A Wednesday!

A million bucks to anyone who can guess what the title of this post really means. Hmmm...I guess, I could give one million and I'll need Katiyar's money to pay the rest. Anyway jokes apart, it's a movie title, and that too a Hindi movie.

Now for those of you who haven't watched this movie, watch it right now! I mean it. It is the best piece of advice I will have given for a while now, and it'll be the best you will have taken for some time. Of course, after that do come back. It's not that this post is a spoiler, I'm not cheap to spoil what could be your life-changing experience, but I finished it at 4:50 am Tuesday, 16th September 2008, and my windows time keeper shows Tuesday, 16 September 4:53 am. So I guess I needn't say any further.

So what is it about this movie that makes someone who usually enjoys going to sleep at 2 am watching objectionable content and then waking up at 10 am, sit up an extra 3 hours awake and blog about it.

Now I will not go into how good the "movie" was, that's something a critical reviewer or the guy who gets paid by both TOI and movie production houses does. I'm not going to analyze the acting, direction.. blah blah blah. I never do it and hate people who repestedly (now thats a spelling error that's not a mistake)crap about how oscar-deserving a negative role was or how well the actor was able to portray the hidden nuances of a hitherto enigmatic character. (References to any person living(or dead) are purely coincidental) Not that I don't do that sometimes, just that I disapprove of it.

A movie or for that matter an advertisement or even a comic strip succeeds in it's purpose if it is able to convey it's message unambiguously, tell it's story unwaveringly and with clarity. It's not about how short or how long it is. The portrayal may demand a seven thousand three hundred and sixty two pages or 10 seconds of recorded video, the length is irrelevant. It is the responsibility of the movie-goer/reader to be patient and willing. Here is where this 95 minutes 45 second-movie nails it. I was captivated, enthralled and engrossed, totally oblivious to everything else around me, transported for those 100 odd minutes to suburban Mumbai (which, the ones who have seen the movie will know and those who did not pay heed to my advice will have guessed, is where the movie is set)

This wasn't because of the direction or the acting. Mind you, both, I felt were top notch, but that's beside the point. It was because there was one storyline and the focus was on it, the direction was clear. There was no unnecessary song and dance(please stress on unnecessary, if it is necessary I'm game for it), no wanting to please the audience. What needed to be said was told, and the fat lady was called. (I'm not sure of the usage is appropriate, if you feel otherwise please keep it to yourself)

This is where a lot of movies fail. There is no direction, no focus, whatsoever, the storyline has loopholes a 5 year-old can identify, the actors overdo themselves, the actresses are busy 'out'doing each other and the audience for a lack of better things to do or rather an excess of time to pass, watches and revels in the inadequacy of it all. It is here that, 'A Wednesday' stands out.

The message was so well portrayed that for a minute after the movie I felt, "Saala, maa c#($@ye jaaye job, MBA, MS. Let me join IAS or IPS and change the system."

Thing to note: If you've noticed there are two instances where the actors swear or pseudo-swear. The first is cleverly disguised but the second is as clear as the straightness of Hugh Hefner. Now I am usually against the usage of profanities in movies. But the effect was electric. Who says only bad boys use bad words, vulgarities are used to vent one's anger, and by God, they're efficient at it.

PS: No animal was harmed during the writing of this post, other than the frog that has just hopped into my room, whose future looks uncertain to me. :)