Manjhi The Mountain Man

The story of Dashrath Manjhi is something that should be told through a medium like cinema as the determination the man showed and the problems he had to face were enormous. Director Ketan Mehta has tried to do that in his new movie Manjhi, The mountain man. Even though the film narrates almost all famous and key instances of Manjhi’s life, the movie lacks that influencing factor.

Well we all are almost familiar with the basic story of the movie. Dashrath Manjhi was living his life with his wife Phaguniya in the village Gehlaur. While Phaguniya was carrying their second baby, she fell from the mountain and because of the same mountain Manjhi couldn’t get her to a hospital on time. The furious Manjhi decided to carve a path by destructing the mountain. The 22 year long struggle of Manjhi for that path during which he had to go through many troubles, tortures and betrayals is what Manjhi the mountain man showing us.

It is the screenplay that mainly causes the lack of excitement in this movie. The sort of drama they have visualized in the first half surrounding the cast discrimination, the village head gangsterism and of course the filmy style romance of the leading man and his wife kind of makes the movie too commercial. The back and forth narration along with the voice over also takes away the intense feel of the film and at some points it even becomes a documentary. The Delhi journey and other pivotal instances looked like a loose end subplot. All I am saying is that the researches were great but the culmination of it as a script is not that moving.

The reason why you still like the movie even after being short of target by a considerable margin is Nawazuddin Siddiqui’s fantastic portrayal of the character. From the madly in love young man to the insane mountain breaking man, he transforms himself to Manjhi. Radhika Apte was good as Phaguniya. Pankaj Tripathi played the part of the antagonist nicely. A lot of characters with short life are there in the movie and they were all good in doing the roles assigned to them.

The making lacks the entice factor. The added up drama that mainly focuses on the love life of Manjhi looks too dramatic. Some of the VFX shots are compromised and overall dramatization somewhat takes away the realistic pain. Screenplay stitches all the major incidents in Manjhi’s life in a non engaging manner. I would like to appreciate the researches done by the makers as it gave more information about the struggle he had to face. Edits aren’t that crisp. Music doesn’t play much of an important role in the movie

On the whole, Manjhi as a movie is average. But the stunning performance of Nawazzuddin Siddiqui and the fact that a man actually did all this stuff will sort of move you. The rating for the Mountain Man story is 3/5. The movie may not inspire you, but Dashrath Manjhi will.