My Take on Chak De India:
Its been 50 plus Days since the release of Chak De India(CDI) and I still see the PVR Display showing all 5 shows Houseful here in Bangalore. Since Akhtar’s ‘Don’ which ran house-full for a good 3 months at PVR, Its been quite long time this has happened here for a Hindi movie and is now happening for a film which I think was not even sufficiently publicized (read YRF’ized). Everybody I have known loved CDI and AMOF, I watched it on the first day of release itself. It was a movie that I felt deserves lots of reviews. It is beyond my level of reasoning to imagine why this topic is so light here at zulm. I am no critic but somehow I decided to write something myself in my own layman words. So here is my attempt at a full scale, scene by scene analysis ….. if u can call it , ‘review’ of Chak De India. I am aware that its quite late and almost everybody who’s reading this has already seen the movie by now. Still, Please BEWARE that this write up is a MAJOR SPOILER for those who’ve not seen the movie yet.
The censor certificate of CDI shows up and I expected the story to unfold with the introduction of all team players one by one. But in the the first ever shot of the film where a young and energetic SRK appears in action on a sports field playing for India against Pakistan of the movie itself, I got the point that this is perhaps going to be a structured film making where in it starts with the background of the coach first. This is not a film where akin to Main Hoon Naa, a path is created to giv SRK a Dhamakedaar entry. (I recalled that last time when SRK was the first ever thing to be seen in a movie was in Veer Zaara.) Still, there follows a loud cheer for the superstar making me feel that yes … I have come to watch a ‘big n serious’ film which will hopefully make me forget the previous nightmarish disaster of YRF which was Jhoom Barabar Jhoom (it pains to even type its name here). In a quick flash, it was clearly shown as to how media possess such power to make the people dance to its tunes who have absolutely got no other way to realize the truth at their disposal. I expected from promos that SRK will remind me of Swades and so, when on the unfortunate loss to a fateful play against Pakistan, media frames Kabir khan (SRK) as a traitor and is forced to leave his ancestral home, in his interactions with his mother while leaving the house, to some extent, I could spot the sober n sensitive Mohan Bhargav of Swades here… but, he proved me wrong later, as I realized that this was true for this and only this shot and NOT for the rest of the film(more about it later). I realized that this way, professional actors perhaps try to bridge the gap between their earlier roles and the current one being watched by people.
SRK and YRF - the greatest combination- something which everybody knows, has everytime poured in millions at the box office, is usually associated with its trademark lavishness, loudest opening credit rolls; while realistic looks and subtlety are mostly given a backseat. But here, right from the moment SRK’s name appeared in pin drop silence on a dead black screen right till the very real middle class look of his house, when I was beginning to think that this time YRF has really attempted something very different, the immediate next shot again came as one more surprise to me- after a dark “7 years later†tag, the cast and credits for the film rolled and it was not on Bright Reds or Sky Blues or Savannah Greens but on a Brilliantly shot circular view of a statue of a man holding a hockey stick, the statue being somewhere in Delhi. The key point here was not merely the fact that the statue was shown in total shadow instead of sunlight, but also the feeling that since it involved a progressive rhythmic score, it cud immediately strike a chord with me that this is probably a very popular hockey player but even after I heard much “khusar - pusar†in my row, I cud not hear anyone uttering a name as to who it was!! …. And I had the answer for why the statue was shown in shadow – simply because the status of hockey game has become like that today. And mind u its our national game we are talking about… I felt equally bad for myself and so, made it a point to do some googling for the statue as the first thing to do on my list as soon as I am done with the movie.
Cut to a lousy and pathetic Indian Hockey associaton. Shimit very clearly communicates another hurting reality that even getting a woman in the association is utter senseless for the Indian womens team. Just when in absence of any coach, rather “sponsors†to be more specific!!, when they are about to write off the women’s team as almost non-existent !! enters a rough and subdued Kabir Khan to train the women’s team for world cup. This was an SRK that I had never seen before. Speaking and reacting very coldly to the remarks of association on his past abandoned career and trying hard to hide the unbarable pain behind his forced smile, I just cud not believe that even after such a stupendous career of variety of roles, there is still lot more unpredictable left to be seen in King Khan. At this point one minor but important hint is given to us that enough attention has been given to defining the character- When Kabir leaves the stadium, he rides the same scooter that he had with him while leaving the house 7 yrs back. I loved the meaningful portrayal of the fact that the moment he is labeled as stained, an abandoned player’s financial condition simply becomes stagnated to improve any standard of living.
The next day , whew… finally ‘the moment’ for which Audiences were waiting since the movie began finally came- the women’s team starts arriving for practice … and we are introduced one by one to Punjab, Haryana, AP and even Jharkhand etc all carrying their own ethnic humorous scent, very well written to suit each character’s background. This was the first ever sense of relief I had since the movie began on an intense note. Right from the first meeting with the team, Kabir showed that he may be a broken hearted player but he is gonna be a tough coach. He communicates the first ‘BIG’ message of the film very effectively to all our minds- Play for ‘In-di-a’ first and everything else like state/self/friends etc comes only second. For me, this scene took the movie to an altogether different level because I instantly felt the message was universal as it was not only for Hockey the game but it equally applies to every obstacle the country was facing to achieve numero uno status. Obviously this isn’t something that we all don’t already know but the question is how many motivating events do we all confront everyday to get this message reinforced inside us? Yes …this is the perfect way- through a mainstream commercial film, when a relevant and easy to understand event comes up on the silver screen, and an ultra-mainstream actor is delivering something, nothing can be a termed as a better reinforcement of the message.
The promos and ‘the making’ shown on various TV channels these days give away almost half the story rightaway- We all knew that the primary diffculty Khan is going to face will be making all of them play in Unity against all kinds of personal problems like Ego, self interests etc. But this is the advantage in a movie when u have multiple characters. The audience still don’t know what kind of problems exist specifically for each girl and so we are curious to find out. We also find it interesting to see an experienced actor like SRK acting as an experienced player and handling it expertly. Apart from sending out the misbehaving and indesciplined players the senior players were treated at par with juniors by the coach which is quite rare to be seen- In a way it can be said that Kabir Khan had become totally fearless because the worst was over for him- nothing could get more frustrating and tragic in life for him– a national player was not allowed to do the very job of a player – ‘To Play’. At the same time I doubted that only sending out the players is going to help for long. Only the other day did I realize that the coach was not just trying to remove the ego’s of all players by making them say a tiny 5 letter word called ‘sorry’ but also something else was happening- There is something called ‘spirit of the hockey’- the thirst to play for the love of the game- Again, the job of a player is simply ‘to play’ for which she is always ready to do anything and saying sorry which was a question of dignity now becomes a tiny thing to do– a beautifully portrayed scene. Meanwhile, at nighttime, the residential quarters of the girls were a sheer delight to watch as they were in pathetic condition- No idea where did Sukant Panigrahi (art director ) got the colors from but it was just incredibly real - the unidentifable color of wall paints, the poor lighting in sleeping wards, the unclean bathrooms- This is perhaps the true picture of facilities still being given to Indian women.. and not just any team- the world cup team for crying out loud!!
Initially, for the solution of individual player problems, since we have Shahrukh Khan - the most .. should I say, “family friendly†guy for the girls on screen, I was expecting that the best way that he could teach the girls how to play in unity will be through tenderness and soft talk with perhaps a song or two to serve the purpose. But this is where the in-depth definition of his character by Jaideep Sahni (Story, Screenplay, Dialogues) blew me away. This time, the toughness and discipline with which Khan treated the girls was only seen last in Bollywood in Nana Patekar’s Prahaar. It is quite natural for any person who had been labeled as traitor in past to have put off all his bigheadedness of being an expert on something. But here we had Kabir Khan whose strictness and harshness proved the point of director that no matter what, when someone has got 100% confidence in having played an honest game throughout his career, nothing and nothing at all can prevent him from shouting to the pinnacle of his voice to teach the world how one should achieve it. Though many would agree if I say that he was getting too rude, I wud rather disagree because I have personally gone thru that phase in life where at some point of time, u start giving every possible abuse to ur senior for being so rude to u that even if u show him the best work in the world, he/she will fail u. Leaders like these behave rudely only because they are testing some particular aspect in your personality which god only knows- It may be a tolerance level check or a sign of any childish reaction to make u learn the hardships when u r in no way ready for it. In this case it seemed the second reason because Bindiya Nayak the senior most player lost her self control and hated the coach to the peak and even abet others to sign on the paper kicking him out as the coach. It was only in next shot that we come to know thru Kabir at night Dinner that his objective was - ‘To make the team have a unanimous opinion on atleast one thing even if it meant making the coach their enemy.’ and what a dialogue it was – simply superb timing and perfect delivery by SRK. Kudos to Jaideep Sahni!!
When the girls hand him the “rejection as coach†letter, Khan is hurt. What I expected here was an entirely genuine expression of being deeply hurt which indeed I saw thru that mind blowing powerhouse delivery by SRK. But… what I dint expect … also to some extent came as a surprise to me was that I would feel the influence of Aditya Chopra(Producer) in this scene. Well Mr. Sahni(Dialogues) Sorry. U can perhaps win over everyone in the audience but not me in this scene because I believe the dialogue and delivery at this point was a lot inspired or say ‘lifted’ from the outstanding Pre-Climax and Pre-Interval scenes of YRF’s Mohabbatein(Director, Dialogues: Aditya Chopra). Just Checkout this comparison:-
SRK in CDI: “Saath Saal …Saath Saal Baad main wapas sirf isliya aaya kyonki jis wajah se meri team hari thi, us wajah ko main ek baar hara kar rahoonga.….â€
SRK in Mohabbatein: “Aapne kabhi Socha Mr. Shankar ki itne saal baad main Gurukul wapas kyon Aaya? Kiske liye? Jis ladki se main Mohabbat Karta Hoon, wo to ab is Duniya me hai hi nahin!â€
SRK in CDI: "…Theek hai… Tum Log Jeet gaye …Main Haar Gaya …â€
SRK in Mohabbatein: “Aap jeet gaye …main haar gaya…â€
SRK in CDI: “…Us mulk se haar jaya jiski team se khela tha aur zindagi bhar sirf usi ke liye khelta rahoonga…â€
SRK in Mohabbatein: “Maine Aaj tak sirf ek hi ladki se Mohabbat ki hai aur zindagi bhar sirf usise karta rahoonga...â€
Back to the movie, for the final meet before leaving, when the whole team goes to a small brunch with khan at ‘Mc D’ came the most hilarious scene of the film yet acting as the twist in the tale. Being moved by the way Kabir Khan was hurt, Just when all the girls were thinking of what they did was wrong, lot of Bad guys teasing the girls at the restaurant get beaten up by the whole Female Team !! One wud ask ya so what? What’s the relevance of this fight to the plot? The relevance is actually very straight forward and this is how I saw it- When the girls were beating the boys, at a very subconscious level they were beating the girl within themselves who was preventing them from apologizing to ‘Sir’. In other words, nobody was comfortable with the way things were going on and so in order for the hue and cry to break out, everybody got up from their chairs to beat the boys. The magical consequence of this act was that when the chaos stopped, no girl said anything to anyone but everybody knew what to do- they marched towards Khan and apologized for the misunderstanding. The shot worked like magic because just looking at the silent repenting faces we the audience (including Khan on the screen) knew that the girls have now clearly understood the difference between acting individually and acting as a team. When just looking at the faces, Khan observed that no one needed to say anything now, the only thing he said to them was to be on time for practice the next day and … Action! on a team marching with SRK towards the camera in a slo-mo shot, began the much awaited title track which sadly stopped soon after the first line for it was time for INTERMISSION. Still, the pulse pounding voice of Sukhvinder was enough to fill us with sufficient enthu and fasten our seatbelts for the second half.
During that 10 minute break time, I felt that I never realized how quickly time passed by. Just when I was feeling that only half an hr is over, the movie was already half way thru !! … which means the first 1.5 Hrs were very tightly paced leaving no chance to the audience to even look at their watches. The last time is saw this recently was only in ‘Lage Raho’. This is perhaps the first criteria of my layman’s definition for an excellent screenplay - when U don’t realize that so many events have passed by in such long span of time and the duration appears to be very small. The second criteria is that the scenes should involve u so much that u r not able to remember the correct order of scenes of the film. This second criteria actually does not apply to a movie like chak de because the step-by-step framework of building a team is easy to remember in a sports film. The other thing I recalled was how earlier YRF-SRK movies had their Intervals and Yes- I found one similarity. Everytime, someone was moving towards the camera in Slo-Mo just before the Interval- be it Raj Aryan in Mohabbatein coming out of the Principal’s office or be it Rani Mukherjee walking out of Veer Pratap Singh’s Jail after delivering a moving statement to the Jailor. Anyway, what works quite well is always welcome for repetition..
The second half started and this was where the movie would have been even marvelous than the first half had it not lost path somewhere by a few instances of lost focus. The beginning is with an exhilarating musical montage of the title song showing the team practicing in full swing. In any movie for that matter I appreciate directors who keep buffers like a song or an unimportant scene to wait for the audience to get back into their seats before the story moves forward- simply because there are still people outside in food court waiting for their popcorn to get billed. Post Song, the association gives a shock by not agreeing to send women’s team for world cup on the grounds of straightaway not believing in their ability to perform. In this situation Khan plays a gamble with the association asking for conducting a match of women’s with the Men’s team to decide their fate for which the association blindly agrees immediately. Unfortunately, to the disappoint of Khan as well as we the audience, the girls just miss by one goal to equal with the boys which almost meant ‘The End’ of the team as well as of the film itself but here was when I saw one of the most brilliant shots ever seen in Indian cinema- Inspite of winning, the entire men’s team waved their hockey sticks towards the women’s team to show respect and the sticks were kept in the air until the heartbroken women accepted the RECOGNITION. Yes that’s the key word which worked like magic. The smile and happiness of women’s team and on the face of the coach directly proved the point that Being recognized is the best award that can be given to any player. The women knew that they are obviously not going to world cup now but what was more important and unbelievable for them was that the Men who they always thought were superior to them were showing respect- now that’s true sportsmanship. Kudos Shimit and Kudos Jaideep Sahni!! Everything just fell right in place- the camera angles, the bg score, the chorus volume as well as the sound recording of clapping by Men. Just the way Men saluted the women on the field, I really felt like giving a standing ovation to the Filmmakers for giving me a moment like that. And as if God was watching all this, to the biggest surprise, the association had to fall for the fighting spirit of the women’s team and Bingo !!! SRK’s only unforced smiling gesture of the entire movie said it all- We are flying to the world cup Girls !!! These are the moments that make cinema an inspiring medium of entertainment. Further, when the second song “Badal pe Paon Hai†came up I never actually realized its presence in because both the songs existing in the movie work only in the background. The visual is relaxing in this second song, as for the first time the camera goes out of India (Australia) to fill the screen with some colors other than the dull chrome colors of Indian playgrounds. In a couple of quick flashes, we witnessed the hi-fi facilities given to players there and feel pity on our condition back home.
Well now was the time for the first match against Aussies and as if the director was testing the patience of Audience, one by one goals were fired from the opponent and we lose by a major difference- so badly that thanks to comeback of their personal egos and issues, it seemed as if they were playing hockey for the first time when they started practicing. This may be quite a killer of enthu of we the audience but I felt it was again reality portrayed. In any job for that matter its true that no matter how much training is given, people tend to forget each n every instruction the first time they face the real situation (and it happened with me in my first job as well
) On the night of this very loss of India, Khan is walking alone on a rainy night and finally sits on a bench and after a serious expression gets up from the bench with a gameplan. Again a sense of Deja Vu- Cant Help but being an avid fan of ‘Mohabbatein’, for the second time I immediately sensed that it was lifted from the shot in M’tein, when on a rainy night, Raj Aryan was sitting alone in his class just to get up for his pre-climax delivery, the entirety of which also came as a sense of Déjà vu in the “rejection as coach†scene mentioned earlier. Now here the coach was shown forming some kind of sets to play for their only hope for survival match with England. This was something new - a core sports thing and perhaps SRK the actor was the most believable choice as everybody knows that in real life too he is familiar with all this when he was captain of various teams in his college career. The objective of this shot was that something technical/logical was done by the coach to gear up the team for the survival match and the miracle happens- we win the following match. Once we won, in some quick flashes, and the title song running in the background, the team wins many more matches finally only to face one more key team known for breaking the opposition players’ bones in the match. Now it was a coincidence that just when I was thinking that in sports movie, every player has some special skill and it should be used in the final matches (like it was shown in lagaan), came the opportunity for the ‘Punjabi Hippo’ here to beat up the opposition. Now wait…. This is not as easy as it looked. This may be a ‘made for the crowd to cheer’ scene but some logic is expected from the scene. It should be noted that a layman is also watching the movie- The obvious question for him is how does everytime severly hitting the players does not account for a foul? So what if along with everybody, I enjoyed the shot, still I regret that it could have been explained as to how did our Balbir(Read ‘Hippo’
) got away by hitting everybody to make her way through? Well AMOF the director took care of this but he was too fast for people to comprehend it. Khan instructed in breaktime: “Komal, Netra etc ke Raaste me jo Aaye, use Khoob maaro.†As I understood it, It meant that the non strikers were allowed to beat the ones in opposition who were disturbing the striker at the moment. The catch is that Khan said this so fast that the audience only took it as an instruction to beat everyone in opposition by everybody in our team which is quite illogical. This was one of those rare instances in the film where Drama took over realism.
Various subplots were silently running within the matches – like the Preeti-Komal Fight to get the highest total of individual goals. At this point, the Preeti Sabarwaal story shown pre interval became important wherein a small scene showed that she had a breakup with her boyfriend who was a cricket star and thinking of hockey as an entirely unimportant game, wanted her to leave her hockey career for marriage. The second story was of Vidya Sharma, the Goalie whose in-laws were against her leaving the family for world cup and who finds a support in Khan. Another one was the ego of Bindiya Nayak who even attempted to attract Khan towards herself to win her ‘senior’ status but soon realises that Khan is not the kind that she thinks he is and he will and infact did use her experience later in the right match at the right time. The issue is not that these subplots were not running in proper length with the matches. Instead, I appreciate the fact that the director had the courage to show that such problems don’t get solved merely by training. The events in all the final matches were very well planned to culminate these subplots (which were big challenges for the coach in the first half) in as much less time as possible because probably even the filmmakers realized that once the first win if India is shown, people will be interested in the final outcome of all the matches more than anything else even if it involved individual stories of key team members. The director cud have opted for resolving all the subplots pre-interval, making the events more cheesy in second half but I highly appreciated the balancing act between maintainance of public enthu for matches and the due attention to subplots’ culmination. Again I felt some similarity to Mohabbatein where Adi faced the problem of whom to give more attention – 6 newcomers or the complex story of the 2 superstars. It is somewhat the same here – here the superstar is the world cup event itself. Shimit’s sensitive decision on this issue also turned up to be a weak aspect for the film as according to many viewers and crtics the film totally focuses on matches in the second half which it should not have. Well….I don’t agree to this because if it was the other way round, twice the people wud have turned up saying that Shimit lost focus from the final events. When the final match being a tie up resulted in penalty strokes, everybody is at the edge of the seats. It is quite magical to see that people watch a sports movie as if it’s a live event and despite the fact that they know that nothing is actually happening in real time, there is acute silence and pounding hearts just before a shot and immediate cheer / disappointing cry after the shot. Lastly, do not miss the closing credits not only because the subplots of each player are being given a final smiling closure here, but also because the ultimate closing shot in grey scale reinforces my best scene of the film- the ‘recognition’ shot where all men including Khan waive their sticks towards the women- Giving a straight message to the audience of this country that its all about recognizing the talent in our country. What a perfect way to close the curtains!!
The cinematography of Chak de is first rate- In the begining I was getting impressed by the ultra high speed of camara but soon I realized that a special camera shaking effect used in Hollywood’s intense movies (viz Bourne Ultimatum, Ocean’s Twelve and Thirteen to be the most recent) was being used here which doesn’t let our eyes relax for a moment because even in normal close up shots the camera is deliberately shaken to give tension to the audiences’ vision. It works big time as a tool to hide the loopholes in the newcomers’ performances as we don’t get a chance to give proper attention to even one facial expression. Further, since the advent of the green in matrix movies, high profile Bollywood movies have been using ‘color tones’ to give a particular shade to the movie in consonance with the feel of the key sentiments surrounding it. Examples include the Champagne gold in Sanjay Gupta’s Kaante, The unforgettable and innumerable shades of Black in SLB’s Black, The dominating cold blue hues of Zinda, or the green pallets of SRK’s Don etc. In CDI, the shade is ‘dull chrome yellow’ which signifies not only the pain of Khan but also the perspective of India towards the national game- we have sufficient sunlight but we don’t have the guts to correct the angles to make it reflect upon something to shine- which is why, in the first half, there is neither a proper green training field to fill up the screen with color, nor a shot in total bright light(which means do not expect any girl to look the way they appear in Voice of India/Saregama or whatever as guests). This actually created problems when the movie jumped to lush green stadiums in the second half. This is perhaps a psychological effect – we see foreign audience, foreign players on field and immediately recall Hollywood movies on sports like Goal, Seabuiscuit, Wimbledon etc which had excellently lit up stadium shots. When CDI shifts to the lush green world cup grounds, the chrome levels were still kept dull. For some people this is a fault of cinematography and of YRF in turn for not being able to technically light up the stadium for the movie but for me it was correct because I never wanted to feel like a new movie began post interval because of new colors flashing before my eyes. A very relevant example is of Fanaa which irritated me because of the same thing done badly when movie shifts from colorful Delhi to ice capped Poland in the second half and for the first 10-15 minutes post interval, I failed to see any efforts in color grading department to link the movie’s pre-interval and post-interval portion. Looks like YRF learned from their past mistakes.
The sound recording(Manas Chaudhary and Ali Merchant) and background score(Salim Sulaiman) are worth mentioning. We don’t take much time to get adjusted to the initially weird sounding score used for the entry of girls and training etc. It is quite catchy and is accurately enough to rock u in your seats. The real beauty is seen when the tune of the title track is matched with the seniments on screen in plenty of ways. Many may not notice but a very subtle piano is playing when the disheartened coach and Girls enter Mc D for the brunch- Its the same tune of the aggressively loud title track. Equally rewarding is the sound design by the cheer of audience in the stadium is powerfully mixed to make u feel u r very much there. The most difficult part for score maker/ sound designer is deciding where will ‘silence’ work perfectly and CDI shows a considerably well done job in both these departments. Watch out for the penalty strokes in the climax where the silence just before every shot is accompanied by the pin-drop silence in the cinema hall. When the hockey stick of Bindiya Nayak hit the ball, I could actually feel the ball flying past my legs and striking the hard walls of the woofer system of cinema, representing the walls of the goal on the screen. Every cheer/cry after the shot is just the right amount of reaction portrayed in score. Frankly and technically speaking, a sports movie demands aggressive surround which was sadly not felt by me but still, thankfully I dint miss it either. Directional surrounds were occasionally used in scenes when Khan remembers the harsh words given to him by the world in his past.
All the girls have given a touching performance because of one simple reason- The newcomer selection team at YRF has done the best job ever due to which no girl looks like an actor at all. Athough the primary focus is only on 4-5 players, Each girl really did look like the character- No second thoughts on that. The filmmakers won half the battle already as none of the girl seem to have faced any problem in making their presence felt in whatever they were saying. If I personally have to choose just one, I think the energy level and timing of the one who played Haryana’s tomboyish Komal itself is worth every penny spent on the movie. Everytime she says something, she brings the house down. At the sametime, I still find it difficult to believe that Bindiya Nayak is the actress’ first time on screen. Her brilliant display of her alter-ego really makes her a detestable person.
Finally, what to say about SRK: He has outdone himself. I initially felt that the role is an extension (oops…may be it’s a strong word) of Mohabbatein’s Raj Aryan, his dead love here being played by his passion for the game. But having said that, considering the duration of role, the role extension …. should I say ‘extended’ to such a greater height that the impact of those momentary aggressions and frustrations is even greater than the ones seen in his best performance yet which was in Swades. Watch out for him just after the winning shot- Atleast half of the hall is bound to believe King Khan can still make u cry by his on-screen tears. Infact his entire look fits his character down to the T. This was pretty obvious from the first ever association meeting where his shirt was matching with the dull wall color and not in opposite contrast color as is usually witnessed in his usual candyfloss movies.
But Alas still, All’s not well in CDI…Editing is one department which I felt lapsed by considerable gap when compared to achievements of other departments. Instances that irritate include scenes of a girl with onscreen name ‘Gul Iqbaal’- it was utter waste watching this girl, her character building being ignored later throughout the movie. Next in the first world cup match where India tastes success, just after we get a lead over the opponent, it doesn’t make any sense at all to show the remaining 20 seconds of match where nothing happens. This is not a live event and a movie’s 20 seconds are no joke. The Editor could have easily trimmed such scenes. Infact in today’s age of special edition DVDs where one can anyway include n number of deleted scenes, it’s a sin not to do a crisper editing. Then in the definition of characters there were minor glitches of least significance like Bindiya calling Sukhram (an elderly clerk assisting the coaches) initially by name in an insulting manner and later with respect and loads of love on a call from Australia. The camera shake effect is a bit ineffective in the Mc D chaos scene because Indian audiences are not used to this focus distraction effect and it was difficult to comprehend as to who’s beating who.
Final Word: Ever since Yashrajfilms handed over direction to new talents, except for Kunal Kohli (Hum Tum, Fanaa) I never came across someone worthy enough to be called a potential successor to the talents of Adi or Yash Chopra. But this time they surpassed all my expectations. I have not yet seen Ab Tak Chhappan but if only Chak de can be considered as any sign, Shimit Amin and Jaideep Sahni are ‘the choice’ which YashRajFilms should retain if they are to change their image of candy floss manufacturers. Attempting to make a Dhoom or D:2 to shift to non-family film making can only work as a commercial move not having any social significance. Tons of hard work goes into writing movies like CDI and since the success of RDB, Bollywood has been struggling to make movies having right balance of mainstream and offbeat elements but the way CDI has done it, it will benefit the YRF banner more than ever. There is something people should realize that it is not the final matches that make a sports movie a hit. It is the journey to the matches that makes it click. It is quite obvious that a match does not suit the format of a movie- People will enjoy every goal of the movie in the same way that they enjoy the Sixes of Yuvraj in cricket which will be shown through many more camera angles than any movie can ever have. The scope of a movie extends beyond the players and forays into the journey on how they became winners of life. Through various subplots, CDI deals with social issues like gender bias, team objectives over personal targets, the communal fights, the post marriage identity crisis, leadership challenges, generation gap problems etc. These are issues which are being handled by every single Indian in some area of his life. This is where CDI makers have put in maximum efforts to make the movie the most effective upto the time in the film the story runs on Indian soil and this is what has perhaps brought it to the attention of Oscar library.
Note : Googling result: 'Major Dhyanchand' is the legendry Hockey Player whose statue is shown in the begining of the film. Infact the stadium in Delhi has been named after him only.
Whew !!! Really sorry to all if I bored u with that irritatingly loooooong review but for once I am glad that I cud write down everything i wanted to say on a particular movie. Was getting sick of everytime passing a comment here and there.
I Heartily welcome any Comments (except on the write up length
)
Anurag
TCS (Whitefield)
Bangalore
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