Saawariya is 2 hours 8 minutes of sheer magic Click here to add this article to My Clips
By Subhash K. Jha, October 30, 2007 - 17:45 IST



At 2 hours and 8 minutes playing-time Saawariya is one of Sanjay Leela Bhansali's shortest films ever. It's just a few minutes longer than the filmmaker's last film Black which was almost as long as Saawariya, but without any songs

Sanjay's second film Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam had 10 songs and a playing-time of 3 hours. Saawariya with 8 songs is far shorter than the opulent and stunning Devdas which, with its mix of songs, dances and operatic drama ran into 3 hours and 10 minutes.

Economy of expression defines the romance between Ranbir Kapoor and Sonam Kapoor in Saawariya. From the time his eyes fall on the porcelain beauty Sonam (who exudes the subtle strength of Waheeda Rehman) Ranbir celebrates his love in ecstatically composed and choreographed numbers that create a waltz of a thousand steps with just gestures and whispers.

Saawariya is Sanjay's subtlest most quiet and mellow film to date. While almost every sequence in Devdas and Black culminated in an operatic crescendo, the shot compositions in Saawariya suggest a symphony rather than an opera. The 8 elaborate songs and dances in Saawariya take up quite a chunk of the film’s precious playing-time. What remains between the two people in love are those unspoken words and unshed tears of a relationship that knows no full stop.

The songs are used in Saawariya to propel the story forward. Every song tells a story. Monty Sharma's tunes and Sameer's lyrics create a structure akin to a raga, minus the casual informal mood of a classical performance.

Saawariya is a formally-structured romance with the episodes between the protagonists moving forward in power-packed pirouettes of passion. The presiding colour of Saawariya is blue. The colour defines the spaces that separate and bring together lovers. But the mood after the film’s screening was anything but blue. It was unanimously felt that Sanjay Leela Bhansali's latest work takes him far ahead of his earlier films, puts him on a par with the world's most subtle and restrained masters.

Those who think all his films are about thundering passion, Saawariya is a bolt from the blue….in shades of blue.

** May be its time for rana sahab to start an opinion poll based thread for OSO, and SAANWARIYA!

Well zoran, you started this thread and this thread seems perfect for that poll you suggested. It's the thread starter who can edit insert poll, so it will have to be you.

And keep poll open till Saturday.

My prediction BTW is for Saawaria to strat slow that may pick up if really as good as Black. Otherwise Flop.
Om Shanti Om : Hit.

Done! take your pick! I did for 10 days?

Saawariya will be a better movie for sure but OSO will be hit just because of SRk just like the crap Main Hoon Na..

Saawaria and Om Shant Om both are showing in non-desi theatres in Ottawa, Montreal and Toronto. Some of the theatres are AMCs that don't have full DD capability, so cineplexes are the first choice. Except, if Saawaria has a SDDS track as well ??

Well, Saawaria is being distributed by Sony and Sony default audio is their own SDDS. If Saawaria really has a SDDS track, SDDS theatres (AMCs) will be a better choice for Saawaria.

Will Saawaria be the first Hindi/ Indian film to have a SDDS track ??

Raja Sen slates the film:

http://www.rediff.com/movies/2007/nov/08saawariya.htm

There's a discussion on bwtorrents about how the film can't be released on there because it's been rated by the MPAA

BBFC lists official runtime as 137 min.

According to Filmjerk, there is an SDDS track:
Saawariya
Logline: A shy dreamer, who spent most of his time isolated in his apartment creating riddles for his own amusement, becomes smitten with a young lady he meets by chance. In Hindi and Urdu with subtitles
Featuring: Ranbir Kapoor, Sonam Kapoor, Salman Khan, Rani Mukerji, Zohra Sehgal
Director: Sanjay Leela Bhansali
Writer: Prakash Kapadia, based on the short story "White Nights" by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Distributor: Columbia Pictures
Opening Week Release Pattern: 85 locations in select markets on November 9
MPAA Rating: PG for thematic elements, brief nudity, some language and incidental smoking
Running Time: 160 minutes
Aspect Ratio: Anamorphic (2.39:1)
Sound Format: Dolby Digital, DTS, SDDS

First hindi SDDS film for rana sahab?

After MORAN spoke for OSO, INDOLINK, reviews SAANWARIYA:

Producer: Sanjay Leela Bhansali and SPE Films India Pvt. Ltd.
Director: Sanjay Leela Bhansali
Starring: Ranbir Kapoor, Sonam Kapoor, Salman Khan, Rani Mukherjee, Zohra Sehgal, and Begum Para
Music: Monty Sharma, Sanjay Leela Bhansali (Guest)
Lyrics: Sameer, Nusrat Badr, and Sandeep Nath
Genre: Romantic
Recommended Audience: General
Approximate Running Time: 2 hrs 30 min
Film Released on: 09 November 2007
Reviewed by: Samir Dave
Reviewer's Rating: 8.5 / 10

Once upon a time there was a movie that touched the senses, the soul, and the heart. Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s “Saawariya” is an eternal film that transports the viewers across time and space into a world that exists just beyond our ordinary lives. The film is like an ethereal spirit that lovingly brushes the back of your heart in the dark and leaves a haunting impression upon your soul.

The movie has been brought to us by the man who may arguably be India’s best director, Sanjay Leela Bhansali. The director has been responsible for some of the most beautiful cinema that Bollywood audiences have seen. Movies such as “Khamoshi”, “Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam”, “Devdas” and “Black” have left an indelible mark on Hindi movie fans all across the world. His previous movies have been praised for his artistic vision and uncompromising dedication to the craft of movie making. If ever there were a director that Raj Kapoor has passed the baton to, it is Mr. Sanjay Leela Bhansali. The director is known for his perfectionism in everything from cinematography to the music score. “Saawariya” is a highly anticipated film by fans, as people wonder whether the director has been able to create another masterpiece or not.

The movie is co-produced by Sony film’s Columbia Pictures and has been given a PG rating (for a bit of nudity) by the Motion Picture Association of America. This highly touted and anticipated film releases worldwide on Diwali (November 9th, 2007) and features the debut of Ranbir Kapoor (Raj Kapoor’s grandson and son of Rishi Kapoor), Sonam Kapoor (Anil Kapoor’s daughter). The supporting cast includes Zora Sehgal with appearances by Salman Khan and Rani Mukherjee. Special mention must be made of the biggest character in the film, which sometimes overshadows even the flesh and blood actors: the small, magical, sleepy blue/green hued town that provides the canvas on which Sanjay Leela Bansali paints his characters over the course of four nights.


“Saawariya” is as much a story about the magical town that surrounds the actors as it is about the characters themselves. Sanjay Leela Bhansali and cinematrographer Ravi K. Chandran have draped the entire town in blue and green hues, giving every scene a wispy ethereal look that leaves the audience enraptured. Each frame/scene is like a painting and the viewer doesn’t know where to look first. These hues combine with the magnificently detailed sets designed by art director, Omung Kumar. If there’s any one complaint, it’s that each frame has so much going on in the background that it can get a bit distracting at times. It’s a testament to Mr. Bhansali, that he has tried a completely different technique in filming this movie. The closest comparisons I can make to “Saawariya’s” distinct look are to films that are directed by Hollywood director Tim Burton who prefers filming completely on indoor sets as Bhansali has done in this film. Though the sets seem visually realistic, the viewer is left quite conscious of the fact that something is just a bit off. This works to the film’s advantage as the town takes on a magical look. It becomes both “everywhere” and “nowhere” within India. In fact, the town is never even properly identified within the movie. The hues which are provided by space lights (the first use of these atmospheric lights in a Hindi film) and the use of blue/green paint, add to the creation of a character which I call “magical reality”. Everywhere you look, there are artistic flourishes such as neon signs in subdued hues, a statue of Buddha, Mona Lisa drapes, Persian rug patterns, and a beautiful bridge with a river running underneath it all combine to form the centerpiece of this emotional tale. Bhansali’s dedication to his craft is evident throughout the movie, and he re-affirms himself as the best director that India has to offer.

Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s “Saawariya” is as much homage to his distinct style of filmmaking as it is to the bygone Raj Kapoor movies of yesteryear. In fact, Ranbir Kapoor’s character Ranbir Raj’s anscestry can be traced back to the beloved vagabond clown that Raj Kapoor performed in movies like “Shree 420”. He’s pure, friend to all, beloved by all, a loser in love, yet never gives up hope for a better future. The legacy of Raj Kapoor can be felt all through the movie, culminating in Ranbir and Sonam’s re-enactment of the RK Films logo (sculpted after the famous scene of Raj Kapoor holding Nargis as she looks up at him)


This is one of those films that will take you to the magical world that exists within director Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s fevered mind. It’s a love story taken to another level. Unrequited love never looked or felt so good. The film is spellbinding, heartwarming, and yes, heartbreaking as well. Is it his best film? No, it’s not Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s best film. It is; however on par with his previous movies and will not disappoint his fans. The only thing that might go against it having mass appeal is that the movie is truly like a classical painting, in that the viewer has to open their mind and have the patience to appreciate true beauty. I highly recommend that you see the movie in a movie theater to appreciate the beautiful direction, backgrounds, and fine nuanced performances. “Saawariya” is a film that will prompt discussion, will be appreciated as a classic and will be one of those movies that will get better upon repeated viewings. It truly is like an ethereal spirit that lovingly brushes the back of your heart in the dark and leaves a haunting impression upon your soul. The film is a magical spectacle of visual and emotional delight.


http://www.planetbollywood.com/displayR ... 0707050629

Two hours and eight minutes? I guess our worries that this will be some overlong film are unfounded. I wonder if Sony asked SLB to trim the film down?

know!! I think, it is right length, but how would 8-11 songs will fit in will have to be seen!

Otherwise, besides, khamoshi, I am not pro SLB, PSEUDO LAVISH, EXTRAVAGANT FILM MAKING STYLE. Imho, even black, was inspired over the top, grandiose remake of an English film, and would not counted in classics whatsoever!

No doubt, his music sense is commendable!

From NYTimes:

This is from the main NYTimes critic! He never reviews Bollywood films...
--------------------------------------------
Movie Review
Saawariya (2007)
Sony Pictures

November 9, 2007
Dostoyevsky With Bollywood Style

By A. O. SCOTT
Published: November 9, 2007

“Saawariya” announces itself as an adaptation of Dostoyevsky’s “White Nights,” but whatever Russian soul may dwell deep within it is pretty well drowned in Bollywood style. Eye and ear candy for fans of Indian musical cinema, it is 2 hours 11 minutes — bracingly compact by Bollywood standards — of wide-screen close-ups, fanciful sets, colorful costumes, bellybuttons, almost-kisses and 10 pumped-up, achingly sweet songs.

The story is narrated, at least at first, by Gulab (the divine Rani Mukherjee), a cheerful toiler in the red-light district of a city meant to suggest some combination of Chicago, St. Petersburg, Mumbai and Venice. One night an itinerant musician named Raj (Ranbir Kapoor) arrives in town, and while Gulab is instantly smitten, the object of her affection just wants to be friends. And friendly he is, in the wide-eyed, puppy-dog manner of certain Indian movie heartthrobs. (The more brooding, strong-and-silent kind will show up a bit later in the person of Salman Kahn.)


Raj falls in love with Sakina (Sonam Kapoor), whose heart belongs to Imaan (Mr. Kahn), whose return she awaits every night on a lonely bridge. She is either drawn to Raj or else she’s toying with him, but in any case psychological realism has far less to do with their relationship than the necessity for duets, pursuits down rainy, half-lighted streets and sudden changes of mood and costume. The experience is visually enchanting, cloyingly sweet, at once utterly chaste and insanely erotic, and finally exhausting. Aficionados will not settle for less.

“Saawariya” is rated PG (Parental guidance suggested). It has exposed bellybuttons and mild sexual innuendo.

SAAWARIYA
Opens today nationwide.

Produced, directed and edited by Sanjay Leela Bhansali; written (in Hindi, with English subtitles) by Prakash Kapadia and Mr. Bhansali, based on the short story “White Nights” by Fyodor Dostoyevsky; director of photography, Ravi K. Chandaran; music by Monty, lyrics by Sameer; art directors, Omung Kumar Bhandula and Vanita Omung Kumar; released by Sony Pictures International. Running time: 166 minutes.

WITH: Salman Khan (Imaan), Rani Mukherjee (Gulab), Ranbir Kapoor (Raj), Sonam Kapoor (Sakina), Zohra Sehgal (Lilian Ji) and Begum Para (Badi Ammi)

David Chute, who's a bigtime Bollywood fan and one of the only Westerners regularly reviewing them for any publication:

LA Weekly
Bollywood Bohème
Indian cinema’s past meets its present in the lavish Saawariya

By DAVID CHUTE
Wednesday, November 7, 2007 - 6:00 pm
I’ve long thought that the opera crowd could provide fertile soil for raising Bollywood consciousness in the United States, and of all the current A-list Mumbai directors, Sanjay Leela Bhansali has the most fulsome operatic temperament. There were sequences in his 2002 Devdas that played like long-lost snippets of Verdi, and Bhansali’s latest, Saawariya (Beloved), suggests a lavish road-show revamp of La Bohème. The film is loosely based on White Nights, Dostoyevsky’s novella of a moonstruck love so pigheaded it borders on dementia. The movie is also a mad creation in its own right, shot entirely on a soundstage in Mumbai, on a huge set that depicts (seemingly in its entirety) an old, decadent, mostly Muslim city: St. Petersburg crossed with old Lucknow. Two young lovers, played by charming newcomers, wander around (or run in slow motion, trailing scarves) through this wholly artificial environment, gorgeous in shades of cobalt blue and mossy green, which is so resourcefully photographed that no camera angle looks familiar. The place soon begins to feel like a dimensional staircase out of M.C. Escher, and oxygen deprivation sets in.


The initials “RK” tower over this giant set, in letters 10 feet tall, and the spirit of Bollywood icon Raj Kapoor (whose production company was RK Films) looms even larger. The key character here is a Chaplinesque vagabond eerily like the one Kapoor became in song-filled social melodramas such as Aawara (1951) and Shri 420 (1955). And the likable young actor who plays the role — Ranbir Kapoor, a gangly goofball with the caterpillar eyebrows and five o’clock shadow of a Punjabi Jason Schwartzman — holds up rather well under the burden of standing in for his own grandfather. With his lopsided killer smile and a flailing, rubber-legged dancing style that’s closer to Donald O’Conner than the aerobic athleticism of a Bolly-hunk like Hrithek Roshan, the young Kapoor takes the edge off Saawariya’s deployment of the most exhausted narrative device in world cinema: the mysterious trickster/stranger who touches the life of everyone he encounters, but who can’t help himself.

Along with his leading lady, Sonam Kapoor, the heartbreakingly beautiful daughter of actor Anil Kapoor (no relation to the other Kapoors), Ranbir is participating in a grand Bollywood tradition — the “launch” of a star’s son or daughter in the family business. It is Bhansali’s good fortune that both of these crazy kids have a lot to offer in addition to their noble names. The movie’s brand of wholehearted Bollywood neoclassicism, which hearkens back to the noir-dappled social melodrama of the 1950s, is an admirable thing in principle: In a period when hip younger filmmakers are scrambling for American-style cool, discarding the songs and replacing sentiment with cynicism, directors like Bhansali (and Vinod Chopra, Ashutosh Gowariker and a few others) remain determined to move popular Indian cinema forward while preserving the unique conventions of the “film industry that is also a genre.” Bhansali does this with so much fervor in Saawariya that he almost makes it work. With the sterling assistance of a new generation of Kapoors, he comes this close to sweeping us off our feet.

SAAWARIYA | Directed by SANJAY LEELA BHANSALI | Written by PRAKASH KAPADIA and BHANSALI | Produced by GAUTMI BHATT, DEEPAK RAAI SHARMA and BHANSALI | Released by Columbia Pictures | Culver Plaza, Fallbrook 7, One Colorado, Naz 8

How Long is Saawaria ??

There are as many run times mentioned as many minutes in half an hour.

Ranging from 2 hours 8 min to 2 hrs 40 min run times have been mentioned.

Cinemaclock.com lists it at 2 hrs 22 min.

As the reports are mixed, expect run time trims as the time progresses. So, if want to watch it in full, watch early.

My bet is that Sony would not allow any additional trimming of the picture. The studios are big sticklers for keeping things in their correct format.

That said, I'm willing to go with 137 min., just b/c the British Board of Film Certification is the most accurate.