Movie - Guru
Director - Mani Ratnam
Producer - Mani Ratnam, G Srinivasan
Music Director - A.R. Rahman
Actor - Abhishek Bachan, Aiswarya Rai, Mithun, Vidya Balan, K Madhavan
Date of Release - 12th January 2007
Maniratnam, A. R. Rahman, Gulzar , Rajiv Menon and a lot of hype had really raised my expectation from this film. In addition after Abhishek's performance in Dhoom 2 he really needed a platform to prove his mettle, which he got and delivered in a way no other could.
The film from the starting to the end belongs to Abhishek Bachan, and you never know but this could become one of the best performances of Abhishek's career and may even ring the box office registers. The movie begins with a shot of Gurubhai (Abhishek Bachan) standing in a huge empty stadium saying that "Bapu kahete hain ke sapnay nahi dekhne chaihe"..... flashback 30 years before where Abhishek is shown as a young teenager migrating to Turkey to work as a delivery boy in a oil company. Seven year later hard work, intelligence and luck is earning him a fat pay package and a promotion. The entrepreneur bug inside Gurubhai prevents him from working any more for anyone else but rather starting his own "biziness".
Landing back in India he decides to marry his friend's sister Sujatha (Aishwarya Rai) for dowry which would enable him to start his own business. Together with his wife and brother in law he heads for Mumbai where he starts off as a textile trader. In the beginning of his career Maneck Dasgupta(Mithun Chakraborty) who runs the "Independent" paper, acts as a mentor to him.
Few years down the line Guru manages to build up a big empire (Shakti Enterprises), but has that been done in an ethical manner ? That's the question which troubles Nanaji for which he assigns Shyam Saxena (Madhavan) the duty of exposing the real insight of Shakti Enterprise , and how it might be growing expsing the loopholes of the laws or by bribing various officials. What happens next is a cat race between Madhavan and Guru is quite an experience to watch. Madhavan is hellbent on exposing Guru whereas Guru seems unfazed by the same. Some of the confrontations scenes are really a delight to watch esp. the scene in which Vidya Balan (Don't know what's she doing in the movie) is kind of stuck between the Nanaji and Guru based on their ideologies.
The climax of the film is definitely one of the highlights of the movie in which he delivers and the audience is spellbound. The voice at times resembles to that of Amitabh Bachan and the performance is also nothing less than that. Without revealing much about the end Guru is sure an enjoyable experience.
The highlight of the movie is undoubtedly Abhishek Bachan who has shown his real class in the movie. Aishwarya has also done a great job though her role was not as demanding as that of Abhishek. Mithun comes up with a good mature performance showing the class he is made up of. Madhavan also does a good job though he does not get a chance to offer much. One of the surprise of the film was Vidya Balan whose role was not that significant but still I guess any role in a Maniratnam movie is not to be missed.
A.R. Rahman does a great job for the background music. In spite of being a great fan of A.R. Rahman the songs definitely do not match his high standards though they have been picturised to perfection. "Jaage Hain" and "Guru bhai.." are positioned as the theme of the movie and are really a pleasure to listen any number of times. One more song, which plays in the background for Vidya Balan is also hummable but for some strange reason was not present in the Audio CD(like the Guru Bhai.. song). Most of the other songs has not been played to their full length and hence does not hamper the flow of the movie. Gulzar saab's lyrics are great and so is Rajiv Menon's work.
Finally hats off to the great man Maniratham for extracting so much from Abhishek Bachan and giving us a pleasurable movie experience. There are quite a few scenes in the movie which Maniratnam has crafted beautifully and probably like no other could have. The starting of the movie, the climax and the confrontation scene between Mithun and Abhishek to name a few.
All in all Guru gives a great start to this new year and definitely not a movie to be missed.
Rating 4/5
