Ahista Ahista (2006)
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Warning: Spoilers ahead
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I have always wondered during the climax of “Rangeela” as to what happens after Urmila says hi to Aamir Khan. Before the climax, Urmila is never shown to be inclined towards Aamir. She see him as a good friend all along. What does Aamir Khan does after marriage? Still sell tickets in black? But then we consider it cinematic liberty and let the matter go. Don’t want to spoil the happy ending, do we? That’s why “Rangeela” was a huge hit and a movie like “Ahista Ahista” has failed miserably.
There are no comparission between “Rangeela” and “Ahista Ahista”. If “Rangeela” left with a feel good feeling, AA leaves you with a surprise but not a pleasant one. After the success of “Socha Na Tha“, Abhay Deol, the cousin of Sunny and Bobby Deol is back with “Ahista Ahista”. The director of his first film, Imitiaz Ali writes the story of this one and is directed by first time director Shivam Nair.
AA is the story of Ankush played by Abhay Deol, who works as a proffessional witness in Delhi’s marriage office. He meets Megha played by Soha Ali Khan who has run away from home in Nainital comes there to get married to her boyfriend. He does not come and she cannot go back. A reluctant Ankush tries to help her. Spending the first night in a dargah (mosque) to spending the second night in a shady hotel to finding a place for her in a old age home, Ankush stays by her side to the extent of borrowing 10000 Rs for her.
To pay back the rs. 10000 he took, he has to earn more. He takes on the job of Bank representative selling bank products. Morally supported by Megha, he manages to sell more for the bank to consider him for a higher position. Slowly Ankush starts falling for Megha and finally proposes to her. When everything seems to be going fine, Megha boyfriend Dhiraj played by Shyam Munshi comes to Delhi in search for her.
Ankush tries his best to keep Dheeraj away from Megha not wanting to let her go. He tries various ways including some by his friends to make him leave Delhi. The end is a not a typical love story.
The story is similar to Kamal Hasan’s “Sadma” where the hero does everything for the heroine only to loose everything. “sadma” was high on emotion. The characters were larger than life. AA has characters which look like picked up from real life and there lies the beauty of the film.
Remember Shahrukh Khan in “Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa” trying all the ways to hold on to the heroine even lying and cheating. Ankush in AA does almost the same thing but he looks more real. He does not become a hero like Shahrukh. He still remains the common man he was. He has his faults and problem but then he understand what his limitations are. He does not believe in fairy tales nor does he want to believe in a make-believe world. He accepts his fate and does what every common man does, He move on. No Melodrama, no big dialogs, no big tears, just pure emotions.
The movie could have been a typical poor boy-rich girl story but the back ground of Megha are never shown but it is understood, that she must be coming from a well-to-do family. Ankush is a common man with no fixed income who one day aspires to live with dignity. He knows that his chances with Megha are none and even tells her so, “Tumhare jaise ladki ke saath mera koi chance nahi. Tum toh Class 1 wali ladki ho na”. (I Don’t have any chance with you. You are Class 1 girl)
He has his weakness which has him holding on to Megha even when he knows that her boyfriend is in town looking for her. He does not want tp tell the truth to her for the fear of losing her. He even says “Main Koi Filmi Hero nahi hoo ki ladki de doo aur muskurakar gaana gaoo” (I am no filmi hero who gives a girl and sings smiling) a trait found in all of us. We tend to lie and cheat to make our life a little more comfortable or to get what we want.
The movie has nice tender moments like Ankush gifting a new dress to Megha, Ankush silence when being embraced by Megha, Ankush planting a rather inexperience kiss on Megha’s lips and the final climax scene when Ankush says bye to Megha.
Abhay Deol is Ankush and he looks 100% of it. He is shy man doing a job of selling himself as a professional witness in a marriage office. He has the charm of being a simple hero unlike his over the top cousins. He could be what Amol Palekar was in the 80s. He looks ok, dresses normally and still has the boy-next-door charms. Abhay is the highlight of the movie.
Soha Ali Khan plays Megha and is ok. She may not have given the best performance but performs ok. The movie is concentrated more on Abhay Deol but she somehow manages to hold on to her own against him. The chemistry between Abhay and Soha Ali Khan is amazing.
There are many smaller character playing Abhay Deol’s friends and the people he works with and they all perform to better the story. All characters are warm with shaded of grey like Abhay deol’s best buddy who guides Shyam Munshi to Megha when Abhay slaps him in anger. There is also the small boy from the marathi movie “Shwaas”
Shyam Munshi has to do something about his long hairs. As for the role, he does not have much to do. His role is more of a guest experience rather than a special appearance. Exactly what is the difference between the two.
The movie is slow but is small. There is no forced humor and no character who is there just for providing laughs but some of the scenes do make you smile. The direction is tight but tends to loose grip sometimes. The most undesirable thing in the movie is music by Himmesh Reshmaiya. He may be a rage with his techno music and his nasal voice, but the music just does not fit in the movie. A movie like AA deserves a more slower soulful music. Except the first qawali song, all the song have failed. They look like forced instertion in the movie. Obviously the economic ruled instead of logic for the songs. The director does try to picturise the song like music videos but as I said they just don’t fit.
Especially at the end when the credits start to roll in the climax and the hero walks away from the camera into the crowd, a Himesh Reshmaiya techno song was a very bad choice. What was the director thinking? Although the scene does remind me of bengali movie and if I am correct it was Satyajit Ray’s “Mahanagar” when the hero and heroine start walking and disappear in the crowd in the climax.
If you are ok to see some off-beat movie which slowly grow on you, AA is your choice. It does not have big stars, does not have designer clothes, does not have dhisum dhisum or even tear-jerking moments or huge sentimental dialogs and does not even have a dance number or for the matter even an item number but it has that different appeal which makes you feel like a story which feels like our own.
I would give it a rating of 8 out of 10 for trying something different.
And coming back to my question with which I started this, why does Urmila say Yes to Aamir in “Rangeela”. I like to believe in that movie than believe in the more real “Ahista Ahista”. According to “Rangeela”, I still may have a chance after all.
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Punds Nice review man. I must watch it now. I will see if the DVD is out. But yaar ek request from next time onwards if you are going to reveal the end.. pls attach Spoliers about it
Rest all good
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Thanks Sumeet
Point taken. Made changes. Next time will be careful
Punds
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interesting review…
I heard the film is pretty watchable..and now, after reading your perspective, feel like I must watch it!
Thanks!
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I saw the movie recently..and you are right if it had to catch viewers would have ended differently but this movie looks more to reality rather than a rosy end……nice watchable movie..
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It was on SET tonight and I finally watched it! This is my kind of cinema. Simple. Pure. Brilliant. If there was a category like “Hrishikesh Mukherji” Film Award then for this year(2006) I would give it to Aahista Aahista.
Abhay Deol is a Deol who will go places. His next movie Ek Chaalis Ki Last Train should be interesting.
I liked the background score by Abhishek Ray, but yeah agree with the soundtrack. They should have gone with Sandesh Shandilya.
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Me was flicking between Aahista Aahista and awards too.
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watch “socha na tha” from the same team. Excellent movie, bette rif not on par with Ahista Ahista.
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jwalant, i have seen Socha Na Tha zillion times! the funny thing is that when first time i saw promos of ‘Socha Na Tha’ – i thought it would be crap, but then i read more about it and…..
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