Piku Review {3.5/5} & Review Rating
There have been many iconic Bollywood films set in Bengal like DEVDAS, CHOKHER BALI, PARINEETA, KAHAANI etc. And now getting deeper into the beautiful Bengali world is this week's release PIKU, which is set in a typical Bengali household. Will this film prove to be as iconic as its 'predecessors', lets analyze.
The film starts off with a day in the life of the Delhi based Piku (Deepika Padukone), whose world revolves around her architectural office, her colleague Sayyed Afroze (Jishu Sengupta) and her ever-so-doting father Bhaskhor Banerjee (Amitabh Bachchan). Life is absolutely monotonous for her. While her day starts off with her office and ends with her ever-worried-about-constipation father Bhaskhor. Despite all her efforts to brainwash him off the same, he refuses to budge. That's why she compromises with the existing situation, which also means that she has to cancel a lunch date in order to attend to her 'mentally constipated' father's constant SOS. Just when life is moving in a monotonous manner for the Banerjee family, a sudden decision to travel to Kolkata springs up. Because Bhaskhor rules out the possibility of travelling by air or train citing his constipated problems, the family decides to go on a road trip to Kolkata. One the other hand, due to lack of 'availability' of any driver, the owner of a rental taxi service Rana Chaudhary (Irrfan Khan) decides to drive the car himself. It is during this trip that Piku and her father realize a few bitter facts about life and about each other, courtesy, Rana, who doesn't believe in mincing words when it comes to calling a spade a spade. It is during this journey that a romantic tension develops between Piku and Rana. But when they reach Kolkata, a tragedy strikes the Banerjee household, which, not only changes the entire course of Piku's life, but also brings the entire Banerjee household to a standstill. What is this tragedy that strikes them, will Piku ever be able to find love and does Bhaskhor ultimately find a solution to his constipation is what forms the rest of the film.
Since the film comes from the stable of the 'thinking man's director' Shoojit Sircar and the 'thinking man's writer' Juhi Chaturvedi (best known for VICKY DONOR), the film holds immense promise/ potential as the whole. One has to applaud the way in which Shoojit has handled the sweet and simple tale of PIKU. This film will definitely go down as one of the films in his repertoire that demands a superlative applause. After VICKY DONOR, MADRAS CAFE and now with PIKU, Shoojit proves his supremacy as a storyteller. Even though the film is good in overall perspective, the climax is sudden and does seem to be left incomplete.
As far as the acting is concerned, this being an author backed role, no prizes for guessing as to it is Deepika Padukone who leads the show from all the fronts. One has to applaud this girl for making all the right choices in her career as far as her film selections are concerned. To stand up to the stalwarts like Amitabh Bachchan and Irrfan Khan is no mean achievement and Deepika successfully does that and how! All in all, she is excellent, sincere and shows immense growth as an actor. Despite his ever-so-towering persona, Amitabh Bachchan, on the other hand, is as down-to-earth as down-to-earth can get! Even though you will not find 'THE' Amitabh Bachchan and his famous mannerisms and baritone, you will be really shocked and surprised to see him in a new light. His behavior and mannerisms as a Bengali old man are simply outstanding. As for Irrfan Khan, there is no denying the fact that he is truly brilliant in his part. Despite the 'odd pairing' with Deepika, his onscreen chemistry with her and her family in the film really crackles up all the scenes. His interactions with Amitabh Bachchan are totally hilarious. The film also sees the 'return' of the ever-charming Moushumi Chatterjee back on the silver screen. In no way, has she lost the magic of her 'simplistic approach' towards her roles. She is an absolute endearing delight to watch in the film. The other actors like Jishu Sengupta and Raghuveer Yadav help the film in moving forward.
Since it's a simple film, the music of the film is also expected to be simple. And the film's music director Anupam Roy delivers just that. Even though there are not any chartbusting tracks in the film, the music of the film helps as a major driving force in the film's progress. While the film's cinematography (Kamaljeet Negi) is beautiful, the film's editing (Chandrashekhar Prajapati) is crisp. A special mention to the film's costume designer (Veera Kapur) for keeping the costumes 'in check' with the 'flow' of the film.
On the whole, PIKU is a must watch this season as it brings back the memories of the legendary directors Hrishikesh Mukherjee, Basu Chatterjee and likes. This is a film that shall grow with word of mouth.
