Directed by : Shoojit Sircar
Imdb link -> http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3767372/
Lovely and sweet take on Father-Daughter relationship by Shoojit with excellent performances by all 3 leads.
After giving successful and quality films like Vicky Donor and Madras Cafe, Shoojit Sircar is back with yet another terrific movie Piku.
An architect by profession, Piku’s (Deepika Padukone) day begins and ends with her father’s, Bhaskor (Amitabh Bachchan) highly irritating ideologies. They are Bengalis living in CR Park of Delhi. Rana (Irrfan Khan), is owner of Taxi company, whose taxi Piku always books for office or any other places she needs to go. And all the drivers are scared of her, because of her arrogant nature. Bhaskor decides to go on a road trip basically to his ancestral home in Kolkata, and Rana finds himself tangled into the trip as his drivers don’t turn up on the morning. And so begins the journey from Delhi to Kolkata, with Rana, Piku, Bhaskor, their servant and a special chair.
In the first scene of the movie, Shoojit shows a conversation between Piku and her dad, where she asks him to go inside toilet instead of roaming around house, to which he replies that he knows his system much better, she tries again but to no avail and annoyingly leaves for her office, and its followed by 'directed by' credits. Quite a wonderful way of telling viewers what kind of relationship to expect between Piku and her dad. Piku’s dad has a fixed thinking over various matters and has habit of bringing his constipation topic into the talks. While Piku shows frustration at not having her own life, with a child-like dad who even sends her office receptionist conspitation related message. She has no social life, and her dad doesn’t want her to get married because according to him marriage is meant for girls who have no I.Q.
What is beautiful about this movie is the subtle way Shoojit handles moments that in any other movie would be either very dramatic or over the top. For e.g., the romantic pairing of Piku and Rana comes across as very real despite no scene where they both admit love for each other. Infact, there are times when you think ‘Now they will, its surely going to go that way’, but it doesn’t. Add to it, the climax is so surprisingly good and unique to describe it in best way.
If you got a father who is ageing, who likes to stick to his beliefs and irritates you, would you stay together with him, or leave him because you also demand your own social and personal space? The movie touches this subject, but it never preaches us as we see Piku give her everything for her father whom she loves even though we see her get angry on him many times.
The plot of movie is pretty simple but its the narrative that keeps you hooked with excellent screenplay and dialogue writing by Juhi Chaturvedi. She gives us characters about a typical Indian family who are very relatable and whose conversations leads to many joyous and interesting moments. Dialogues are witty at times, but always realistic making the conversations delight to watch.
In one of the scenes, Bhaskor gives reference to her daughter as ‘She is financially, emotionally and sexually independent'. And there’s a scene where Bhaskor is singing a Bengali song during road trip, with Rana driving as Bhaskor tells Rana meaning of song since being a non-bengali he (and we viewers) wouldn’t know. He tells its meaning ‘this journey should never end’, and Rana quickly tells him to change song ‘koi aisa gaana gao jiska koi matlab ho’.
Anupam Roy’s music and background score is simple and gels well with Shoojit’s vision. Bezubaan, the best track of movie has the cinematographer Kamaljeet Negi showing us some very good shots of Kolkata. No song is used in totality, as Shoojit uses them in background mainly.
Only low points of the film would be, the bengali accent at places was missing and the 2nd half was slightly on slower side though the screenplay and performances negates that to larger extent.
Performances wise, the trio Deepika, Amitabh and Irrfan are fantastic. Its a dream star-cast, and as expected they didn’t falter even in a single scene. Deepika Padukone gets larger screen time, and its one of her best performance outdoing ‘Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani’. Amitabh Bachchan is so lovable in a role where he plays his own age, and behaves like a child like character who gets sad to know that nothing bad came out in his medical reports. Irrfan Khan may have lesser dialogues, but his body language is enough to impress. His unusual pairing with Deepika works so well specially the silent moments he shares with her, he effortlessly brings a smile on your face.
Moushumi Chatterjee is in top form playing Piku’s maternal aunt role with utmost ease. Good to see her in a hindi movie after a long gap. Jishu Sengupta is effective too in his small role, playing partner of Piku at her work place.
Piku is a lovely sweet movie that you will enjoy. Its entertaining and at times it also makes you emotional. With powerful performances by everyone, its a movie to be watched in theatre. In 10 years time, Piku would be talked along with classics like Golmaal, Angoor, Chupke Chupke etc.
Verdict : 4/5
Imdb link -> http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3767372/
Lovely and sweet take on Father-Daughter relationship by Shoojit with excellent performances by all 3 leads.
After giving successful and quality films like Vicky Donor and Madras Cafe, Shoojit Sircar is back with yet another terrific movie Piku.
An architect by profession, Piku’s (Deepika Padukone) day begins and ends with her father’s, Bhaskor (Amitabh Bachchan) highly irritating ideologies. They are Bengalis living in CR Park of Delhi. Rana (Irrfan Khan), is owner of Taxi company, whose taxi Piku always books for office or any other places she needs to go. And all the drivers are scared of her, because of her arrogant nature. Bhaskor decides to go on a road trip basically to his ancestral home in Kolkata, and Rana finds himself tangled into the trip as his drivers don’t turn up on the morning. And so begins the journey from Delhi to Kolkata, with Rana, Piku, Bhaskor, their servant and a special chair.
In the first scene of the movie, Shoojit shows a conversation between Piku and her dad, where she asks him to go inside toilet instead of roaming around house, to which he replies that he knows his system much better, she tries again but to no avail and annoyingly leaves for her office, and its followed by 'directed by' credits. Quite a wonderful way of telling viewers what kind of relationship to expect between Piku and her dad. Piku’s dad has a fixed thinking over various matters and has habit of bringing his constipation topic into the talks. While Piku shows frustration at not having her own life, with a child-like dad who even sends her office receptionist conspitation related message. She has no social life, and her dad doesn’t want her to get married because according to him marriage is meant for girls who have no I.Q.
What is beautiful about this movie is the subtle way Shoojit handles moments that in any other movie would be either very dramatic or over the top. For e.g., the romantic pairing of Piku and Rana comes across as very real despite no scene where they both admit love for each other. Infact, there are times when you think ‘Now they will, its surely going to go that way’, but it doesn’t. Add to it, the climax is so surprisingly good and unique to describe it in best way.
If you got a father who is ageing, who likes to stick to his beliefs and irritates you, would you stay together with him, or leave him because you also demand your own social and personal space? The movie touches this subject, but it never preaches us as we see Piku give her everything for her father whom she loves even though we see her get angry on him many times.
The plot of movie is pretty simple but its the narrative that keeps you hooked with excellent screenplay and dialogue writing by Juhi Chaturvedi. She gives us characters about a typical Indian family who are very relatable and whose conversations leads to many joyous and interesting moments. Dialogues are witty at times, but always realistic making the conversations delight to watch.
In one of the scenes, Bhaskor gives reference to her daughter as ‘She is financially, emotionally and sexually independent'. And there’s a scene where Bhaskor is singing a Bengali song during road trip, with Rana driving as Bhaskor tells Rana meaning of song since being a non-bengali he (and we viewers) wouldn’t know. He tells its meaning ‘this journey should never end’, and Rana quickly tells him to change song ‘koi aisa gaana gao jiska koi matlab ho’.
Anupam Roy’s music and background score is simple and gels well with Shoojit’s vision. Bezubaan, the best track of movie has the cinematographer Kamaljeet Negi showing us some very good shots of Kolkata. No song is used in totality, as Shoojit uses them in background mainly.
Only low points of the film would be, the bengali accent at places was missing and the 2nd half was slightly on slower side though the screenplay and performances negates that to larger extent.
Performances wise, the trio Deepika, Amitabh and Irrfan are fantastic. Its a dream star-cast, and as expected they didn’t falter even in a single scene. Deepika Padukone gets larger screen time, and its one of her best performance outdoing ‘Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani’. Amitabh Bachchan is so lovable in a role where he plays his own age, and behaves like a child like character who gets sad to know that nothing bad came out in his medical reports. Irrfan Khan may have lesser dialogues, but his body language is enough to impress. His unusual pairing with Deepika works so well specially the silent moments he shares with her, he effortlessly brings a smile on your face.
Moushumi Chatterjee is in top form playing Piku’s maternal aunt role with utmost ease. Good to see her in a hindi movie after a long gap. Jishu Sengupta is effective too in his small role, playing partner of Piku at her work place.
Piku is a lovely sweet movie that you will enjoy. Its entertaining and at times it also makes you emotional. With powerful performances by everyone, its a movie to be watched in theatre. In 10 years time, Piku would be talked along with classics like Golmaal, Angoor, Chupke Chupke etc.
Verdict : 4/5
