desert turns into a transformative experience for Vishnu. A life changing transition from a self centred, disoriented person without much direction to that of a selfless companion is seen revealing itself, beautifully yet subtly.
He picks up a sharp-tongued runaway (Mohammed Faizal) in search of a new life, an old entertaining mechanic (Satish Kaushik) who repairs the truck in exchange for a ride to the desert fair, a beautiful gypsy woman (Tannistha Chatterjee) who is in search of water.
An unquestioning bond is shown beautifully developing between the four comrades belonging to different generations. The woman teaching him about love, life and laughter, the old mechanic stirring his conscience, Vishnu transforms through the journey. In spite of being ambushed midway by a corrupt cop and a notorious water lord, they escape with a clever slap of comedy that touches the magical realism already unfolding in front of us.
Abhay Deol’s outstanding performance in Dev D earmarked him as an exponent of unconventional independent cinema. He now plays a completely different role in this movie. Subtle, in search of direction, a something to help him break away from immediate destiny, Abhay Deol manages to pull off this face of Vishnu with remarkable ease.
French cinematographer Michel Amathieu’s stunning camera work gives a visual delight to the viewers. He pays tribute to the receding open areas of rural India by capturing the dreamy picturesque beauty of the drought-struck Rajasthan amidst a water crisis.
Credits for the effectively eclectic background score go to Michael Brook who has previously worked on the likes of ‘An Inconvenient Truth’, ‘Black Hawk Down’, and ‘Mission Impossible:2’. He has also carved recognition in international music with the two break-through albums with Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and Armenian Djivan Gasparyan. His light-hearted motifs contain both Indian and Western influences that blend in with the country charm. While the movie makes use of a lot of background score, the OST album features Lucky Ali, KK and Kailash Kher. Very well selected tracks from across the artists. Do check out Kesariya Balam and Naiharwa.
The movie was premiered at the 2009 Toronto Film Festival and screened at the international film festivals of Berlin and Tokyo, drawing forth a mature international audience.
Road Movie has resulted in a short and crisp story with the perfect dosage of humour, thrill, sarcasm and reality rolled into one with a tad bit of cheeky fantasy to it. A simple story, which is enacted beautifully with superb cinematography, unfurls at its own lethargic pace. A light unhurried touch is maintained and only a mild sense of real danger creeps in. It might come as a disappointment for those expecting a mainstream conventional ‘road movie’ with frequent adventures and an intriguing plot. It makes for a ‘Must Watch’ for those open to a modestly amusing and life-changing story that might just be the new Indian archetype of independent cinema.
Tejal Johri
a very well written review! saw the movie and very much agree with the whole layout.
Very nicely written. And a good choice of words in the whole review…
rlly rlly well written review!
damn sexy dude
totally agree
Thanks
crisply written
nice work teju
teju? when did that start?
andd yes sweety..! very well written..!!
Nice review… well written and packed with relevant information..
movies of genre are very rare in hindi cinema.. hope they make more such films….
waiting to see something like motorcycle dairies in Indian context– it would be a lovely film as India offers a very wide canvas
nothing can beat che's story in motorcycle dairies. by the way, did you check out samir karnik's feeble attempt at it via his film heroes?
screw the liked of Nikhat kazmi and taran adarsh who dont know what movies should be recommended
At Taran Adarsh's review:
to me, he seems to not have the patience that is required for a slow pacing movie like this one. again, he seems to expect a movie full of incidents that would prevent him from getting bored. I'm not surprised then that he didn't get the point behind the story.
Secondly, by calling it a movie only for people who like "film festival movies" he seems to have restricted the range of viewers. Is it that "film festival movies" are not liked by the general public? Far from it.
Finally, when he says that the director has concentrated more on visuals than on the story itself, maybe it is also important to understand that a movie does not always give its message directly in the most simplest of forms.
At Nikhat Kazmi's review, he has given a quite good review of the movie. In the end, if he didn't find much to the story, that's his own view on it
hey very well written i will see the movie,i dont think it is like motorcycle dairies,coz in that movie they set on journey to see their country ,which they heard all about .any good work tej will see it after my exams
hey it is me again i told my tamilian friend to type the above message and he screwed it up i am sorry ….. hey good work tej ,next time i will type my own message .yes i will see the movie.
hey-actually really liked the review. but u didnt see any flaws here and there? i havent seen d movie as yet, guess u really liked it, but i suppose d review cud have been slightly more objective. but overall- very nicely written…looking forward to reading more reviews by u
Yes, that is one point which many people have raised, that I seem to have praised the movie too much, certain amount of criticism should have been there.
No flaws as such, but at points the jokes did seem a bit enforced upon us.
Thanks though
now thats what lured me to watch it .
classic:)
Universal directing style? Many can relate to? funny common day activities. Sounds like it would be fun to observe.
You write so well Tejal!
awesomely written..but even i agree to sourabhi's point..little criticism would have been better or maybe the movie is actually very good! have to watch it now!
beautiful piece of work…even if d movie is not dat gr8 ur words will probably force ppl go see it…m sure everyone is all praises…relli gud
Personally, I disliked the movie very much. With all the premiering at Cannes and Toronto Film Festival; we have to realise the kind of light India is shown at these do's, so being the base for so much fondness for such films.
what i mean is, it wasn't justified, we didn't feel any emotion when 1) they kissed, 2) when satish kaaushik dies either.the kid (while saying goodbye to the banjaaran) was conviniently forgotten, like abhay didn't tell him anything (another starbucks mini-sermon, or a jestful insult would have given abhay & the kid's relationship more meaning and a connect).
I LOVED the cinematography, not the angles so much, but the frame composition, Brilliant, but that's all the movie had to it. Its a very good looking postcard of Rajasthan.
I felt, zero characterization, plot definition, inter-relationship of the characters, start point, end point, nothing. A technically brilliant film, with an extremely weak script and direction.
according to me even if a film maker is making a film in a closed room, he can show thee full world through the window in the room. Now, for more character definition, instead of showing abhay reaching the dhaba and interacting with the boy, he could have cut, just shown a good minute of what the boy is doing or saying and conversing with others, giving us reasons for the way he talks to abhay, and then shown the boy looking at a truck coming, subsequently abhay getting off and then continue . . . ..dot dot dot. (small example)
i believe that every film’s plot has a certain element or theme to it, which makes it a separate entity from a character. Of course a character takes story forward, but this comes first in terms of what an audience understands, and so the writers has a take off to build the plot, then a detailed story and then the script with the screenplay. (For example, if you take away the 2 characters away from saawariya, it will still be about unrequited love through gulabji’s narration or even not. Aamir will still be bout terrorism without aamir ali.) But if you take Vishnu and satish kaushik out, the moving cinema and the truck fail to take center stage, as a separate identity that can be looked at as something that makes the film move forward, it is not the moving cinema (which is claimed to be what this film is about in all synopsis’ and reviews and the title itself) which is the reason that they move from place to place in rajasthan (which is what should have happened), instead, it is either survival, or water, or some mela or desperation to add a character in the truck that takes the movie forward, which results in the conflict in plot and leads to confusion. See, in the beginning when that man gives abhay deol the truck, describing it to be the chevy 80’s model with the cinema speakers and all that jazz, you’re lured more towards what will happen with this truck and how the truck will tell us more bout this film, rather than Vishnu.
I think satish kaushik’s character was the best. I loved it too. But did not understand his death, one of my friends mentioned a cardiac arrest while laughing. I cannot digest/accept that.
The track of the boy and abhay deol, seems less like a pattern or an intentional gap left, but more like an unfinished, incomplete story or track. Its like, i felt like screaming in the theatre (after they kiss and she takes the kid and they’re shown walking away), “arrey, uss bechare ko bhool gaya”! if you know what i mean, cause that kid is the reason that he got the truck moving again after “uska poora din waste ho gaya” (such mediocre dialogue, i tell you), and stealing the electricity for first screening the films for the police folk.
i mean its called Road, Movie, you expect the moving cinema, with the basic concept of a movie theatre on wheels, to propel the story forward, which it doesnt even try to do, forget being successful with it. like, dev benegal hasn't even tried to make the plot a central character, which is the most important thing to do in such a film; give the plot a distinct identity.
the last kiss between tannishtha and abhay was not called for, like the director just put it to complete his "abstract art" film.
I can only go on, but then again, this is my opinion.