A love letter to the city of dreams
the girl surprised by how nice she looks in the picture would at t e s t , i t i s al l about t he beholder.
Her name is Miloni, and while an academic overachiever, she has never been made to feel special. Her reaction to this picture is one of disbelief — and trust. This touristhunting photographer has somehow found something in her, making her feel less plain. What else is there?
The photographer has his own problems. His belligerent grandmother is holding him to ransom, stopping her medication until he picks a bride. Backed into a corner he says the girl in the picture is the one for him, thrilling the old lady who then wants to spend time with her. It is a situation straight out of classic comedy — but Mumbai doesn’t always feel like a comedy, and the thing about farce is that pratfalls actually hurt.
Sanya Malhotra is superb as Miloni, boxed in by her own hesitation, while the standout performance comes from Farrukh Jaffar, playing the wise and outspoken grandmother. Nawazuddin Siddiqui is fine as the photographer, but the actor predictably endows him with his usual mannerisms.
‘This is a country so big it has room for anything,’ a character says at one point. ‘Anything except what it has forgotten,’ someone adds. Photograph is a poetic film that allows us to believe in minor magic. It is a film about a city with room for everything, from formula films to ghosts. Like when posing for a camera, all we need to know is where to look.
In Hindi, sexually transmitted diseases are coyly called “gupt rog”. They are treated as an illicit secret, and this unfortunate stigma al l ows director Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra to stage a most charming scene of courtship in Mere Pyare Prime Minister. In his new film, a young man takes a young woman, a victim of rape, to a clinic to get tested for STDS and, noticing her shame, announces he needs the tests himself. It is only after himself braving the nurse’s condescension that he offhandedly asks the woman if she’d like to be tested as well, since she’s there. This is chivalry at its most effective.
Don’t be fooled by the primarily waist-high cast. This film opens with women from a Mumbai basti making bawdy jokes about their bedrooms, cuts to a man getting children to sell hashish, and then gives us a glimpse of that item song about a woman who repeatedly needs to be reminded of her name. Sex, drugs and Katrina Kaif. Right from the start, Mehra makes it clear this isn’t for kids.