I watched Vijetha today expecting nothing more than a throwaway low-budget cheeseball 80s film. That's a fairly accurate description, though Vijetha leans strongly toward soap/serial territory with all its second-half dialogues and angst over duties to ones family and all that jazz. Apparently, it was not a throwaway film in its day and did quite well according to this article, which goes as far as to say that “Vijetha is one movie that will remain permanently etched in every fan’s mind as one of the best movies of Chiru.” Hmmm...
Basically, the film tells the story of Chinnababu (Chiranjeevi) who has a heart of gold and would rather practice soccer/football then study and get a job. This frustrates his father Narasimham with whom Chinnababu, his umarried sister Lakshmi, and three other married siblings live in a joint-family-ish setup. Priyadarshani (Bhanupriya) plays the annoying, relentless, overly-cheery pursuer of Chinnababu despite his early rejections of her advances. Narasimham fears that he is nearing the end of his life due to his health problems and believes that his sons will not properly help their sister Laksmi be wed due to their money problems, selfishness, and overbearing wives. Much talk of duty and expectations is hurled about. Narasimham tries to sell the family estate but Chinnababu saves the day by committing a selfless act that the family does not learn of until the end of the film. Cue emotional speech and the ending credits!
I was amused by Chiranjeevi's direct plea to the audience at the beginning of the film to support him in the “new” kind of role he was playing.
So what about Chiranjeevi himself? This was my very first film of his, ever. All I really have to say is that he is one unattractive fellow. I thought his acting was alright. He certainly could express some emotion and use his body for a bit of physical humor and dance, but I'm sure this film is not the best example of the abilities of the infamous legendary Megastar! At least he looked the general age of his counterpart heroine unlike the icky films of today!
The songs are very silly and worth a watch for all the weird under-the-legs/crotch focused choreography, cheesy costumes, and 70s musical touches. I have always been a huge fan of Bhanupriya, and she looks gorgeous as always here.
I thought Sarada who played the character Saraswathi was elegant and gorgeous.
And the surprise of the day: Allu Arjun apparently appears in this film as a two-year old! I think Arjun can be seen vaguely sucking his thumb on the bed in the first cap and on the woman's lap in the second:
Arjun's older brother Allu Venkatesh plays the character Bobby, who I first thought was Arjun but according to this article is not.
For comparison, here is Allu Venkatesh (left) and Allu Arjun (middle) a few years ago.
And Allu Arjun's grandpa (and Chiranjeevi's father-in-law), the late Allu Ramalingaiah, plays the taxi driver Anjayaneyulu. I read up a little more on him, and apparently he acted in hundreds of Telugu films over his lifetime and was even awarded a Padma Shri.
A few more random things I noticed... Groovy beaded curtains and ingenious dish-slot kitchen wall organizer: Shameless advertisement I see this all the time in Telugu weddings. What is the square piece called? Priceless moment: Chinababbu uses his sister-in-law's sari pallu as a napkin
I’ve heard nothing but good things about this film every time I’ve seen it referenced. When I finally watched it Friday night, I felt very disappointed. After my first viewing it was just sort of a feeling of being let down. Then I figured that maybe it was partially because I didn’t fully grasp the story and all the characters, so I went back and rewatched some parts. That actually made it worse! This is one of my extremely long, meandering reviews that I have no idea how to organize, so I’ve tacked on some cheesy headers for you. General spoilers ahead, big ones in mouseover spoiler tags.
WHY THE LOVE? So why do people gush so admiringly about this film? I’m guessing it has something to do with the type of thinking found in Planet Bollywood’s review, which sees the film as “sticking a mirror in India’s face.” I think people were so impressed by the very mention/presentation of corruption and politics in an Indian film and the unusual and hardhitting story that it automatically is “a great film” with no further thought or analysis. The only voice of dissent I could find on the web was over on Qalandar’s blog that mentioned Hu Tu Tu as espousing an ideology of a “combination of naivete and charlatanry” and peddling “fascile cynicism.” My main reasons for not liking the film were that there were not enough plot details for me to buy into the story, and the shocking final scene at the end (think Dil Se, folks) was confusing and made the film questionable.
THE CHARACTERS
Tabu as Panna (LOVE the short hair!!) Sunil Shetty as Aditya (Adi) Patel Suhasini Mulay as Malti Bai Shivaji Satam as Amol Barve, husband of Malti Bai Mohan Agashe as Sawantrao Gadre Joshi Master Kulbhushan Kharbanda as P.N. Patel, industralist Nana Patekar as Bhau, a Dalit street-poet Arun, Malti Bai's son Gracy Singh as Shanti, Bhau's sister (before her Lagaan days!)
THE STORY
The film begins by introducing us to Panna (Tabu) who has been kidnapped. As she sits nervous and tied to a stair railing, she watches a news program being played on a television below. It’s an interview of Chief Minister Malti Bai (Suhasini Malay), who we soon learn is Panna’s mother. CM Malti Bai is asked if she is worried about her daughter, and she coldly replies, “No. My personal worries are much less than the nation’s. After the love and respect that I have received from the people of this country, am I still eligible to say that I have only one daughter or one son.” I thought this was a brilliant, brilliant beginning. I was in such a short time extremely interested in learning more about the characters. How can Panna’s mother be so callous? How did Panna get kidnapped? The possibilities were endless!
The film then switches to a long series of flashback scenes that explain the backstory to the kidnapping. Every once in a while the present-day kidnapping scene is returned to, often jarringly, and I was confused at times regarding what happened in what order. The story is very difficult to summarize, but I’ll try my best.
Malti Bai’s entrance into politics started when Mr. Sawantrao Gadre (Mohan Agashe) asked her to run a social work program. They eventually have an open affair that Malti Bai’s spineless husband never objects to. Panna and her mother have a distant and hateful relationship, and Panna grows up to be a course, confident, brash young woman with cropped hair and western clothes. Panna meets Adi (Sunil Shetty) and the two become lovers, bonding over their shared hatred for their parents and their corrupt ethics and love for their work/empire at the expense of their family. Adi’s father, PN Patel (Khulbarshan Kharbanda), is an industrialist who owns a factory in a nearby village. Panna and Adi visit that village often and befriend two social activists. One is Master Joshi, a man who respects Lenin, Karl Max, and Netaji, and the other is Bhau (Nana Patekar), a street poet who gathers the village folk to sing rousing songs with social/revolutionary themes. Bhau often comes to visit Malti Bai and confidently tells her what a terrible job she is doing and how terrible politicians are in general.
During another flashback to the present, Panna walks up the stairs and is stunned when she sees Adi (Sunil Shetty) who we later learn was presumed dead when he and Panna’s car crashed off a bridge. He looks at her with a glazed look and tells her, as if a consolation, that she won’t be tortured- just simply killed. He explains that she will be returned alive if one of their men is returned alive.
The movie then goes back to the past to explain just how corrupt Malti Bai and PN Patel became. After we learn the extent of their evil actions, we see that Panna has finally realized the truth about her mother, why she has been kidnapped, and the person that the kidnappers are waiting for.
ISSUES WITH THE FILM
I had a lot of problems with this film. I found the non-linear format of the story confusing. I actually went back and rewatched parts it to try to make sense of it, and I became more confused.
Plot issues/holes: • Why did Adi never contact Panna after the car crash? He could have recruited her to his group’s purposes. After all, they both bonded over the hatred of their parents work. • Why did Panna never learn of this group that Adi joined, and that Bhau was apparently apart of? She went to that village to meet Bhau many times, and she talked to Bhau frequently! • Why was Panna so surprised by her mom’s true ruthlessness? She claimed that her mother was corrupt but wouldn’t do something as bad as murder someone by proxy. Yet she was so close to Adi who knew his father had condoned the burning of the village near his factory. And when she sees the stories of Bhau’s village being burned on the news, why does she not wonder who was behind it? • Why was Panna so quick to consider an act of terrorism as the only solution? She had not been indoctrinated all that time like Adi, so what was it? Rage? Anger? Why not first consider exposing the corruption? Is it really that hopeless? • Why did Malti Bhai not freak out over her daughter visiting and believing in her most outspoken opponent Bhau? Why did she not question why Panna sat quietly as Bhau lambasted her verbally for failing to live up to her duties? • It was very WTFish that Adi would be able to reminisce with Panna about their past and actually show some emotion yet keep telling her she is going to be killed. And then there was that awkward moment when she asks him to make love to her. What kind of up messed up relationship is this?! • Panna’s complete change of character from the first half of the film to the second was very unconvincing. I get that the car crash and its aftermath profoundly scarred her, but come on. Not only does all of her mannerisms and style of speech change, but she grows out her hair and suddenly starts wearing Indian clothes and acting very quiet.
POLITICAL CORRUPTION, MOTIVATION
In addition to the plot holes, the film, despite having very heavy subjects at hand, never really discusses them in much depth or complexity. I started getting tired of having to listen to Bhau’s “common man philosophy” about how politicians are bad, politicians are corrupt, the poor people are the twinkling stars of the earth, that history repeats itself, that it’s not good to burn villages, blah blah blah blah. It didn’t help that most of the songs were of him repeating this stuff ad nauseum. The parents say things like “children in this generation ask too many questions” and the children respond “and we never get the answers,” yada yada yada. It’s quite black and white. Master Jyoshi says he considers Lenin and Marx the greatest revolutionaries and thinkers of our times but doesn’t give any detail as to why. The general feeling is that older generation politicians are bad, younger generation is pure and sinless and can turn things around. Except in this film there is no thought to turning things around- it’s a straight cut to terrorism! Apparently I’m not the only one that felt this way- this review has some nice thoughts on the subject of this and other similar films like Rang De Basanti.
While the film didn’t seem to be too keen on giving political motivation and solutions a complex shake, it did spend a decent amount of time in painting the politicians as real, breathing human beings gone bad by predictable forces. We see from things that Malti Bai says that she was able to direct such vicious acts by believing that the end goal for the “greater good” was greater than the means to achieve it. She and her associates felt they knew what was best for the common man, even when the common man protested it was not so. Their families were of no importance compared to the greater need. Anything that went against this good could be rationalized- even murder. That said, I did wish the film had given us more dialogue from Malti Bai regarding how she justified the murder of someone she was so very close to, or how Mr. Patel cleared himself of any guilt in ravaging the hamlet by his factory.
The title “Hu Tu Tu,” as the character Bhau explains, is the Marathi name for the game of Kabbadi. During a humorous moment in one of the songs, real footage of a bunch of politicians throwing large objects at each other in some legislative/congressional meeting in India is shown, and Bhau relates it to the game of Hu Tu Tu; politicians pushing and pulling each other down and only the most successful in doing this wins.
SONGS There are waaaaay too many songs in this film, and most of them feature Bhau singing and choreographing awkward moves with his villagefolk to revolutionary themes. They were in the spirit of “Chale Chalo” from Lagaan but after you see like four of these numbers you are sick of it. And the less that can be said of the two “Panna and Adi” romantic songs, the better. You can YouTube them if you really want to torture yourself.
GENDER ROLES Another interesting angle was that here the woman was corrupt and controlling and her husband was weak and submissive. It was quite heartbreaking, and I loved the gender role-reversal. Panna’s character also has a few “girl power” moments in her early scenes.
COMPUTER GRAPHICS
ACTING As a shock to me, Tabu nearly pulls-off the portrayal of a brash, ballsy young woman with cropped hair in the first half of the film. I say nearly because there still is kind of an awkward lankiness to her that comes through at times, but it was such a treat to see her acting so differently from the usual. She adds lots of mannerisms with her mouth and fingers which make it very natural. Her completely change of character in the second-half, which I mentioned above, has her back in her comfort zone.
I thought Sunil Shetty was meh... it's as if his eyes don't move much or register any expression, and that damn moustache irritated me! But the grand prize goes to Suhasini Mulay! She has such a range of expression and I so enjoyed watching her play such a strong and conflicted female character. As of course Nana Patekar. That just goes without saying. He is so effortless that he steals every scene he is in, including his final heartbreaking one.
LACK OF VIOLENCE I was expecting the film to be very violent and hardhitting like Hey Ram or other similar films, but it is not, despite how the plot sounds. Almost everything in the film is alluded to or talked about- we never see it. Only exceptions were hearing the gunshot of a character being murdered off-camera and then seeing the dead body with the wound visible, but it was not gruesome.
FUN STUFF Having some bad hair days...
I didn't know the Prime Minister was a visual artist on the side! *wink*
WHAT’S THE POINT? I wasn’t sure what the point of the film was. After the terrorist act in the end, we are shown a scene of Panna’s father leading a group of school children in singing the patriotic song “Jai Hind.” Huh? Was the act condoned? Condemned? Is the next generation being taught the same twisted ideology that turns them into corrupt politicians, or what?
MOST POWERFUL SCENE Despite my overall dislike for the film, there was one extremely powerful part in the ending- Tabu’s face as she looks at Adi right before their final act. I actually didn’t know the film would end like it did when I watched it, and I knew the moment I saw her expression what was going to happen next. It was like she embodied futileness, heartbreak, existentialism, self-righteousness, pride, and complete and utter despair all in one expression. Incredibly, incredibly powerful.
