Sunday, May 20, 2007

Nayak: A movie that you yearn to see happen

I am watching Nayak (The Anil Kapoor, Amrish Puri and Rani Mukherji starrer), and even though the movie is slightly over-dramatic, I do like the movie. The scenarios that it outlines initially as problems, such as corruption by ministers, caste based identities, stealing by public servants, indifference by the police, government doctors preferring their clinics, etc are all very realistic, and most of us know about these problems when reading about them in papers or from personal experience. Those who have actually worked for the government know far more about these problems.
The movie has a touch of unrealism, from the scene where the journalist is able to beat dedicated goondas, or when the chief minister tried to be too clever and offers him the post for 1 day (such things don't happen, and after seeing the movie, will never happen), or the bombs detection scene, or the fact that a novice could sweep the entire polls. Some of the songs seem inserted without any rhyme or reason such as the songs where some amount of special effects such as snakes, etc are inserted. I typically grin and bear the songs when they come.
However, people are desirous of quick action against the amount of corruption in the country, and would like nothing better than the corrupt to be removed from public posts, and the image of a man strong on his convictions and honesty is a very appealing one.
Ok, this is the story. Anil Kapoor is a journalist following the chief minister, including in a local village where Rani Mukherji speaks the truth inconveniently when Amrish Puri (CM) is touring. Anil notices her and is smitten, and after some time, she is equally smitten. During a riot (starting due to a fight beween a student and a bus driver), things escalate quickly out of control and Anil notices the Chief Minister ordering the police head not to take action due to his supporters being involved. In a interview, Anil strips the Chief Minister over this incident with actual proof, and in the course of this interview, Amrish offers Anil the Chief Ministership for one day, and Anil accepts hesitantly. In the course of this one day, Anil does a lot of direct positive action and then finally jails Amrish Puri for corruption.
Amrish takes action against Anil and his family (including a fight with slow action Matrix type of steps) and then gets bathed in milk. Later, he sees his house getting demolished. He is urged to contest elections, and he is very hesitant. At this point, Paresh Rawal gives him a long speech, which to me was the high point of the movie (essentially, if honest people refuse to get into politics, then they have no one to blame). He finally accepts and becomes chief minister due to his honest image. In the meantime, Rani's dad refuses to accept the match since he is into politics.
He suffers from the machinations of Amrish Puri, including 2 assassination attempts in which one of them kills his parents. After a lot of such problems, he finally turns political, killing Amrish Puri in a legal way. His comment in the end, that he is finally into politics is a sort of bitter-sweet end in the sense that he got his way after doing an action against his principles.

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