14.11.09

movie review Tum Mile

movie review Tum Mile

Critic Rating :
Tum Mile
By movietalkies
Friday Nov 13 4:15 PM
Director Kunal Deshmukh's second movie, Tum Mile, is a passionate, contemporary take on relationships, with the July 26 deluge as a backdrop. A word of caution here: the film is not really about the deluge but about two lovers who rediscover their love for each other in the midst of disaster.
The film is about Sanjana (Soha Ali Khan) and Akshay (Emraan Hashmi), who belong to two diametrically different spectrums of society. While Sanjana is the only child of a rich businessman, with a secure job, Akshay is a struggling artist, a typical case of opposites attracting. So far, so good, however, things go out of hand when they move in together. He loses his inspiration and is absolutely penniless while she pays all the bills. Each goes through their own hell and insecurities within the relationship but is never able to convey it to the other. They are like two hurting souls, who only further exacerbate each other's wounds every time they collide. Inevitably, they drift apart, break up, only to meet again on the fateful day, on a flight. Both are flying in to Mumbai and arrive to a city besieged with heavy showers, traffic snarls and flooding. The two go their separate ways, till the rain becomes too heavy and Akshay decides to go out in search of Sanjana. They find each other and navigate the city, surviving the odds and, in the process, rediscover their love for each other.
Kunal Deshmukh has done a fine job of etching out the love story between Sanjana and Akshay. In fact, his choice of actors for the two characters is quite impeccable. While Soha has that natural air of sophistication about her, and therefore seems to be a good choice for Sanjana, Emraan too is perfectly cast as the struggler with his passionate outbursts and need for solitude. The actor has a certain man of the street kind of air about him, which lends itself brilliantly to the current role.
Tum Mile, the love story, works very well indeed, but the disaster angle which the director brings in, is not as impressive. While Deshmukh makes a good attempt at revisiting the terror of that night, there seems to be something missing in the depiction. The sense of desperation and urgency is just not there. Actually, it never seems to be horrifying enough. Plus, the director seems to be in two minds about how important a role he wants to give the deluge. While on the one hand, the director gives a point of view from the Met Office two scenes in fact, he then quickly shifts the focus back to the oscillating love story of Sanjana and Akshay and their flashbacks. The deluge does not seem to have been properly melded into the main story. There are also some clichéd scenes like when the hero acts like one and jumps into the fray to rescue a small child, or the manner in which the hero's friend dies. But the director seems to have spent a lot of attention to details in the manner in which the deluge is portrayed and the flooded streets, recreating the disaster well, and the aerial shots are impressive.
To come back to the love story, it works very well as the actors seem to be quite involved in their characters and their lives, but again, the relationship is not very clearly delineated. The reason for their drift is never quite clear. In a sense, Akshay's character is bit of a cliché as he is the typical poor, struggling, honest and idealistic artist. Again shades of a cliché in Sanjana's portrayal, as she is rich and hence, controlling. Again, the deluge does not revive the love between the two protagonists, the process starts much earlier, when they spot each other on the plane, so the film's focus is not much surviving and reviving a relationship triggered by the disaster but more about the relationship. The deluge is just a by of the way, which is a bit of a letdown.
The film has been well shot and there are some beautiful shots of South Africa in the film. The flood too is well executed. One just feels that one would have wanted to see a bit more of the disaster and a little less of the constant flashbacks, for it to work and for it to play a stronger role in the dramatic set up. There's just too little of the flood and that too at the fag end, and therefore can hardly be the film's USP. The music, which has been composed by Pritam, is very easy on the ears, and the title track stands out.
One has heard enough about the huge sets that were erected to depict July 26, all of which is very nice. But the film is actually a love story from the Vishesh Films banner. Both the lead actors do their best and do full justice to their roles. There is enough passion and emotion here to justify this as a contemporary take on love, and is a must see for the romance.

0 comments:

Drugs rocket in AP