Halla Bol

I'm reposting this from another blog of mine that I've deleted. So it is old from 2008

2008 starts of with 2 flops, Anthony Gonsalves & Halla Bol. Halla Bol is a Ajay Devgan starrer and directed by RajKumar Santoshi - a winning combination disappoints at the box office.

The Promos of this movie hinted "weak" all the way somewhat looking like a Yuva kinda script. Very rarely does a Ajay Devgan starer fail at the box office immediately specially when the role is author backed to suit his angry intensity in the skin of the character.

The movie starts of with the hypocrisy and deceit in the Film industry almost rubbing shoulders with Madhur Bhandakar's "Page 3"

Shah Rukh Khan and Aamir Khan it seems are also upset with indirect criticisms of their personal lives.

Three real life issues are tackled here:
- The Jessica Lal murder case: How the rich get away with murder with power and money
- Aamir Khan's Narmada Bachao Andolan- How political parties use their force to any person they target.
- Sarfdar Hashimi who was killed by goons performing Halla Bol in 1989

Halla Bol is the story of a man fight with his conscience and sacrifice for the truth at a very heavy price.

The Director- Raj Kumar Santoshi
RKS is a brilliant writer and director whose had hitting scripts and fast pace movies are always successful. Halla Bol is well conceived and well packaged to those who want to watch this type of cinema of the weak common man standing up to fight the system, goons and powerful politicians, the problem is it caters to a small number of viewers.

Why the flop?
Take a look at the script less Om Shanti Om, which is a super duper hit. The audience wants large sets, dream locations, fantasy lives and music to dance too.
Halla Bol is reality that people live everyday and in real life can never encounter goons or powerful politicians- so why watch it? That being the formula to the flop.


The Actor -Ajay Devgan
is a small time street play performer who makes it big in Bollywood changing his name from Ashfaq to Sameer Khan. His star life includes casting couches, false promises and betrayal to his family, it shows how fame can change a person.
Sameer Khan witnesses a murder at a party by some powerful people and like all the party attendees he too denys seeing anything- Jessica Lal murder case?

Soon he is pressured and threatened by politicians to withdraw from any involvement in the case. His effigies are burnt, Cinemas running his movies are attacked- Aamir Khan NBA Case?

The problem why the movie failed: We expected this acting from Ajay, it was nothing new.

The Actress- Vidya Balan
is Ajay's wife, she has practically no role. She has been given one important scene where she lashes out at the reporters.

The Powerful role: Pankaj Kapur
Pankaj plays a reformed Dacoit, his character is a Sikh named Sidhu who is fearless.
RSK has packed all the dynamite into Sidhu's role, Pankaj Kapur after Dus as Jamwaal is flawless and proves his mettle here and he has the hard hitting dialogues too.
Pankaj's acting is so intense it leaves Ajay Devgan weak in many parts.
Pankaj should probably get a supporting role award for this strong performance.

The music- Sukhwinder Singh
Nothing really worth mentioning except two slow devotional songs- Shabad Gurbani & More Haji Piya.

On the whole I enjoyed it, I'm a fan of Ajay's intensity and RSK's work. Too bad it failed at the Box office.

Verdict: 7/10

Tirza- Dutch excellence

Tirza tells the story of Jörgen Hofmeester, a middle-aged man who is desperately looking for his missing daughter Tirza who has gone to Namibia with her Morrocan boyfriend and since then not contacted of her whereabouts or her present condition.

Hofmeester's elder daughter hates him and his divorced wife curses and insults him at every given moment. His prized daughter Tirza is his 'sun queen' as he amicably likes to call her, the apple of his eye who he raised by himself after his wife abandons the family. The elder daughter has moved away with her boyfriend and his wife now decides to come back into their lives.

Hofmeester disapproves of Tirza's new boyfriend of Arabic origin (Morrocon) named Choukri who Hofmeester names Mohammed Atta; after one of the 9/11 bombers.

Hofmeester decides to go to Namibia and find Tirza himself after calling her endlessly for many days to hear her voice-mail only, he also receives no email.

He meets a 9-year-old child prostitute named Kaiza who follows him everywhere and accompanies him around the city in search for Tirza. Kaiza represents the ugliness of our planet and the poor conditions of the third world countries where children run after foreigners or tourists asking them "Sir, you want company?"

The good:
Surely one of the best dramas to come from the Dutch cinema, I thought though that suspense or even perhaps thriller (to a small extent) and even crime must be added to the genre too as it is one of those movies that keeps you on interested and you cling onto you seat to know what's going to happen next. Although a drama; the director ensures a medium paced movement of one scene to another which does not bore at any point.

The editing of this drama somehow added a touch of thriller to it in some parts, the clever use of flashbacks and well-integrated ghost-like appearances by a younger Tirza further flesh out the backstory before the script to its main location that is Namibia.

Actors in this small country come from strong theater academies, and Tirza is a strong and powerful drama that almost missed it's foreign Oscar despite it's heavy acting and cinematography.
The cinematography by Gabor Szabo is magnificent to the core, the Namibian desert is a glorious beauty.

Tirza on the whole is is brilliantly constructed, unpredictable and unsettling.

The Director
Director Rudolf van den Berg's ambitious work has a natural flow to the book that it is adapted from; Arnon Grunberg's novel of the same title.
The movie is highly literary and philosophical in non-aesthetic and non-sentimental ways. Rudolf van den Berg delivers surrealism realistic in every moment of his main character's portrayal.

The Actor
Hofmeester is middle-aged, retired, sexually frustrated, divorced, left alone with bitter memories of his elder daughter and taunting ex-wife. He is empty inside and has nothing in his life except the love for his daughter Tirza, Aschat he director conveys every emotion, his deteriorating sanity in a credible way.

The depressed tale also has graphic depiction of sex exploring human psyche with a unexpected ending.

Verdict: 7/10


IMDB LINK

Cast
Gijs Scholten van Aschat - Jörgen
Sylvia Hoeks - Tirza
Johanna ter Steege - Alma
Abbey Hoes - Ibi
Titia Hoogendoorn - Ester
Nasrdin Dchar - Choukri
Keitumetse Matlabo - Kaisa