'Barfi' - a movie review

Barfi – Review of the movie

For me the touchstone of a good movie is the lingering hangover- a simple barometer, the longer, the more intense, the better.

‘Barfi’ hits you like the aroma of freshly ground coffee as you step into a café. It stirs your senses like fresh air let into a damp room.

No matter the blatant copying of the Charlie Chaplinisque jokes, they are still so appealing and delivered with such panache by a brilliantly versatile Ranbir Kapoor.

A fragmented yet taut storyline set in shifting time frames, grips you from the start. Ostensibly, the story of a hearing and speech impaired boy (Barfi, played by Ranbir Kapoor) set in a sleepy hill station, Darjeeling, in due course, Barfi becomes a revelation of what ideal love should be. It depicts the innocent and fresh love that blossoms between Barfi and Jhilmil, an autistic girl portrayed remarkably well by Priyanka Chopra. Their love speaks of the desire to dance together to the beat of the other, to be able to see the world through the other’s eyes; a raw pure, primal attraction between two souls, where being together, always, is all that matters. Unhearing yet perceptive, Barfi senses Jhilmil’s elation with the dance-drama performers. In the final moments it becomes a thoughtful wedding gift!  Barfi stirs those long forgotten emotions - the desire to laugh, run and play, unrestrained and uninhibited like little children in the open countryside. A freshness and innocence long lost in the worldly cacophony. Perhaps, the hearings impaired have rightly more perspective on what a more fulfilling life should be.

The director cleverly gives the audience a view from both Barfi’s as well as Jhil Mil’s side. The blindening confusion of a noisy insensitive society is reflected in the blinking diffident eyes of an aptly named Jhil Mil. (She prefers to decipher the world inverted in a glass ball.)

And the keen perspicacity of a man who does not hear the vehement denials of a concerned caretaker guardian, but gauges the restless body language of a man who is lying. The powerful scene leaves you speechless!  

The backgroundscore is appropiately sprightly, to keep up with the verve of an upbeat Ranbir and solemn with the pathos of some truly poignant moments.

Barfi is a heart rending love story of a differently gifted young man and a woman. Or maybe no - Barfi is an eternal love story. Period.

 

My memories of a trip to Dang Forest, Mahal

Standing on a balcony of a forest rest house, overlooking a muddy river, one can hear the rustling leaves whispering a forgotten secret, the humming drone of a thousand insects, the rousing breeze that sways the green branches of the canopy over me and the constant gush and the mad rush of the brick coloured river breaking into white waves at the check dam...unspoilt, virgin, untouched by the decadent insidious fingers of commercialization. Open your eyes and one can see in the distance, tall trees draped in green foliage, stoically standing sentinel over a boundless, immeasurable ocean of greenery, with ebbs and troughs of grass and leaves rippling in the wild wind, the sun playing hide and seek with dusky, boisterous clouds........Mahal is Nature's lap indeed.

The intermittent chirping of invisible birds, a flight of birds cackling in unison, their unexpected crescendo, the calypso beat of a an elusive woodpecker,...forest ants marching down a green railing bar, all adding up to a magical symphony conducted by nature. I'm not the first one to be in the throes of this rapturous beauty, and I hope I'm not one of a dying breed! There are others happily ensconced in their simulated world of Angry Birds and Temple Runs!

Add caption

 

The population here mostly consists of marginal farmers with small plots demarcated by rickety fences. All day long one can see villagers (mostly women) doubled up, draped in dowdy saris, planting paddy saplings with back breaking ardour. Men ploughing the fertile fields with bulls abound. All along the way, wonder-eyed, half naked little children arrest your attention with their out-spread palms, innocent wonder in their eyes...many already burdened with siblings astride their gentle hips.



My Umbrella!



Does verdant nature have to be hand in hand with heart rending poverty? With nature's bounty abounding one wonders why can't the fruits of so called economic development percolate down to these adivasis? In an era of a vibrant industrialized Gujarat, one realizes that growth is perhaps never uniform. The alluring beauty seemingly camouflages this harsh truth. The irony is that this untouched canvass of beauty exists because of the protection that it receives being part of a protected forest reserve. 

You want to roll on the green meadows, like 70's heroines!

 

The river following a tortuous path amidst lush greenery. View from the top of a somewhat dry waterfall.



I am dreaming.... of a land of regained opportunities....of flying unfettered in sapphire skies....a phantasmagoria of aspirations and ideals.