Filmistaan

Filmistaan is a beautiful culmination of passion and emotion. The uniqueness of the idea and the real feel in treatment makes this film from Nitin Kakkar a special one. Constructed around the love for cinema thought, the writer was successful in pushing the envelope to discuss more things that also demands attention.

The movie focuses on the life of Sunny, a young man who aspires to be a superstar in Bollywood. He was struggling to get a chance to show his face and on his friend’s advice he decides to be a part of an American crew as an assistant director who wishes to shoot Rajasthan. This journey shatters Sunny’s life when he gets kidnapped by Islamic terrorists and was kept as a hostage for their demands. Sunny’s life as a hostage and also his attempts to come back to the home land is what Filmistaan telling us.

Nitin Kakkar has connected the many links we have with Pakistan in an impressive way. The people of both the countries have that love for cinema and in Pakistan it has this religious obstruction.   It also questions the terrorist attitude which tries to establish its ideology using the religion. That dialog from Jawwad about his childhood dreams was something that touches the heart and explains a lot about the condition in that country. Primarily the movie’s bone is made of cinema that connects two cultures which got divided in 1947. And to establish that bond Kakkar has included some hilarious and emotional sequences that show us the desperation of our protagonists to perform and create something. If they gave the movie a clear climax that ends on a filmy knot, things would have been slightly underwhelming but the climax they presented was something that showed justice to the treatment of the entire film.

Nitin Kakkar has created some rooted characters with his writing and with the direction that conceives the situation in the raw format adds more life to it. Many memorable sequences are there in the screenplay. The maine pyaar kiya sequence, the hostage video shooting, the escape plans, the different dreams of the film lovers and the character Jawwad whose life story created an ache in my heart. Dialogs were pretty good. Cinematography suited the feel of the movie. Music could have been better, but the BGM kept quality.

On screen I loved the   performance of Sharib Hashmi who did an excellent job as Sunny. The desperation of the character to use any platform that allowed him to entertain people was rightly conveyed by the actor. Inaamul Haq also did a fabulous job as Aftaab. The performance of Gopal Dutt was something took me by surprise as he conveyed the emotion even with his silence and it was a pleasure to see him do such a role (I have only seen him in The week that wasn’t). Kumud Mishra was also good as the intense Mehmood bhaijaan.

So to sum it up, Filmistaan should not be missed. It’s a unique film that utilizes the cross border emotions in a beautiful way. My rating is 4/5 for director Nitin Kakkar’s  Filmistaan. It’s a content that is accessible to everyone.