Paheli [2005]

Paheli
Reviewed: June 24th 2005

My expectations well it stars my all time favourite actor (Shah Rukh Khan) and actress (Rani Mukerji), therefore I expect quite a bit… that too with my other favourite actress (Juhi) making an appearance, I expect the film to be special… And it’s being produced by SRK to top it off, so not only do I want my expectations fulfilled but I want all the audience to enjoy the film and I want the film to do well… but from the first promo I knew Paheli was ‘different’… that made me nervous! Will I enjoy the film? Then a couple of reviews came early of which 2 or 3 (out of the 6 I had read) had said the film was ‘slow’ and that the second half was a ‘let down’… that made me further nervous… why did they not enjoy the film much? And again – will I enjoy the film??

Some points to mention here… Paheli is not a ‘realistic’ film, it is not from the ‘realistic’ genre, yet it still remains ‘different’, it still belongs to an as yet untouched genre, for audience like me… Paheli is a fairytale…! the first fairytale I have seen come out of Indian cinema…

The look First of all I have to say the sets were breath-taking, extremely beautiful… but what stole my heart was the locations themselves… Costumes were gorrrgeous! I don’t mean just Shah Rukh and Rani’s costumes, but every single person in the film wore such beautiful clothes… yet I don’t feel you could complain that the costumes, sets etc were too ‘loud’ they weren’t, nothing was garish, it was all very simple… simplicity is the word which probably describes Paheli, on a whole, at best actually… last but definitely not least the Cinematography by Ravi K Chandran was mind-blowing, he made everyone, and everything, look so beautiful… everything looked so fairy-tale-ish as though it would disappear if you touched it!!

Rajasthan Rajasthan seems so beautiful… I think what makes it look further beautiful, is the fact that Rajasthan has been so untouched in our cinema, earlier I remember seeing Lamhe shot their and the ‘off-beat’ film Bawandar, but I don’t recall seeing much of Rajasthan in Indian cinema as we do see other places… therefore it was really refreshing to see!

The music/songs At first I was no huge fan of the Paheli soundtrack, it was teek-taak, nothing amazing for an entertainment-wanting-queen like myself lol… but after watching the film, I feel the soundtrack is so beautiful… the golden touch of MM Kreem makes the music classical and you just feel like listening to it for hours on end, the lyrics are absolutely beautiful too… the Choreography was spot on gorgeous, each song was pictured so, so well and I feel it’s amongst Farah Khan’s best work, as it was very ‘hatke’ (different) choreography for her… Each and every song from the film is my favourite, but I guess it’s Minnat Kare and Kangana Re which I would pick visually, as my faves if I had to… musically I have to add that ‘Khaali hai tere bina’ has not left my mind ever since I saw the movie, it’s one of the most beautiful songs I have heard in a long time!

The story I know the story was not specially written for this film, a film has been made on this legend before, and it’s a Rajasthani folk legend, all adapted from a book… I have not read the book or seen the earlier film, so for me, Paheli gifted me a story full of entertainment, a very unusual story

Screenplay I usually talk of the story and screenplay together, but because this film was based on a book I don’t want to upset anyone by confusing the two! The screenplay was good, I feel it was tight enough to keep you gripped and everything was written very well… dialogues too, were beautiful and very ‘conversation-like’… editing however could’ve been better, my knowledge of the technical aspect of movies is limited but from what I know the editing of Paheli at times didn’t please.

The Direction The direction was superb, I don’t remember seeing any of Amol Palekar’s earlier directorials, I am unaware of his earlier work, in fact… but I’ve seen him in a film or two as an actor, and he was good…I could definitely see his touch as an actor into the direction of Paheli, in fact sometimes SRK’s acting reminded me of Amol Palekar lol… the only criticism I have of him as a director, if any, were that sometimes the scenes tended to not drag (if that was the case I’d have criticized Sandhya the screenplay writer), but go at a slow pace… I mean I read in a review (either Indiafm or Rediff) just a few minutes ago that the film does travel at a slow pace, and I think everyone would agree with this, but the review also mentioned how this is a small price to pay as Paheli is such a treat to watch, and I absolutely agree with that!

Performances I feel everyone in the film, even the backup artistes gave admirable performances, not one person went over-the-top in any scene… everything was kept very real, and maybe it is only in terms of performances this folk-tale could be call a piece of realistic cinema!!! lol … I do not know each actors name so I wont be able to analyse each of their performances, therefore I’m saying it right now that each and every performer did extremely well, in this film their were no ‘superstars’, their were no ‘stars’ and maybe their were no ‘actors’ as such, they were all ‘performers’ who most definitely became their characters for the while they had… each character was there with a relevance, no one was just ‘thrown in’, you could tell that no character was written for the stars, in fact the actors picked were so apt for the roles!

Amitabh Bachchan Well he had just one scene, but it was in a way the most important scene and he the most important character of the scene, so his character leaves a wonderful impression… he did a fantastic job in that one scene and really lets his presence be felt. Was very cute and nice to see him in such a role lol

Suniel Shetty Actually I genuinely feel Suniel had nothing to do, and feel I would be being unfair to judge such a small performance lol but nonetheless whatever he did have, he performed with grace and well you could tell that for a senior actor as him the appearance was a cake walk of course… it was nice to see him, though.

Anupam Kher Now this was one great role! It was so good to see Anupam, I love this guy and the role did complete justice to his amazing capabilities as an actor… a wonderful role and even more wonderful performance!! Great to see him!

Juhi Chawla Oh she looked gorgeous! So cute! Her role was actually quite nice, not as bad as some people were making it out to be according to me… it was a sweet role which really did further the story, a very important role in putting the message of the film forward. She performed, as expected, flawlessly and oh my God she still looks so young and beautiful, still the most beautiful actress their ever was and ever will be, love you Juhi!

Rani Mukerji First things first, Rani looked so mind-blowing-ly gorgeous! She looked out-of-this-world! Performance wise, what can I say? With each film this girl takes on a new challenge by taking on a radically different character from her previous film, this was yet another completely alien/different role for Rani as an actress, and she took it on with full force and emerges, as always and as expected, a complete winner! It’s becoming common-knowledge to expect brilliant, flawless and stunning performances from her, and obviously that happens here with Paheli also!

Shah Rukh Khan Shah Rukh has been going around saying Paheli is Rani’s story, and yes it is in a way, but I feel he is being far too modest in saying that… Rani I feel was the heartbeat of Paheli, but Shah Rukh WAS the HEART, he was the soul (ironically he literally was a soul haha)! I was so proud to see SRK in the film, when I think about his performance I feel like a proud parent (even though he’s old enough to be MY parent haha)! Honestly, this film ranks amongst SRK’s best performances of all time… To follow up the performance of Mohan Bhargav in Swades with another subtle, brilliantly performed, flawless performance with a different character as Kishan/Ghost in Paheli, was a very wise move! I hope SRK continues doing such characters so that his ‘haters’ just have to stop saying stupid things to him and accept his unbeatable brilliance as an actor! As the ghost and husband both, he excels soooo well, if you have any doubts about his versatility or capabilities as an actor, Paheli will surely wash them away!

With Paheli Shah Rukh Khan and Rani Mukerji prove for the nth time that they are the best, or at least one of the few bests, the industry has seen in a long time! And Amol Palekar proves that he’s an extremely talented filmmaker to make such a simple, sweet emotional and cute film and extract such brilliant performances from his cast!

Few last notes:

Chemistry between Shah Rukh and Rani was outstanding! This time their pairing had a very adorable/cute feel to it, as compared to the hot/sexyness they had together in Chalte Chalte! These two gorgeous versatile actors prove they can even make versatile chemistry haha… the scenes they had together were soooo cuute!

Seeing Shah Rukh and Juhi together again, though not much, it was enough for me to be grateful to the crew of the film for bringing them together haha, man it was awesome… they still have so much warmth together, hope they do another lead film together soon, they were really teasing the audience with their chemistry in this film, making us thrive for more!

For the first time, Juhi and Rani was so awesome! It’s so awesome now that I can say each of my top three actresses (Juhi, Rani, Kajol) have interacted together onscreen, I’m so happy… Juhi and Rani looked so warm/cute together, I wish they had more scenes, it was aweeesomee to see them!

Production values were great, everything needed was provided… For Shah Rukh as a producer, I am so, so happy that he’s getting to make such wonderful films, I’ve enjoyed each of his productions and Paheli continues the tradition!

Puppet shows When I heard they were using puppets in the film, I was a bit confused as to how that would happen and whether that would stall the film, but it didn’t… it reminded me of how the cartoons were used in Hum Tum, I think it was a great way of putting the story forward… puppets were great and I read at the end that Naseerudin Shah was the voice of the male puppet that’s cool!

Accents I have to add that it was brilliant for the actors to try the rajasthani accent, rather than speak the way they normally do… the accents furthered the feel of the film and Rajasthan and let you be ‘at one’ with the film, falling into a world of these characters, without knowing your watching a film!

Special effects were awesome!! Oh my God they were so amazing… first double role film I’ve seen in India where you cannot even tell which SRK was put their computerized-ly later lol it all looked so real, was awesome!

The ending was great, very unexpected!

OVERALL I don’t know how Paheli will do at the box office but reading the review by Taran Adarsh was helpful in making me hope for the best, he seems to think it can do great, I really hope so! It’s a wonderful, wonderful film and a must-see for everyone!