Friday, February 16, 2007

Eklavya: Review

Eklavya – The Royal Guard

Cast: Amitabh Bachchan, Saif Ali khan, Boman Irani, Jackie Shroff, Jimmy Shergill, Vidya Balan, Raima Sen, Sharmila Tagore and Sanjay Dutt

Eklavya is one more movie coming from the stables of Vidhu Vinod Chopra and it really deserves to be called one of the finest crafted movies in recent times. Having roped in a heavy starcast with the VC Banner regulars like Sanjay Dutt, Saif Ali Khan and Vidya Balan, et. al. as well as getting Amitabh Bachchan to work with him for the first time, he does bring out the best of all of them to narrate a story which took 5 years to write and was equally difficult to portray.

More importantly he does not stretch the movie for the sake of it and keeps it as short as less than two hours with just one nominal song in the movie. The direction is impeccable to say the least. Some of the scenes especially the ones where Amitabh blindly separates the ghungroo from the pigeon, the scene where the camels cross across with the fast moving train in the background among others leave you just spell bound.

The story essentially portrays one of the Royal families in Rajasthan with no more dynasty and the secret behind how the lady of the family takes the help of their guard (Eklavya) to give birth to the next generation of the family. The revealing of this secret just before her death brings about a feeling of being cheated to her husband and sows the seeds of taking revenge for it. The director has shown great detail of creativity to create a scene as to how the secret is revealed to her son by the way of a painting by his twin sister (Raima Sen) who is mentally retarded by birth. And then starts the entire plot of how Eklavya keeps up the fight to keep up his duty of protecting the Royal family which otherwise would have resulted in ill-effects for the next few generations in his family.

Amitabh Bachchan comes up with and delivers one of the splendid performances till date. So much so that never in the movie would you feel that he is someone greater than the servant of the royal family. Saif is pretty neat in his role with lots of glimpses and shadows from his erstwhile Parineeta and so is the case with Vidya Balan too. Sanjay Dutt does a cameo in his short and sweet role of a policeman while the others (Boman Irani, Jackie Shroff, Raima Sen and Jimmy Shergill) don’t disappoint either in their tits and bits roles which bind up the plots.

Verdict: A combination of good talent putting up a great performance all together. Can there be any other reason for not watching the movie. Definitely a one time watch. (Though the subject of the movie is such that it cannot expect repeat audiences)Photo Courtesy: IndiaFM

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

As with the current trend in Hindi films, there is too much hype around the movie. All regularly known industry review writers seem to be on the payroll of the producer to produce such glamorous reviews.

I saw the film, and was not impressed to the point that the reviewers make it out to be.

Of course Amitabh Bachaan was excellent.

But the story was too flimsy, Shakesperian type. Good affair for National Film Awards where technical finesse is understood and appreciated. But for commercial audiences, there is nothing to capture on or keep on talking long after the movie.

Go to watch the movie with too little expectations (do not expect the power of Parineeta or Parinda). And if you cannot watch it, then no big deal - you will not repent it.

meetu said...

I didn't think the movie was great either. Eklavya is shot very beautifully. But, there are too many holes in the story which keep you from enjoying the experience. Overall, I was disappointed. Read my full review at http://withoutgivingthemovieaway.com/reviews/2007/02/review-eklavya.html

Jay said...

I did not like the movie much though it could have been a real thriller...

You can check my review at http://jkpcblogs.blogspot.com

Sanjay Kumar said...

I thought it was a technically superb and visually stunning movie that did not heed to the myriad of splinter stories and unnecessary character development. I would easily compare this to some of the creations of Kurosawa.

myaarzoo said...

Technically this is one of the best indian movie that I've watched lately. Go for it.

Ved
http://www.myaarzoo.com