Movie Review – Silsila

Typical Indian Melodrama Conundrum

‘Silsila’ is yet another step of mine towards the road to Bollywood literacy. Like millions of other movies, this movie too is saved by the music. Incidentally, its not by R D Burman, but by Shiv-Hari. A name I haven’t heard of till now. So, another step towards my Bollywood literacy. But if not for the music it was a really tedious watch and tough to sit. Adding to the misery was the duration, which was a good three hours so it felt like a lifetime before the movie got over.

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Seems that the movie was flop at the time of release. But became a cult with time. Got to know that the real-life story between Amitabh resembled the film, maybe that’s why it got a fan following with time. Otherwise, it was a pretty insipid subject. Shekhar Malhotra (Shashi Kapoor) is a squadron leader with the Indian Air Force who’s in love with Shobha (Jaya Bachchan). Shekhar’s good friend Amit Malhotra (Amitabh Bachchan) meanwhile tries to woo Chandni (Rekha). During a meetup with Shekhar, Amit hits it off well with Shobha. The dialogues and the relationship between the three were nothing but cringe worthy. Especially Amit’s idea of how they love each other and the ‘nanga naach’. Seriously?

In sometime after giving a lot of hype about Amit, Shekhar dies. Shobha asks whether he’d marry her. Again, seriously? So, he does and continues to have an affair with Chandni. Whom he had encountered by a chance accident. It’s a bold move to have such a storyline with a top actor. I don’t think any other lead would do an unheroic, beta male, negative character. In fact, out of the three, Amit is the most hateable character. But in spite of that, the movie falls in the familiar terrain with Shobha shown as a woman with a heart of gold and Dr. V. K. Anand (Sanjeev Kumar), a comic relief. But Sanjeev Kumar actually does a fabulous job.

There are lot of twists, everyone they see are related somewhere and characters come out of the blue. With a film with these many twists, it should have been far more interesting but every twist looks forced and irritating. Even the characters were neither written well nor acted well. Jaya Bachchan was clueless and her role was written with such disdain that the soap operas would win in a race with her. Rekha on the other hand was a glam doll in a variety of sarees. The only saving grace was a subtle Amitabh. In spite of not being a big fan of this version of Amitabh, there was so much control in his acting. He constantly repeats that he’s after all a human, with so much tiredness. Something which only Rajni could achieve after all these years of glory. A relatively young Amitabh able to emote in such a grand manner was a pleasure to watch. Apart from that it was an extremely tedious watch which couldn’t even be a guilty pleasure like Karan Johar’s never ending saga.