Udta Punjab!! Fly....Flew......Flown......... :)

Udta Punjab!! fly…flew……flown……. :)

Hydaa ppl,

How ready are you for the hydro-cution [as in like electrocution ;)] policy of Bhagwanji?

Confused? Hmm??

Arre baba, mai baarish ki baat kar rahi hu….Mumbaikars will understand wat I mean, being used to experiencing the wrong side of it. :)

Khair, aap sab ka nai pataa but I for one experienced a big short circuit in these rains….on the verge of a huge fire breaking out. Yu ki, Paani me aag lagaane jaisi baat thi.

Again marm ko samjho, don’t go by the literal meanings. :)

Here I am referring to “Udta Punjab”!!

I know each one of you have something to say about it. So do I.

It was a brave dare. Abhishek Chaubey was crystal clear in what he wanted to say and he dished it out exactly the way he wanted…undeterred….unadulterated….RAW!!!

I saw that movie not because I wanted to, no it wasn’t in my list of movies to watch. Why? Simply because I am a family person and what I had in my mind about it was that it was some movie made by Anurag Kashyap…..a complex movie which will be something like parallel cinema, unacceptable language, that I used to think was put in, in the name of reality, but which only fetched dislike from ordinary people like me; dare without much sensibility etc etc. All in all a movie strictly a no no if you want family entertainment. Obviously I had given not a second thought to it.

But as luck would have it, the other choices that I was left with in the then time frame were The Conjuring 2 and Dead Pool!! :(((

Sigh!! We could easily have returned, and I promised myself to book tickets online in future so as not to get in such a dead lock situation. I surrendered and left the decision to my family. They decided to take the tickets for Udta Punjab and I complied. I was sure we would come out after not more than a few minutes with what I had made up my mind about the film’s content.

So there we were, with our popcorn buckets, nachos, cokes etc….at least some entertainment in these I thought…..if not in the movie. :)

And true to my anticipation the beginning hit me with a berserk Shahid in the matrix of sorely horrible and horrifying language. I was jolted by the shock culminating into helplessness that I was enduring it all. Shock tends to put you into momentary stony inactivity when you can’t bring yourself to move….or run away stat. I thought it was sick. I mean was there no civilized conversation possible?

The next few minutes were spent in the storming of my “little grey cells” in the words of Hercule Poirot :), to just imbibe and relate to wat was going on onscreen.

Gradually, I got into the Zone………

……..and I swallowed it, hook, line and sinker.

People talked about online piracy…….you just cant get into the zone if you are not watching it in theatres and if you are not watching it in theatres, any other option whatsoever for spending that time of yours would be better.

You are taken there…..whether you like it or not, you Are there, you witness that….all that. You are forced on to the revelations and realizations. You face what they face, you feel what they feel….the pain, the helplessness, the reverse metamorphosis from a human to the lowliest of living creatures…..

You get scared….you panic…..

You are thankful it’s a movie……..and not the reality…..

You are thankful you are not one of them….

You are thankful, you can come out clean and unscathed………..

This is what Udta Punjab does to you…..For good.

The controversies, the negativities, the blame games, the political connections, the reference to a particular state……..all seem so ridiculous!!

I can do but pity those who cannot imbibe what is being writ large all over it for their own good, for the good of their kids, their families.

It is one movie that reached the hearts and heads of its own cast and crew even.

Aliya!!! My God, that little girl went all out for that movie……not for the movie per se, but for the sheer strength of purpose it held. The appearance that she clad, the peculiar tan of a sun beat labourer, her superlative acting…..she didn’t even have a name!!

Because she was The Character that she portrayed….above any thing else. She didn’t care what petty people might say, she didn’t care what image she would beget, all she cared was, even if this would prevent one person from landing into this hell of drug deadlock, her purpose will be solved. Salutes to her.

Shahid did his best.

Diljit n Kareena did well too.

Each character was tailored to perfection. One thing again noteworthy and worth appreciating is that Aliya, Shahid and Kareena reduced their remunerations for this movie….Hats off guys!!

How we loath and pity Balli [Prabjyot Singh] at the same time   

The message was so crystal clear….whoever you are, whatever you do…no matter what class ,caste, state, creed, sect you belong…..stay away…..stay as far away as possible from this gruesome, unforgiving, worse than hell vice……or be doomed in eternal peril…..

I was amazed, in all this dare act, Abhishek Chaubey had the cheek of putting in perfect comic moments too. :)

When Balli opens the door in his intro….the very characteristic teenage into drug abuse….you can make it all out instantly….the disheveled expressionless blank stare with the fluorescent gogs set tilted on his nose :))))

While running to trace Aliya, Tommy bravely climbs up the compound wall and jumps down landing straight on to gunpoint of the goons…..you laugh despite the heaviness of the moment when you haven’t yet gotten over Kareena’s shock.

And it wasn’t just Udta Punjab giving me the shocks…even the Interval did….

Kaise?

Just before the post interval resumption of the movie, came the grossly grisly ghastly disgusting trailer of Great Grand Masti!! And I literally felt like slapping all those in it……khair the lesser said about that the better….

Just a piece of info…Ekta Kapoor is a co producer in Udta Punjab as well as Great Grand Masti…. :/

Generally, actors directors and the others involved give their skills and talents to a movie….but Udta Punjab wrenched out each bit of their souls too…..something like the dementors of Harry Potter…only to make Us realize, only to help Our youth survive….Only to make the World a better place to be….

Udta Punjab has shown us the power of inner strength and determination. So good people join in the fight, join in the campaign…..together we shall triumph.

Start by watching it in the theatres, leaving behind the prejudices, negativities, and celebrate the bravado, the dare, making it a huge leap forward…

Share your experiences with me and enjoy the rains… :)

Till then its tata, bye bye, cheerio from me here at Page-3!!