GURU | A Review January 12th, 2007 · 7 Comments My father advised me not to dream. Dreams never come true. But I saw a dream, says the deep baritone of Abhishek Bachchan with Jaage hain track trying its best to make its presence felt through the background. Thus begins the movie with high expectations considering the starcast and the infallible Mani Ratnam.
Gurukant Desai (Abhishek Bachchan) is the son of a teacher belonging to Idhar village in Gujarat. But Guru is a failure at studies and has made big plans to go abroad to work. His father though never believes in the ability of his son. Guru is amazingly ambitious and supremely confident about his abilities. So he joins Shell in Istanbul, Turkey, selling oil cans and does very well in that job to merit a promotion within 3 years. When offered the promotion, Guru refuses saying, Agar main idhar achcha kaam kar sakta hun to khud ke liye kyon na karu! (If I can work so well for some foreign company then why not work for myself?). He leaves the job and returns to his village to pursue dreams of setting up his own company. Guru marries his best friend Jigneshs sister Sujata (Aishwarya Rai) who is one year elder to him and even though she tried to run away with someone from her village because he will receive a lot of money in dowry from Sujatas father with which he can start his business. And he also promises to make his best friend-turned-brother in law a partner in his business. So everyone is happy with this deal and the marriage is ritualised! Guru, Sujata and Jignesh then proceed to Bombay to try their luck which Guru is absolutely sure is going to click. He is supremely confident of making it big in Mumbai. But he faces a slew of obstacles and emerges out of them successfully through plain guts (never is any unethical practice shown which is somehow brought up towards teh end!!) which border on foolishness. After a few successes with the help of Gandhian newspaper owner fondly referred to as Nanaji, Guru becomes very confident and starts making rapid strides. Jignesh cannot keep pace and leaves Guru and also takes Sujata with him. Guru, on the other hand, though is slightly worried about these happenings. But he has reached a point of no-return and continues with completing those large half-strides that he has already taken. He goes for a public issue and creates his own company manufacturing polyester and keeps growing. Somewhere along the way he goes back to his village and brings Sujata back home. Guru finally reaches a stage where he begins using the media and others to achieve more success. Nanaji suddenly (another point of concern here is that, the war cries are let out on what the audience sees as something harmless) realises this is where their roads clash and resolves to fight Guru to the end. According to Nanaji, Guru has now become a disease of the society that needs to be stopped in his tracks. Shyam Saxena (Madhavan) is nanajis protege who believes that people like Guru need to be jailed and the key thrown into the sea. So, the movie builds up to the interval as a fight between Guru and Nanaji (through Shyam) with Guru saying, Mujhe koi nahi rok sakta. Na aap, na yeh Shyam Saxena, na yeh akbaar!. (Nobody can stop me. Neither you nor Shyam Saxena or your newspaper!) When I got up from my seat during the interval I realized my eyes were aching because the camera had moved so much that it almost had me tired. I was tired of watching those close-ups. In order to avoid covering much of the background because it was a period setting the camera was focussed on close-ups rather than any other beautiful reason that the camera man Rajiv Menon can conjure. And as the timeline approached the 80s it was relatively safe to take those long shots. I thought the cinematography could have been better. Atleast by Manis standards we have seen much better pictures than the work done here. This looks like Manis first shot at a period film (A classic called Iruvar was also by the same gentleman, Guru ends during the late 90s or around that time) and it shows through the cinematography. All that unnecessary slow motion shots during the climax court scene made me feel dizzy. But I should mention that the movie is crystal clear visually - no dots, lines, nothing. Pure digital print I guess. Coming back to what happened after the interval: The fight between Guru and Nanaji climaxes with the shareholders of Gurus company questioning his ethics and integrity. Guru lands up in a lawsuit and how he wriggles out of it forms the remaining part of the story. The dialogue in the climax is good and hard-hitting but needed more populist punchlines. The applause that Mani expects to generate in the audience during that scene is obviously missing and that is very embarassing for a movie-maker of Manis calibre. Frankly, I was not impressed with the movie at all. A typical rags to riches story is what we all knew it was about. But then with Mani Ratnam wielding the microphone you expected better stuff. Alas! Mani misses the bus! The execution of the story lacks conviction and is too unbelievably fantasy-like. For starters, nobody understands the concept of shout and trade market unless they have been through a similar experience somewhere before. So, for most part of it you dont understand what is going on when Guru tries to get the market opened after its closed down for apparent gambling. Nanaji seems to have just come along wanting to meet an angry chap on the road during his morning walk. His taking of a sudden interest in Gurus case makes for a no-brainer to me atleast! And instantly the very next day he publishes a story about the closed boundaries of Mumbais trading market - I mean Rupert Murdoch would be proud of his ability to respond so quickly to an angry and shouting strangers case. Sujatas character could have been developed further in an intelligent fashion. She is reduced to cooking and household chores throughout the movie but in the end she becomes a 50% shareholder in Gurus company and a promoter too! Voila! Wonder what the remaining 30 lakh shareholders were thinking! Whatever Guru does in Istanbul is fairly Greek and Latin except for the three-glasses game. Gurus character had great potential, but Mani concentrates on one too many things within the three hour 70 mm format and loses focus of everything. Guru shows so much of passion to achieve success abroad while studying in Gujarat and when he is offered a promotion he reveals to a stunned audience that he wants to go back to his village and make it big there. Huh?!! If not for the hazaar interviews and over a lakh of trailors on the television I would have fallen off the seat when that happened. Guru develops a circle of people whom he trusts unquestionably. And in business those are the people that decide whether you go up or down. And Mani doesnt show us how Guru develops that group of people. Guru seems to be a character that would have had a flair for sizing up people in the first look itself but Mani choses not to show that aspect. Guru is shown to be a man of just one aspect and that is MAKE IT BIG. But Guru is not that alone, Guru treats Nanaji as a father-like figure, Guru loves his wife, Guru loves his children, but then how did he develop such an apathy towards his brother-in-law? Or is it just that it was convenient to forget about Jignesh once he left Guru? Either the editor or the story has erred completely on these aspects. And what is this obsession with rain? Who in his right mind would hold a shareholder meeting under rain? Especially when all the previous meetings had a roof, this one meeting there is no roof and it rains too! I mean God must be so mean! Abhishek Bachchans acting towards the end falters a little in terms of being consistent with the facial experessions. The songs are placed so badly in the movie that if I were A R Rahman I would just sit and cry because you dont expect Mani to make such fundamental blunders. Barso re and Ek lo ek muft are the only songs that are in the place they were meant to be. All the other songs seem utterly out of place. Jaage hain was the most dissappointing for me. The greatness of the song is totally lost in the awkard placement. But yeah, there are good parts in the movie too. The theme of the movie is an excellent one in todays times. Dream big and get going. If someone tries to throw muck at you go further ahead. Amazing message. And finally there is the touch with reality too - showing the system and its fallacies. How the system itself produces a person that it finally comes to hate is a fantastic depiction. The narrative that is started is suddenly given up somewhere along the line. Not that you miss it, but then you expect Mani to keep a track of such things. The performances are good. Nothing to get excited about. Abhishek excels. And shows shades of his legendary father during the last scene. Especially when he says, ..yeh haath aise hi latakta rehta hai ( this hand that hangs ) you are instantly transported to the Vijay Deenanath Chauhan of Agneepath. Good work Abhishek. Aishwarya is sadly relegated to nothing not even background. A cute song to start with, a few dialogues here and there, have kids and smile into the sunset. What a role Mani! I am sure Suhasini would have voiced her concern with you about it! Mithun da is the smashing package. You love him when he supports Guru and hate him when he criticizes Guru. Thats the dynamite that Mithn da is. And not only by seniority but also by performance he establishes why his name should be flashed first during the title credits. Madhavan and Vidya Balan have no chemistry whatsoever. When Madhavan proposes marriage I almost spat out the popcorn. I was like..what the [EMAIL PROTECTED] is happening here? Madhavans costumes make for an interesting study item. Only when he goes out for stories does he wear khadi kurtas and while at workplace and home he is either in casual shirts or t-shirts! Hillarious that was! I mean stereotyping ki bhi koi hadh hoti hai yaar! (There must be some limit to stereotyping!) Vidya Balans character was what I fell in love with. The objective lens of the movie. Everyone she loves is fighting with one another. But she knows the true thing. The right thing. Stunning character. Whatever stars I give in my rating will be for Manis ability to visualise a character of this sort. But then the execution of her character on the big screen failed big time. The art direction though very detailed and precise and all that engineering good stuff you want to say about it. It looked artificial. Maybe I dont have the eye for sets, but then this is my review, right?! Mani Ratnam could have slept though this movie. I believe in this mans ability and know that he will make another classic in an years time and it will be called Lajjo. You have failed in Guru though, for me atleast, thats the truth. Rating: ** Legend: *Stay at home **If you have the time to kill, go ahead, but not recommended ***Watch if you are a film buff! ****Go watch it on the big screen! *****Dont miss watching this one on the big screen! Avoid piracy! http://www.mysorean.com/2007/01/12/guru-a-review/
