Having not really watched Bollywood films, since the days of the action movies of the 70's & 80's, I wasn't really interested in watching the more recent offerings from Bollywood, since I assumed they were mostly love stories and were full of songs which had no reason for being there.
But, having watched a few (subtitled) films shown as part of an Indian season over here in the UK, I've started to change my mind.
I watched Fiza last night and even though it was full of songs and was let down slightly by the second half, I was amazed to find a film dealing with the Bombay Hindu/Muslim riots of 1993 and it's consequences on a Muslim family.
It starts with the 1993. Amaan (Hrithik Roshan) lives with his mother (Jaya Bachchan) and sister Fiza (Karishma Kapoor). One night Amaan goes out into the riot-stricken streets of Bombay and disappears. We then jump to 1999 and the first half of the film then deals with the consequences, as Fiza determines to find her brother.
Through flashback we find out what happened, as Amaan finds himself a outsider in his own country, but the real reasons for his disappearance are only discovered when Fiza discovers her brother hiding out with terrorists.
I won't reveal the rest of the story, but I will say, it was refreshing to see a film from the Indian-Muslim viewpoint and having central characters who were Muslim. Being British and of Indian-Hindu descent, I hadn't really thought about it before.
I know the film isn't an in-depth look at the problem or even that it represents Indian-Muslims in general, but it did open my eyes slightly to the problems facing India today, especially since the recent (2002) Hindu/Muslim riots in Gujarat showed how bad the violence could be and how much politics played it's part in them.
One last point, the performances from the three main leads is excellent. Hrithik Roshan was much better than I expected, but Jaya Bachchan and Karishma Kapoor were really outstanding.
Although, not a perfect film and still very Bollywood in it's style, I still found it much better then the standard Bollywood fare and I would highly recommend it.
