A reporter for All India Radio is heading to his next assignment when he meets a young woman at a lonely train station. Before he can bring her tea she steps on a train and disappears into the night. Haunted by the girl, he never suspects he will run into her again; only when he does, she doesn't seem to remember their meeting. More chance meetings lead to romance...or does it...
Serious Bollywood romance/drama about what happens when affairs of the heart run into affairs of state (the girl is part of a revolutionary group). It's a very serious film with a very deep romance that for the most part impressed me. It's a well acted "little " film with some beautiful settings, great dialog (I'm still thinking about the reporter trying to pick up the girl at the beginning: "Can I get you anything? The stars?"), and a hard edge. Part of the reason for the intensity is the film is very intense in its emotions, which is both good and bad since our hero at times seems to be almost a stalker. At the same time, that makes the feelings that much more sharp.
I'm a little thrown off by the musical numbers in this serious film. Here it kind of works (more so than in the horror films I've seen), but at the same time as the film gets darker and darker the music felt out of place to me. Of course it's my Western sensibilities, but this film is rather dark. One piece I read on it said the film failed at the box office and I can kind of see it because it has left me somewhat shaken. It's not really like your typical Bollywood film, or even Slumdog Millionaire. That is probably saying too much, but at the same time it's the truth.
The film really rattled me. I don't know if it was in a good way or a bad way. I'm not sure if I like the film; I certainly admire it, but at the same time I don't know if I like it. I know one of my reservations with it is the fact that the film runs over two and a half hours. Yes, it allows for a deepening of the characters and the situations, but more than once I just wished that the film would have gotten on with it. Then again I'm not sure I would have been as moved by the film if it had. I'm all over the place about the film. It's very good, but do I like it? I have no idea.
I'm all for giving the film a try. I can't say anything else, mostly because I don't know what else to say.
I think that the best way to describe this film is as a romance for the modern world, bleak though it is.
I don't know if this has had an official US release. I picked it up as an import from an Amazon e-seller which is certainly the way to go if you want to see a film that will almost assuredly stay with you.
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