Baabul – Ravi Chopra lost what he earned with Baghban!
Years ago in 1950, S.U Sunny had directed a sensitive film ” Babul” with Dilip Kumar and Nargis in lead roles. Now Ravi Chopra tried his luck by adding an additional “a” in title. This additional “a” defies his attempts to make an honest film on a subject where he tries to dispel superstitions. If Ekta Kapur or Kapoor and Karan Johar and Rakesh Roshan are infected with “K” Virus then lot many filmi people are infected with the fashion of including additional alphabets in their original names and titles of their films etc.
Ravi Chopra thought that this additional “a” will bring more success to his below average film. Additional alphabets surely can bring more success but it cant bring quality to the product. Ekta Kapur, Aruna Irani etc should be given awards because they have changed the face of fashion through the characters of their serials. Thier characters applauded are always decorated and covered with strikingly fashionable clothes and jewellery etc and films are also affected now. No matter which class of soceity these filmi characters are belonged but they are also decorated with latest fashioned clothes.
Ravi Chopra picked up remarriage of a widow and he did not care to see once again a nice RK film on such topic – Prem Rog. Ravi Chopra could not establish his characters well within the story and screen play and audience don’t feel any attachment with the events happening on screen.
Film picks up such a sensitive issue where there was enough space to bring right kind of emotions but scenes are planned in very light manner and every character behaves with “take it easy dude” attitude. Salman and Rani falls in love very easily, Amitabh and Hema, Sharat Saxena and Smita Jaykar accepts this relation very easily. Fine enough. Even Rani’s childhood friend and her silent lover also accepts her decision very easily. Good. Rani Marries Salman, gives birth to a boy who is Chashmish like her. Seems Ravi Chopra took Mahabharat’s story very seriously where Dhritrashtra was born blind because his mother closed her eyes when Rishi Vyas made physical contact to her. Same way Chashmish Rani gave birth to Chashmish son. Soon Salman is died and everybody again takes it easily. No emotions attached. Even child is fine with the calamity fell upon him. Indian directors lack in bringing good acting by child actors and very few are able to do this.
Perhaps Ravi Chopra made changes in his script after seeing “Dor” of Nagesh Kuknur and when Amitabh sees Rani dancing on the floor with Salman’s sweater in her hands, he catches the message that now this is the time when he should think about the injustice done by time to Rani. He recalls that Rani had a childhood friend and he visits Rani’s mother and asks her about whereabouts of John Abraham and she informs him that after Rani’s marriage he went to Europe and perhaps has been settled there only. Now John is shown to be like adopted son of the Rani’s family and they don’t know where he is settled. Even with this ambiguous whereabouts of John, Amitabh directly reaches to the show where John is singing and dancing. Perhaps Google search helped in his efforts.
Keeping the same easiness Amitabh and John agrees on the point that John will lure Rani for re-marriage and after little protest Rani too accepts it. Om Puri and Hema Malini show reluctance and protest this decision but after 2 minutes long dialogues of Amitabh they too surrender.
If looking beautiful and handsome is acting then Salman Khan has looked strikingly handsome with new crop of hairs on his head. He delivers too whatever was assigned to him.
For Amitabh Bachchan’s calibre, such meaningless roles are able to extract only 1% of his talent. But with his fixed get up of French cut beard it’s a question that will he be able to portray a poor man’s role in future or he will always be playing roles of characters who are multi millionaire?
Hema Malini’s character was given roles we see daily on TV in Saas Bahu serials whose work is to always look beautiful and put on best available dresses even at home when nothing special is happening as if they have to attend a function where they are chief guest to cut the ribbon. This is more sad and this should be blamed over directors as with age Hema Malini has started saying her dialogues in hindi with south Indian touch. Though in the older films during her prime days, this lacking was handled very beautifully. Was it due to extra care taken by her directors? Who persuaded her to do enough rehearsal before doing dubbing? Whatever is the case, Ravi Chopra shows her a Punjabi lady and she speaks hindi with tamil accent. Amitabh and Om Puri knowing Punjabi very well speaks the language effortlessly.
Though Om Puri is wasted. Recently there is decline in his performances, be it Malamal weekly or Baabul.
Sarika was there in few scenes and until climax audience can not guess if she is Sarika as she was always shown with a distance. She had 2 dialogues in the film.
John Abraham has to take care of acting and dialogue delivery rather than to take care of his dimples as he shows them consciously. Perhaps he needs a director who put extra care on him. He was better in Water and showed good potential but sorry, he is hopeless in Baabul.
Rani is one of the best actress in present day’s actresses but she could not do what Padmini Kolhapure did in Prem Rog. Is it difference between capabilities of two directors?
Aman Verma’s character looked like extension of his serials and when he calls “ Jiju” to Amitabh, then he looks more like caricature straight lifted from Raju Srivastava’s “ Saliyan” episode of comedy show.
Raj Pal Yadav is becoming very predictable and here too he had nothing to do. Same happens with Sharat Saxena and Smita Jaykar.
Rather all the characters had little to do. Why Ravi Chopra gathered this much crowd in his film? Rani, Salman, Amitabh and John’s characters could have got more depth if they would have got more footage which director wasted with other irrelevant characters.
Film runs very fast and things happen in fast forward manner and perhaps I am unable to understand that with this so called zet speedy age, emotions also have to be run faster and now on wards everything will be handled in “take it easy” manner.
Ravi Chopra had earned some name and enough money with Baghban and he has lost some name with Baabul. Money, Box office will suggest, he loses or gains?
Baabul gives a feeling that its not an honest approach and director is unable to put in everything needed to make film on such subject. Moreover, story lacks in spirit. It looks very outdated theory. Hema Malini’s protest is well received because she protests on the basis that she will lose her grandson if Rani marries again. But Om Puri’s protest does not deliver content. Baabul is not first film where marriage of widow is raised and his dialogues look very outdated.
Characters are surfacial and so is the movie.
Adesh Srivastava has used Amitabh’s voice very well and here he sings his songs very well. Perhaps this is time when Adesh or any other composer utilizes Amitabh’s voice atleast in a semi classical song if not purely classical one. Amitabh’s singing can be said only saving factor in this below average film but for that one can listen songs of the film.
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
Oh one loooong post! I couldn’t even bring myself to write a few lines to review this movie let alone a chapter.
The movie really was bad, I don’t even know where to begin with stripping this movie. It lacked in every department and in terms of performances Salman Khan really doesn’t even try to act does he? He doesn’t half annoy me now, and cringe everytime i see in the Saalam-e-ishq promos saying that line!
Re story – the tag line was he broke all relations to form one. Well he doesn’t do all this until the last 15 minutes and even then it’s not a huge issue, everyone gets a lecture for a few minutes and we acept it.
Rani doesn’t even get the chance to grieve, nope they just decide whats best for her, okay so fair enough they wish to restabalise her life but at least discuss this with her before approaching her so called best friend who just wonders off for x amount of years!
I can’t understand why Sarika took that role – how many words did she actually say, and her silent dignified widow role had no impact either!
The script had more flaws then I can even remember!
grr
#:-s~X(
@sangeeta i am totally with you about salman’s acting.. his acting was just so annoying…i guess it’s time to grow up a little(i know its kinda mean… but really was he trying to be funny??)…
on overall movie.. i couldnt watch it..it was so slow..
@RK “Perhaps Google search helped in his efforts.” LOL
)
Baarish : film was slow in acting but fast in events:)
Sangeeta: Sarika is not big named heroine and she worked in films long ago. She is ex wife of Kamal Hasan and her work desire may bne the reason she took this hindi film knowing that she will be register her presence in this film where Salman AB and Hema Malini are acting.
@Sangeeta: The one time I appreciated the acting ability of Salman Khan (and I’m not being sarcastic here) was when I saw ‘Main Prem Ki Deewani Hoon’ – Hrithik managed to absolutely butcher the type of idiotic role Salman so easily breezes through, so there’s something to him I guess.
Baarish,
Maybe if they killed Salman earlier and spent some more time with the character being widow we could feel her pain and understand the in laws journey into remarriage for her.
John’s character was left as a puppet, Om puri just shouted as loud as he could and Amit ji walked the role in his stride.
Seriously if film makers have money to invest then donate it into my piggy bank
RK yeah thats true…slow acting not events. i just have too many problems with this film.. i love the message and all but i couldnt stand the movie..
@ Ranjit – hahah oh yes Hrithik was bad in that role, but Salman suited “Prem” in the earlier days .. not anymore
@ RK – I know Sarika isn’t a big name, but surely a slightly more dignified character role would have helped.
The events could have been paced out had they killed Khan’s charcter earlier.
Oh and teh whole “Buddy” act between father and son was completely OTT
sangeeta.. yeah i think that might have helped.. at least give us time to understand the characters/”journey” more in depth
anyway far too much cribbing here . I refuse to dwell on this waste of time and space any longer
Eh yea the movie wasnt that great, the message was good but the protrayal wasnt done right. I like the first half..cute little love story …and then when he died i didnt feel like watching it anymore becuase there was nothing t watch.
Forget about Prem Rog…there was another one…way back in 1956 from the same production house, however, directed by BR Chopra… ‘Ek Hi Raasta’ with Ashok Kumar, Meena Kumari and Sunil Dutt…a good one!
Sangeeta: yes story lacks badly in content. Director could not plan which charcater or event he must give emphasise so that film leaves an impact over audience. He tried to befoll the audience as he was riding over successful fame of Baghban: He collected 4-5 stars and thought now scenes allocated to these stars will make a good khicharhee which audience will like:)
Alok:
yes BR Chopra made that film. Ravi Chopra has not been able to keep pace with the talent his father was having. Ravi Chopra easily got big star/actors like Dilip Kumar, Amitabh Bachchan, Dharmendra, Vinod Khanna, Hema Malini in his films but he could not make full use of these actors. None of his film can be termed as a film which can be remembered for long time. One can recall only The Burning Train because it was first of its kind in India though it was also copied from hollywood film. Story and script of his films always show flaws and these two elements were very important in BR Chopra’s films!!
Prem Rog is the film when Ravi Chopra had been established as a director so he should have considerd the quality of that film on almost same subject.
Ranjit, Sangeeta, Baarish: Salman has given quite good performances at times. Salman has his own category and certain roles he does with so much ease which no other contemporary actor can do. Surely He is not Dilip Kumar and he finds his ideal in Dharmendra. In certain fields he is a very good actor and in those areas he can give competition to anyone.
This is not simple destiny that Suraj Barjatya replaced Deepak Tijori by Salman Khan in Maine Pyar Kiya. Salman is not replacable in films like MPK, HAHK,HDDCS,Judvan, Andaz Apna Apna, etc. List is longh which I dont recall. He is no where less than SRK in KKHH. He has great screen presence and he may not handle emotional scenes well but when you need a sobre, soft, sauve hero then he is there to fill the bill. He has charming personality. Directors dont always need great actors but actors who can pursue the story they wish to tell. And now Salman has become painter also, see so creative he is:d
RK i do agree with you.. Salman Khan did give good performances in some of his films…i liked him in many of his films Andaz Apna APna being one of my fav.. but even in KyonKi he was good…
However, Baabul wasnt one of them.. Here i found him very annoying.. maybe he was just doing what he was told.. i dont know.. it just wasnt right…
Baarish:
Given Anurag Kashyap’s account, if Director Ravi Chopra has to be blamed for John’s bad performance in Baabul then same criteria shd be applied in case of Salman also:)
But no, Salman has 17 years experience and he cant be spared under the excuse that director could not extract out best from him. Om Puri, Hema Malini, Rani Mukherjee and Salman Khan cant be excused for their low level acting in Baabul. Perhaps director and actors all lost the interest in the subject while doing shooting. When actors were not convinced by the plot then how could they have brought genuinity in their performances. hence a taste less khicharee we got from Dhaba of Ravi Chopra!
@RK: I don’t know if I would go as far as to call some of them ‘good performances’, but yes, he does have a certain amount of charm if directors use him judiciously. But calling him ‘irreplaceable’ and that too in movies like ‘Judwaa’, ‘HDDCS’ would be going too far, I feel.
I best liked Salman in ‘Khamoshi’, ‘Andaz Apna Apna’, ‘KKHH’, ‘Karan Arjun’, ‘Maine Pyar Kiya’ and ‘HAHK’. The rest of his performances range from borderline insane (’Hello Brother’, ‘Har Dil Jo..’ etc) to incessant hamming (’Judwaa’, ‘PKTDK’ and so on).
I personally feel he does best when saddled with the desi Adam Sandler-Ben Stiller-Hugh Grant kinda roles – the ones where he can be charming, goofy and loveable all at once – ‘Lucky’, ‘JPKHH’, ‘Khamoshi’, ‘HDDCS’ etc…he pitches those performances exactly right (which is what Hrithik got SO wrong in ‘Main Prem Ki..’).
Ranjit: I recently saw one of Salman’s old film, kahin pyar na ho jaye, he did good comical cartoon like acting. I liked him in this role.
With Irreplacable – I meant if I dont feel that he is not able to this role and if certain actor would have been plaiyng this role then it could have been better. He does not give this imprerssion in the mentioned films.
i love you guys for loving salman khan :x
he does have his own category..he does his own thing,
if an actor has good films..they have bad ones too..evne superstars
Folks, for wooden actors like Salman and John Abraham, you need solid axes like Santoshi, Bhansali, Barjatya. If these directors are not at helm, watch the movie at your own peril
Jabina: Certainly he has his own category, As Shammi Kapoor was having. They are not great actors but their so many films satisfy your hunger for entertainment and they play certain characters very well.
Jwalant:
Bro, I disagree here. even a good director cant bring out required acting expression out of wooden faces. Yash Chopra could do nothing with Deepak Malhotra. Though everybody on this earth can do little acting and we all do but Camera is very crual medium it catches the minute movement on the face. But perhaps when clap is given so called Non actors come under pressure and its like fear and tension in body if we fear of having injection in the body and result is plane face. Buddy, Salman and John both are not wopden faces. Both can act. but true they are not versatile actors so that can play any kind of characters.