IT IS TRUE WHAT THEY SAY about greatness. It is always meant to be. No amount of planning or foresight or pundits with beards longer than their hands can ever truly make someone something one is not. If one is destined to be great one is. Most times one wonders how much more one has to shout and scream so that people can take notice while other times
well, other times silences creep in so beautifully that we hardly recognize them and something breathe taking has already been created.
Before, dear reader, the assumption is made that I am off on a track quite abstract to the common man ah, that word suddenly sounds so powerful let me underline the topic I have chosen. I was browsing through my usual collection of review websites when I happened to get a glimpse of one interesting review. It was for a movie I had never heard of. Neither had I ever seen any publicity posters of it nor had I guessed it would feature two of my all time favorites Naseeruddin Shah and Anupam Kher. The fact that no one else, except maybe the highly underestimated Jimmy Shergill, was even remotely recognizable on the credit list apart from these three did not deter me from giving it a shot. Bollywood these days is being showered with 'alternate' cinema that runs a delicate line between commercial masala-fundas and the documentary type approaches. In such a rain it is easy to miss some true refreshingly different rain drops. Having shied away from such features for a while, I decided to give this a look-see since I knew Naseer and Anupam would definitely make it worth my time. With that random assumption, I began watching 'A Wednesday'.
Two hours later
I was going through a very rare feeling. I did not understand it initially since it had been such a long time but then, I knew. It was the same bunch of emotions I had felt when I had seen the climax of 'The Sixth Sense'. It was the same 'Oh wow!' feeling that had pierced my veins as the final few minutes of 'The Usual Suspects' drowned in my eyes. It was the very unique gut sense of genuine enthusiasm I had felt when I finally understood 'Momento' in its last frame.
But, this time it was different. I had never felt such a tingle in my heart for a Hindi movie in many years. Sure, I have had my share of laughs and appreciation for some decent Indian cinema over the years, but there was never anything in them that made me say to myself '
he is so right
this could happen to me too
today
tomorrow
any day
' since there was never any context. What 'A Wednesday' successfully did was pick me up from my starry eyed slumber and slap a 'REALITY CHECK' sticker on my face. It reminded me of the times we are part of. It made me wonder about my own life and how unsure things are in the world we live in. It, if not anything else, made me think.
I am sure people often sigh and yawn about movies that make them 'think' since it is exactly the opposite reason of why one would watch a movie. No one wants to see relevant issues these days. There is a huge fan following for the larger than life, escapist features which come and go every week. We Indians, the world's best consumers, lap it up in all our glee not caring about if it had anything to do with our life. Why? Since it does not matter. It never does, does it? But then how long can we keep doing this? Once in a while we do need that refreshing slap on the face that makes us realize who we really are. And what a wonderful slap this was! No better way to bring me back to reality than a movie like this one. I was applauding myself for having taken a chance and seen one of the most relevant movies of our times. A silent yet beautiful effort at capturing human emotion on the screen. To summarize in one word great.
Do yourself a favor watch 'A Wednesday'. A must see for every Indian according to me. If not anything else it will definitely catch you by surprise! I strongly recommend this movie to everyone who has ever sat back and said 'I wish things were different
'
