Pachan prosthetic pinnaala pOna super physical performance. - dasavatharam mattum maidha maavu kamal. Indha baradwajkku shame shame-na ennannE theriyAma pochu. En. Dasala kamal baady language theiyalaiyA?
In his own words, this is pattabhiraman-parminder syndrome.
My Take:
In one of the final sequences of Paa, Vidya (Vidya Balan) bursts out at her estranged (and now apologetic) lover (and the father of her son), Amol(Abishek) - “Just by lending your bloody sperm to me, you don’t become the bloody father of my son”. Shot beautifully in rain by P.C.Sriram, it is one of the key moments of the film for at least three reasons. One - it is such a powerful statement coming from an Indian Maa, enacted brilliantly by Vidya Balan. Two - It is the last moment of the film, as you would not empathize with any of these characters after this point. Three - It is an intentional/unintentional self mocking observation that the film makes, with only 20 more minutes for the Climax to come, so far not making its point about the rare father-son-son-father story!
Writer Balki takes this equation of a mother and father - a mother whose aspiration and devotion lies with the child and a father whose aspiration lies outside. The choice of their occupations brings an instant smile - She is a gynecologist (Who understands the bond to a kid, better than a gynecologist mother?) and He is a politician. Vidya and Amol, fall in love and break up because of a disagreement over abortion, all in a jiffy. They part ways, taking up their choice of responsibility - it’s the baby for Vidya and politics for Amol. Vidya handles the accelerated ageing of her kid ( he looks 60 though he is 13 years old), Amol tries to infuse young blood in the age old politics. Both of them are cool - they handle that “extra attention” that arises because of their responsibility, in the coolest way possible. (Vidya shuts the curious woman at the park amazingly; and for Amol, you have this long long episode involving media).Both of them are supported by their single parent. Balki even extends this mother-father equation to a man-woman conflict - Vidya lives with her mom and interestingly she grew up as a fatherless child; Amol lives with his father and there is no mention about his mom. This man-woman equation is full of contrasts - check out their introductory sequences - Vidya’s mother (A superb Arundati Nag) keeps asking repeatedly, “Tumae yeh bachche chaahiyae, ya nahi chaahiyae”, bothering least about Vidya’s fear about the society and career. Amol’s father (Paresh Rawal), interestingly, steps into the shoes of media and rival politicians and asks Amol every question that they would raise about Amol’s ambitious slum development project.
And towards the end, the whole equation is balanced by Auro and his little girl friend beautifully, though very contrived.
Let’s get this straight - Balki is definitely a smart writer. Right from establishing this setup and exploiting every interesting contrast that arises from it - Balki is a winner. Paa, at the best, can be defined as a series of tiny episodes of varying effectiveness, playing out without any frills. Be that quirky moment where Amol, the cool “visionary” of India, confesses on TV that not using a condom was a mistake or the Kichadi / Hichaki moment - Paa appeals instantly. Imagine this - Amol “legally” stops media from making any news out of Auro, helps Auro to remain a secret (Auro‘s friend quips, “Your secret is going to be out”), without knowing that Auro is his own son, whom he wanted to be aborted, to remain a permanent secret! (Ilaiyaraja underscores this beautifully by playing the same mood piece for the both the sequences). Paa is loaded with such moments, in perfect AD-Maker’s spirit!
But AD-Maker’s execution of this script doesn’t pass muster. Try hard, but you cannot shake off the feel that nothing much happens during most of Paa. Much of Balki’s ideas are clearly established earlier in the film and he moves towards his target, The Great Melodramatic End, accompanied only by these pleasing moments, making all those genuinely thought-out ideas look a bit contrived. Ultimately, Paa could have been better though its very enjoyable as a whole.I right way disagree with anyone calling the Progeria angle pointless. SPOILER ALERT On a completely different plane, Paa works as the story of an aborted-to-be baby, who lives and ages fast, reaching his end as soon as possible and makes his parents’ marriage a reality. It is chilling to note that he is sort of ‘deformed’ when his parents marry. The Corpus Clock (ChronoPhage, literally the “time eater”) is a mysterious clock; it keeps ticking without the hands and as you watch and shows accurate time only once in five minutes, making time fly. This clock features during the romantic episode to denote the rapid bonding between Amol and Vidya. The same clock makes a fleeting appearance when Amol carries Auro on his back. Time is defined differently for this whole family! END OF SPOILERS
If Auro suffers from Progeria, every character in Paa suffers from poor writing. Vidya Balan not only rises above her recent fashion disasters and box-office disasters, but also above her poorly written role and shines admirably as a doting mother. On a sarcastic note, even the characters suffer from accelerated maturity - Vidya from a careless young girl to the doctor who advices about right time for pregnancy; Amol from a love who suggested abortion to the one who says “I will kill anyone who destroys my son”.
If casting Amitabh as Auro is a masterstroke, advertising Paa as a rare father-son-son-father story is a marketing masterstroke! Paa works better as a mother-son story by all means.Anil Naidu is already at the receiving end for his not-so-easy-on-the-eyes editing of Ittefaaq se sequences, but it is an interesting idea - the editing takes the role of the narrator here (They bumped into each other - drank coffee-fell in love..). The brief shot of the power-cut dark slum is enough to appreciate cinematographer P.C.Sreeram. And then you have Ilaiyaraja, who creates the mood for the film impeccably.
I haven’t mentioned about Amitabh Bachchan - Auro, the hero. I am reserving it for those of you gonna watch this film, as Paa, much more than anything else, is a pleasing as well as rewarding date with Auro aka Big B.
movie was anything but thatOriginally Posted by Appu s
.....yaar kooda pona :P
eh?? the mother-son and grandma-grandson relationship(boy-woman) is to be taken as a counterpoint?......
the "pleasing moments" were pretty much scattered in the movie which made it look very unstable and gave the impression of a oscillating characterisation/screenplay......
i kinda liked that abhishek dominated for most of screen time because the film is about "Paa" after all and not Auro.......but in the process of this makeups, sensationilising, - the screenplay suffers a lot......im very apprehensive now on such "different" indian films........Sivaji for example was an extremely good looking movie but way below shankar's screenplay tightness.......i think they waste so much in these things that they lower the priority for writing
_________
Rahman's music is the ringtone on God's mobile phone
NI colleagues kooda than.. Time pass konjam rude than..paathuttu vantha vegathula ezhuthitten.. it was big let down for me... the enjoyable scenes for me were Auro's Oneliners and Vidhya's single mother performance.. abhishek's scenes were fit for nothing.. those media bashing scenes..movie was anything but thata cliched climax...
eh?? the mother-son and grandma-grandson relationship(boy-woman) is to be taken as a counterpoint?......
Nope. I felt it worked as meeting of two worlds -> Mother, GrandMa on one side, Father, Grand Pa on the other side. Auro and the little girl are just role reversals of Auro's dad and mom (one being apologetic and other being adamant). Of course, all these didnt come out very strongly. May be it was intentional.
Of course, "to be taken" nu solla maatten. Idhellaam chumma namma adichchu vidradhu dhaane.
the "pleasing moments" were pretty much scattered in the movie which made it look very unstable and gave the impression of a oscillating characterisation/screenplay
Agree. I too felt that. >>Try hard, but you cannot shake off the feel that nothing much happens during most of Paa.>>
Nakkerar:indha kavidhai ningal ezhudhiyadhu dhaanaI didn't read the whole reviewyes - i know u liked Paamaddy did you write that review for Paa?Too long adhaan ketean avlo periya review neen ezhudhinadahnu
nallavela paathadhillathats bcos u havent seen her with me
Dharumi: naan dhaan ezhudhinen.pinne, mandapathula yaaro ezhudhi koduthadhaiya vandhu padikkaen
:lol - nom , was reminded of that conversation
npNakkerar:indha kavidhai ningal ezhudhiyadhu dhaanaI didn't read the whole review
Dharumi: naan dhaan ezhudhinen.pinne, mandapathula yaaro ezhudhi koduthadhaiya vandhu padikkaen
:lol - nom , was reminded of that conversation
_________
Rahman's music is the ringtone on God's mobile phone
Seriously more than 10 sentences reviews should be banned
From the pA thread on IR's music forum :
Watched pA.
I loved the way songs are placed in the movie, helping to move the narrative rather than stalling it. My most preferred way. Also, there's no "lipping" the lines
The best one is 'hulke sE bOlE' and it was goose pimple stuff for me with eyes swelling with tears, one great song finally found presence on-screen. That too at the beginning of the movie, also indicating that IR has got a "puththam puthukkAlai" north of vindhyAs
'mudhi, mudhi' (and the other two nice variants) are placed at appropriate places, helping to move the narrative beautifully. Serves as great BGM / OST as well.
'hichki-hichki' is kind of MR style but with much less effectiveness. Same goes for 'gum sum gum', ok but not so much effective.
Other than the songs as BGM themselves, on the music front, there wasn't much I could appreciate personally - average stuff from IR with the exception of the 'pA' theme ofcourse. Actually, even that theme somehow didn't stand out on the movie.
Except the confusing characters of Abhishek & Vidya, I liked all others. Ofcourse the big B is lovable and a commendable effort.
On the whole, an average movie, that could only raise on me, say, 10% of emotional 'pongal' of movies like anjali. May be that's the intention of the director (and he's quite successful in the north with this level). Personally, I'm quite fond of strong scenes (e.g. Appu walking dejected upon his mom's negative comments about his height) and felt that way only on the opening scene when 'hulke sE bOlE' was played. (And I've seen and appreciated an exhibit item similar to the winning one in the movie, in 1996 at NYC, talked about it to 100's of friends, and it's something close to my heart personally).
Well, I'm happy the songs are successful and IR got his second commercially hit movie in Hindi. Other than that, an average movie (though better than many TF movies I've seen in the last few years).
Kambakkt Ishq!
Back after a while...
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