Saeed Mirza and Kundan Shah on Sankat City
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The reviews have started trickling in. Atleast from those who were lucky to catch a few private screenings of Sankat City. Filmmakers Saeed Mirza and Kundan Shah (blog) sent in their thoughts to us on Sankat City.
Saeed Mirza
I saw Pankaj Advani’s film ‘Sankat City’ and what struck me most about the film was its anarchic splendour. The underlying theme is the need for cash, and lots of it, by people to either repay debts, to rebuild lives or to escape to greener pastures.
Pankaj’s world is of thieves and con artists, film producers, fading stars, financiers and God-men, rag-pickers and cab-drivers, underworld dons, hit-men and whores, shady businessmen and shady suitcases, shady bars and dives and even the city’s vast and stinking dumping ground.As we journey through the frenetic and desperate lives of all the protagonists we realize that the film becomes a methaphor and a tribute to a city that really should be a corpse yet refuses to die.
Kundan Shah
(Pankaj Advani and nonsense comedy)Tags: Photo Gallery, Sankat CityPankaj has been remaking the same film again and again (not literally of course) – from Sunday to Urf Professor and now to Sankat City. The dominant theme in all three is an attempt to stretch a comic moment to an absurdity lasting two hours.
The story, the structure and the characters all interchange to achieve this sole purpose and knowing fully well that making a comedy is a tough business, creating nonsense or absurdity could be inviting trouble. That’s a huge task. Pankaj very well knows that – to be sublime or stupid is the only choice he has opted for.
Now nonsense comedy or absurd comedy or black comedy – please tell me the difference – when it works, it is magic. Marx Brothers in “Night at the Opera” created that sublime moment between Groucho and Chico when they get down to sign a contract. Those five minutes is sheer madness. It happens early in the film and frankly, the rest of the film, with its full MGM opulance, compares poorly. Those five minutes have attained eternity.
Sankat City, while you watch it, gives you a high and an expectation of being on a merry-go-round with a never ending fun ride. It does stumble here and there but finally manages to finish celebrating nonsense.
Very well casted, the actors are totally in tune with the filmmaker’s wavelength and you enjoy some very unique moments. What more can one ask for?
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
This is amazing…two fantastic film personalities writing a review before the film has released and even before many know about. Cinema supports cinema. I love nonsense comedy when done right. Chupke Chupke, Andaz Apna Apna, Golmaal.
now from what Kundan sir describes about, Sankat might fall in the lines of Golmaal. That is awesome
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thats two thums-up for the movie
… gr8
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overwhelming! cant wait to watch now! celebrating nonsense! ROFL! :-D
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“a city that really should be a corpse yet refuses to die.” coup de grace!
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Wah! That’s wnough reason for me to go see it!
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I meant ‘enough’
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Ah! the excitement keeps building up.waiting for the same eagerly!!!
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When is it releasing? I thought it releases today but can’t see in the listings? (Was out of town for a week so don’t know if any new developments have changed the schedule again?)
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Well, well!! I guess there couldn’t be a better day than 10th July!! Would be hard to convince lugaai-jee to watch this but what the heck! ;)
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Pankaj bhai all PFC members are gonna watch the movie the first weekend itself. Hehehe looks like there will be too many reviews and discussions on Sankat City on PFC after the movie releases. I really wish that such interest was generated India-wide.
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Tempo is building for Sankat City!!. Hope it lives upto the expectations !!
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Hindi comedy is going through celibacy. We want to break it and celebrate nonsense with Sankat City.
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i’ve been watchin promos of this movie on tv… but non hav been impressive…promos cud’ve been more bettr as they r key to atractin audience to theatres…not evry1 logs on to PFC to read these excitin blogs…
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All this promotion makes me not want to see the film before the official reviews are out…. don’t know why i’m having a feeling that this is going to be a bad film.. and all d promotion is just to save it…. anyway all d best to d makers!!!
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‘anarchic splendour’ – wow! I think these two words perfectly describe the film.
Bhavesh bhai tu ja na, Kambakth Ishq dekh na… billiant film…stallone bhi hain, brandon Routh bhi hain and promotion ki kya baat hai … mangalam mangalam…
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Kundan sir, when could we get to see your film again ??
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cant wait to watch this one, but unfortunately, not released anywhere in the US. so probably have to watch it on DVD when its out, if stream it online if it makes an appearance online. ( which i really dont want to do, but …… sometimes, the temptation to watch is too strong), especially when I am already so amped up about it…(PFC articles to blame)
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