Street Talks…. Jab We met.. some random thoughts

December 11th, 2007Related|Filed Under

Amongst many other things, art is supposed to offer an introspection into a philosophy of life that one may not necessrilly pertain to, or simply not yet introduced to. Movies, perhaps by structure if not by virtue, are the most influential and most effective at that amongst all the art forms. Because, amongst others, movies don’t require one to pitcure the scenraio, the event, the situation, you actually see it all in the course of action, and yes there’s ways to decorate it through a thousand other non-connected, unrelated factors to enhance the effect.
For e.g. Amitabh’s Vijay brought with him a certain philosophy to life, that whether one agreed with or not, whether one followed it or not, came across as very attractive, simply coz there was a certain Amitabh with a towering personality bringing it on the table. His personality, on paper, my be an unrelated factor when one put forthe that philosophy but on the screen it’s very much a part of it all.
Or for that matter, Khanna in Anand, brought with him the utmost charm an actor can possibly bring with him to a character, and it worked wonders with the philisophy of life that the writers of his character vested in. So, as it is, with the two above examples alone, one cann’t deny the fact, that any tenet or thought system, specific set of ideologies, etc. one wills to put forward in a movie, works best by imbedding the respective qualities into its certain characters, preferably the main protagonists of a movie. So, if the director/writers of a movie wanna endorse a happy-golcky attiude to certain situations in life, it can be best achieved by romanticizing that ideology through certain charcters in the film that adhere to those qualities - cheerful, easy-going, breezy characters, more than having the underlining theme of the movie And if those actors involved can somehow muster out the required characteristics, not necessarily great acting, it goes a long way clicking with the audiences. Khanna is no great actor, and that’s something I’m sure every critic in the country will attest to. But at the same time, can his character of Anand be played as convincingly by any other star actor since his time, or even before him. Most critics, if not all, will say no to that as well. So how did an okay actor deliver such a performance, that will be hailed amongst the best of its generation, of not the best of all-time? ecause, Khanna brought him certain other characteristics, that complimented greatly with the philosophy of life the writers of Anand, or director of the film had attempted to present.

Now what has that all to do with Jab We Met? Well, the movie is nothing, .. there’s nothing noteowrthy about it.. and falters on sores of occasions. But the one aspect, and perhaps the most important in a film, it scores a home run on. Unlike hundreds of “empty/hollow” films every year, this movie has a base, substance at the core level. It’s not just a display of events of events of that happens into a few individual’s life. Here, the movie throws at you a “Geet” (played by Kareena) with a certain view at life that I, for one, simply don’t beleive in, well atleast didn’t one bit before watching the movie. A girl who lives on the edge, a girl, who thought is “girly” in every way, but unearths and touches upon the most complx of issues with her simple yet exrtremely profound take. Notice the scene, when she gives her take on Aditya (Shahid)’s mom. She so casually, so free-mindedly, so freaking carefreely tells him that her Mom did what she was suppoed to.. Forget slapping hypocrisy on the face… there wasn’t even any pretentions there, un-needed disguized talk, no phoney showiness, but straight outta heart words. Man, I don’t remember the last time such a question posed in a Bollywood movie, and there was no melodrama to go alongwith it. And where, at any other places, movie, or in real life, Geet’s handling of the situation (the way she said it) would be suggested as careless, rude and above all lack of class and ofcourse “stupid”… not to mention the total dismiss of her actual point of view on thr matter.

And talking of stupid, as you see the film starts off, specially in the initial reels, all you can think of while adressing Geet are words liek immature, irresponsible, naive and even foolish. But as the film progresses, we get acusstomed to “her way”, we see the reasongings behind her actions. She’s not immature and naive… but simple and carefree. She’s not indescreet, rash or insensitive but she’s simply not fake and showy and will call a spade a spade if she sees it a spade. Honest, sincere, and living life very much on the edge. And Kareena comes fully equiped on the table, she had it all in her to work out perfectly with the character. And it doesn’t surprise me one bit when I see how this movie became such afan favourite, inspite of being sandwhich amongst all those biggies.

On the film, as I said, nothing else really stands out. The story’s been done a million times. Guy, done with life, encounters a girl and the seriesof events thereafter forces him with her. First they hate each other, then they become friends.. and then.. well you know what. The dialogues, however, are really good. Old plot, same old story, and even the treatment not all that much diferent, butthe screenplay overall somehow keeps you interested throughout. And though there’s not really much stomach-aching comedy, there’s quite some qoutient of light-hearted comic moments throught out the film. Music was okay.. just found one song likeable.. and that too just about okay .. the “Nagada Nagada” track. As for teh performances. Well already mentioned about Kareena .. and how she is the single, by far, the best thing about the movie (lots of credit to the writers for etching out such a character). Shahid was just about Okay. The guy seriously needs to do his own thing and stop aping SrK. rest of the characters din’t have much of a role.. but I thought the guy who played Kareena’ uncle, I believe, (Narang from SrK’s Don), stood out amongst the others.

There Are 21 Responses So Far. »

Comment by rks on 11 December 2007:

Pawan Malhotra - Black Friday?

Good write-up. Aptly summed up.
“Old plot, same old story, and even the treatment not all that much diferent, butthe screenplay overall somehow keeps you interested throughout.”
Comment by ILG on 11 December 2007:

Good one Street.
Comment by Street Pharmacist on 11 December 2007:

thank you… Pawan Malhotra.. damn I loved his performance in Black Friday.
Comment by Arun on 11 December 2007:

Loved this film, one of my top-5 this year!

Kareena surprised me, never thought she could be so good. Career Best!
Comment by Sameer on 11 December 2007:

Great review Street! Pawan Malhotra is great actor, always loved him!
Comment by Sameer on 11 December 2007:

This movie will be remembered in future ONLY for Kareena’s performance!
Comment by shetty on 11 December 2007:

Excellent review SP. & Glad to see you back.
Comment by sandy on 11 December 2007:

“Amongst many other things, art is supposed to offer an introspection into a philosophy of life that one may not necessrilly pertain to, or simply not yet introduced to. Movies, perhaps by structure if not by virtue, are the most influential and most effective at that amongst all the art forms. ”

Well said Street and nice review.
Comment by sandy on 11 December 2007:

Beyond Kareena’s wonderfully endearing performance, there’s also an ironic, haunting beauty in the film’s script that makes it memorable for me.
Comment by Sash on 11 December 2007:

“The guy seriously needs to do his own thing and stop aping SrK.”

Don’t quite agree with this Street. It was possibly the first film where Shahid did his own thing very much in his own way as the character demanded so. His ‘Aditya’ provided the perfect foil to Geet. If Kareena was her effervescent best, Shahid’s low key act reflected a maturity that was missing in his earlier attempts. The actor definitely has a long way to go yet to take away credit from his is being a tad unfair…. don’t u think?
Comment by abzee on 11 December 2007:

Street- While I don’t agree with most of what is in this review, I must commend you for the writing in general. It is amazing how eloquent you can be, if and when you choose to. I only wish we’d see more of this Jekyll than the Hyde.

My take on art is a very different one. I belong to the Andy Warhol school of thought. Art for me is all-encompassing and self-sufficient. In other words, it is not and must not be dictated by any other concerns than the concern of itself. Therefore, I disagree with the general claim that art(and movies in particular) have a ‘job’ to do. They do, but this ‘job’ is more perfunctory in nature i.e. it comes with a responsibility of propagating itself. By that definition, it has no virtue…only structure. Students of formalism may find this difficult to digest, but in all art forms(cinema especially), one cannot overlook the myopic attitude of the expression and the artist in question. Take an OSO or J-e-M for example. What we are witnessing in the form of spoofs, tributes, whatever one calls them…is in fact referring to self. In other words, art can go only so far before it has to begin self-referencing. And this happens in painting, music, cinema, you name it.

Talking specifically about JWM, I know for a fact that this film doesn’t offer a ‘way of life’ vis-a-vis Kareena’s character. The movie is intended to be an existential journey. Shahid and Kareena represent two sides of the same argument. What Imtiaz leaves to the audience, and wonderfully so, is to grasp that these sides don’t necessarily impose to ‘taking’ them. There are no ’sides’ in existentialism.

Talking simply from a filmic point, I disagree that this is a done to death story. Apart from Cameron Crowe’s Elizabethtown, I can’t remember a recent film(let alone Bollywood) which has dealt with ‘man’s place in the world’. Imtiaz has always been a fan of Dostoevsky’s works(his Ahista Ahista is a much better adaptation of White Nights than Saawariya is, although the latter is much more truer to the text), and his movies though commercial entertainers, are actually existential arguments in disguise of popular fluff.
Comment by abzee on 11 December 2007:

Sash- I agree with you. JWM is the first time I actually felt that Shahid was being himself, and he was very endearing indeed. Of course, this is a Kareena show all the way and I’d really be upset if she didn’t win some awards for it come awards season. I’ve yet to see Aaja Nachle(will hopefully be catching it tonight), but I’m pretty confident that Kareena’s is the best female perf this year in Bollywood.
Comment by sandy on 11 December 2007:

“Talking simply from a filmic point, I disagree that this is a done to death story. Apart from Cameron Crowe’s Elizabethtown, I can’t remember a recent film(let alone Bollywood) which has dealt with ‘man’s place in the world’. Imtiaz has always been a fan of Dostoevsky’s works(his Ahista Ahista is a much better adaptation of White Nights than Saawariya is, although the latter is much more truer to the text), and his movies though commercial entertainers, are actually existential arguments in disguise of popular fluff.”

Excellent point Abzee, I didn’t think of Ahista Ahista in context of White Nights but now that you mention it, you’re absolutely on the dot. Imtiaz’s film was undoubtedly a more affecting and poignant adaptation of Dostoevsky’s idea of existentialism.
Comment by abzee on 11 December 2007:

Sandy- You will see that all of Imtiaz’s works(Ahista Ahista in particular) deal with exitentialism. That he disguises them and makes it accessible is precisely why I believe him to be the best screenwriter in Bollywood at the moment. Kashyap while a better reader of philosophy and psychology is often handicapped by his inability to ‘connect’. Imtiaz does this effortlessly, almost to the point of making me envious!
Comment by sandy on 11 December 2007:

“My take on art is a very different one. I belong to the Andy Warhol school of thought. Art for me is all-encompassing and self-sufficient. In other words, it is not and must not be dictated by any other concerns than the concern of itself. Therefore, I disagree with the general claim that art(and movies in particular) have a ‘job’ to do. They do, but this ‘job’ is more perfunctory in nature i.e. it comes with a responsibility of propagating itself.”

Abzee: While I too am a believer in the ‘primacy of art for its own sake and its own terms’ and as an aesthetic would say, ‘not the fruit of experience, but the experience itself is the end’, however, I don’t quite think that Street is necessarily objecting to that notion.
Yes, he used the line ‘art is supposed to’ but his point that new philosophies and ideas of thinking can emerge out of art and it is, in turn, the most lethal medium of propagation is very valid too.
Comment by abzee on 11 December 2007:

Sandy- My intent wasn’t to invalidate Street’s view at all. In fact, his is the more accepted ‘objective’ of art.

I do realize that Street isn’t opposed to my notion of ‘art’(how can he, when I’ve commented on his post and not the other way round!). My argument however, is with the ’suggestion’, which you make as well, that art can in any way give birth to new ideas and concepts. Art is concepts and ideas, so to suggest that it can propagate these things assumes a ‘role’ for it. The moment art is associated with a ‘role’, we delve into a seperate territory where art has to be defined and divided into aesthetic and popular. This always bothers me, for it is often wrongly generalised that art which can be popular must not be aesthetic and that which is aesthetic is never popular. Since the ‘job’ of propagating is a popular one, one can conclude(at its own peril) that popular art is lower form than aesthetic art. This goes against the very idea of ‘art’, as art by definition must indulge the senses. Which is why, I much rather prefer art servicing itself.

I’m not sure if I’m being clear enough, but I’m tired and have been writing for 6 hours at a stretch. Sorry to keep rambling.
Comment by jayshah on 12 December 2007:

Very nice review indeed. Thanks.
Comment by sandy on 12 December 2007:

“The moment art is associated with a ‘role’, we delve into a seperate territory where art has to be defined and divided into aesthetic and popular.”

I don’t think I spoke of art needing to have a ‘role’ assigned to itself(hardly!)but merely that it can be a wonderful medium for the exploration and experience of new emotions and newer philosophies. Not sure where the contradiction is.
Comment by abzee on 12 December 2007:

Sandy- Just fuh-get about it. I’m too sleepy, and must’ve been typing incoherently.
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