Spoilers ahead…
Rajkumar Hirani has often spoken about his admiration for Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s films, and it comes as no surprise. Hirani’s films, from the two Munnabhai entries to 3 Idiots, are essentially reworkings of Mukherjee’s films like Anand, Bawarchi and Khoobsoorat, where a free-spirited outsider breezed through stuffy surroundings and made people rediscover what they’d lost. In the charming Ferrari Ki Sawaari, which Hirani co-wrote, there was an echo of the scene in Guddi where a student is late to school and ends up leading the choir in prayer. In the quirkily named pk, the narrator (Jaggu, played by Anushka Sharma) writes a book on the titular character – and that’s what the Amitabh Bachchan character did in Anand. (His book was named Anand; Jaggu’s book is named pk.) But consider the title itself. It goes back to the joke in Chupke Chupke that transformed the initials of a character (P.K.) into the Hindi word for “intoxicated”.
The outsider in pk is played by Aamir Khan, and he’s named pk because people hear him speak and think he is intoxicated. But the truth is that he hails from another galaxy (he’s an alien, the outsider to beat all outsiders), and as the Dharmendra character in Chupke Chupke expressed befuddlement about the intricacies of English, pk is puzzled by the workings of Hindi. (In a hilarious scene, he ponders over the various meanings of “achcha”.) pk is more puzzled by the workings of religion. Like many earthlings, he wants to find God, but his is a more immediate purpose – he thinks God can help him return to his planet. (He’s stranded on earth, like the alien in E.T.; Jaggu is his Elliot.) He prints “Missing” posters with the images of various gods on them, and he wants them found – for only they can help him. And how does he know this? Because he’s been told repeatedly: “Only God can help you.”
This bit is pure genius, and it is revealed in a flashback, the film’s best stretch. It’s truly joyous, and a textbook example of combining a message (how mystifying our religious practices are) with entertainment. The magic touch that Hirani displayed in the Munnabhai movies (and which deserted him in 3 Idiots) is back. The laughs are plenty (“dancing car”, “rotation” of chappals in temples), and Aamir plays the character beautifully. I wasn’t too taken by the controversial nude poster for the film – he came off too muscled, too chiselled. But this look suits the character, making him look a little otherworldly in the midst of the portly men in Rajasthan, which is where pk lands. His wide-open green eyes and raised eyebrows (he looks perpetually astonished) and even those protruding ears look just right, and he’s amazing in a song sequence (Tharki chokro) where he robotically replicates the dance steps of a newfound friend (Sanjay Dutt, as a bandmaster named Bhairon Singh).
This song sequence is itself quite amazing, filled with the whimsy that is such a part of Hirani’s cinema. pk’s means of communicating with earthlings is by holding their hands, and when Bhairon Singh refuses (he’s a guy, and guys don’t hold other guys’ hands), pk looks around for women, whose hands he thinks he’s allowed to hold. Of course, this causes all kinds of mayhem, and hence the lyric – Tharki chokro. They think he’s a horny bastard, and this time, they’re the ones unable to understand him. But gradually, as pk realises the futility of searching for God, the laughs subside and we get the song Bhagwan hai kahan re tu – his plight in the face of God’s silence is truly moving. If Bergman had made a Bollywood music video, this is how it might have turned out. Hirani is one of the handful of filmmakers left who still likes his song sequences to say something, mean something. Even the use of older songs is perfect. After a bomb blast perpetrated by religious extremists, we hear the Phir Subah Hogi number Aasman pe hai khuda aur zameen pe hum / aaj kal woh is taraf dekhta hai kum. No further commentary, no more dialogue is necessary.
But apart from the flashback, there aren’t many scenes that stand out. (And some scenes look downright forced, like the one where pk teaches Jaggu to shrug off sadness by launching into a “cute” dance.) There’s the moment where Jaggu is stranded without cab fare, and pk offers her money – he knows what it’s like to not be able to go home. It isn’t a big scene, and the emotions aren’t exaggerated – the offhand quality of the staging is enough to make us empathise with pk. A latter sequence with Sarfaraz (Sushant Singh Rajput) is also very nicely pulled off. His early scenes with Jaggu are alarmingly bland and I wondered why they even needed to be there, but this arc is resolved most satisfyingly. The biggest relief is that the heavy-handed lecturing from 3 Idiots has been replaced by a gentler form of hectoring – we’re still staring at a wagging finger, but at least, for the most part, we aren’t being beaten over the head with a bludgeon.
The smaller problem with pk is that it’s reminiscent of OMG – Oh My God!. But that’s forgivable – after all, we do keep watching variations on, say, love stories all the time. As long as we are entertained, we shouldn’t really care. The bigger problem is that the film practically reeks of formula. Hirani has become some sort of Madhur Bhandarkar, telling, essentially, the same story and simply focusing on a different facet of society. If the enemy-establishment was the medical profession in Munnabhai MBBS and educational institutions in 3 Idiots, it’s now the religious right. If the catchphrases earlier were “jadoo ki jhappi” and “all is well,” it’s now “wrong number.” And as with 3 Idiots, the Aamir character is practically deified. It isn’t enough that we, the audience, know that pk has fallen for Jaggu – she has to find out too, and shed fat tears about his sacrifice. (In many ways, her character is a conflation of the Madhavan and Sharman Joshi characters from 3 Idiots. The film keeps cutting to her reaction shots each time pk says or does something.) These similarities are exacerbated by the casting. Hirani likes to keep using the same actors (in big and small roles), but sometimes they seem to be playing the same parts – Saurabh Shukla, who plays a godman here, played a similarly manipulative guru in Lage Raho Munnabhai. The result is endless déjà vu. Someone should remind Hirani that Hrishikesh Mukherjee liked to repeat a winning formula too, but in between Anand and Bawarchi and Khoobsoorat, there was also a Buddha Mil Gaya, an Abhimaan, a Namak Haram, a Mili, an Alaap, a Gol Maal…
KEY:
* Anand = see here
* Bawarchi = see here
* Khoobsoorat = see the whole film in about 15 minutes here
* Guddi = this is the song where she’s late to school and ends up singing
* Chupke Chupke = try keeping a straight face through this bit here
* chappals = slippers
Copyright ©2014 Baradwaj Rangan. This article may not be reproduced in its entirety without permission. A link to this URL, instead, would be appreciated.
thekomentor
December 20, 2014
The review seemed to end abruptly…
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Devarsi Ghosh
December 20, 2014
Dang. I’m sold. Booking tickets…
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ramitbajaj01
December 20, 2014
@thekomentor: For me, the review didn’t end abruptly. I think it had a proper arc. It started with a comparison, then told us about the positives and negatives of the movie with appropriate information regarding the themes, acting and screenplay. It finally ended by closing the comparison by telling us which of the two is better and why.
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Biswarup
December 20, 2014
Has anyone here seen Ray’s Mahapurush? PK uses the same device in a very redundant and laborious way. It’s a story where Saurabh Shukla’s character (The baba) has to be as important as anyone in the film. Perhaps the most important. When his scope or spread becomes as broader as National TV ( Ray could not use TV as a medium in the movie because of its time) it is imperative he becomes a voice backed up by political interests. Hirani removing it from the story , again falls back the movie in the same typical mode of easier solutions to grave social issues (As deceptive as organized religion). I am sorry he could not flesh out or did not want to flesh out Baba jee’s character. There was no story of how Baba jee manages to hypnotize. in fact Baba jee was losing the battle from the word go. The movie lost its importance there. Aamir just never faces a tough battle ever . This is not so easy in real world.
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Rahul
December 20, 2014
I can empathise with thekomentor. My reason is that the final thought that this article left me with was about Mukherjee`s movies , not this movie.
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Salim
December 20, 2014
The clip you posted has been re-sung by someone else – the original track by Mukesh is here:
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TheKomentor
December 20, 2014
To be fair on Hirani, I don’t think Hrishikesh Mukherjee would have ever had to deal with such huge expectations from his movies and the pressure for them to not only succeed but succeed in a huge manner.
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Vidya Murugan
December 20, 2014
Might watch this weekend. Was hoping you’d review it before that. Thank you 🙂
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vimal
December 20, 2014
Formula !! Thats the word I was looking for when I exited from the movie hall – The catch word ‘wrong number’, the forced sentimental scenes, the father who gets changed (same guy who acted as jimmy shergils and madhavans father in lage raho and 3 idiots), the saurabh shukla part you mentioned, the confrontation scene which reminded me of the public viva voce session in munnabhai mbbs, right after the death of jimmy shergil (over here its sanjay dutt), sonu nigams high pitched melodramatic songs, everybody around crying in the final scene when anushka speaks to sushant which was there in both the munnabhai movies, and a few more which occurred while watching. Not a flaw, according to me, but there is a sense of ‘seen and felt that before’, which in some way affects the flow.
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Ashutosh
December 21, 2014
@Rahul: Surely, I don’t know if the following was intentional and it doesn’t matter really–but, leaving us with a thought about Mukherjee’s movies in a review of Hirani’s film is stylistically consistent with the larger point of the review which is that Hirani, like Mukherjee, is fantastic with a particular formula but falls short of the latter because he beats the one repetitive formula to death.
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Aran
December 21, 2014
Why, oh WHY does every mainstream Bollywood movie seem to have the need for a ‘love interest’? I loved the first half, (yes – especially the flashback! Amazing), but then in the second half PK starts falling for Anushka and all went downwards from there. I kept thinking what does he see in this chick that he didn’t in the one who taught him Bhojpuri in six hours. I mean, can you even fall in love with an object that has botoxed lips?! Seriously annoying love track. The only reason it seemed to be in there was because Aamir needed to be bigger than us mere humans by ‘letting her go’. Ugh.
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Madan Chopra (@mpmainka)
December 21, 2014
The video of the song you have put is a karaoke version of the track. Not the original audio sung by Mukesh.
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sridharvisu76
December 21, 2014
The whole idea of debate-with-guru isnt enough of a payback for the audience and the way it is clumsily handled is the biggest loss in watching PK. It is like making Sakkarai Pongal with nice ghee, jaggery and milk etc and finally thus callously throwing salt and pepper.
Problem is most audience will use their liking from first part to decide on nature of debate. PK has to grow up. Really !
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TheKomentor
December 21, 2014
@Aran: Sad that Anushka has become another before/after advertisement for why actors shouldn’t go for appearance-enhancement surgeries. Wonder what she thinks of that decision now.
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brangan
December 21, 2014
thekomentor: You mean the ellipsis? That was intentional.
About your point on pressure and commercial success, I’m not saying that Hirani is WRONG to do this. If he just wants to keep making money with a well-established format and making people happy, that’s his prerogative. But it makes it hard for me to take him as a serious or major filmmaker.
Rahul: the final thought that this article left me with was about Mukherjee`s movies , not this movie.
Well, I did want that. Because if the HM style is what Hirani is after, then he should definitely try to broaden his range. See, I can live with the fact that you’re not a great “crafter” of cinema, and like HM (who was not great shakes in the “filmmaking” department either) you just want to be a solid storyteller. But that makes it all the more important that you tell different stories, and not just the same story dressed up differently.
I was shocked at how templatised Hirani’s screenplays have become. The one major change is that he’s junked the “hero getting discredited” moment in the second half. (Munnabhai is exposed as someone with “chemical locha.” Rancho is thrown out of school. Munnabhai is exposed as a cheater in exams.) I thought that would happen in the TV show scene, but thankfully there was a great segue to the Sarfaraz angle there. That I really enjoyed.
As for things like pasting an image of God on the cheek, it reminded me of that film where an enterprising man paints pictures of gods on walls so that people stop urinating on them? Was it “Such a Long Journey”?
Salim: The clip you posted has been re-sung by someone else
And your point is? 🙂
vimal: Oh yeah, the “father who changes his stubborn stance” moment. Forgot to mention that. And Madhavan’s father was even played by the same Parikshat Sahni 🙂
Maybe this is intentional? Maybe Hirani DOES want the same actors playing the same parts for some reason? Throwing a bone to auteur theorists. The arguments may begin 🙂
Aran: I know. I cringed at that “cute dance” moment. It was so not needed. Anushka didn’t need to be the love interest at all. After all, she had another role in the film. She was the “Jahanpanah tussi great ho” character here 🙂
BTW, did her lips really look botoxed? i thought she was pouting…
sridharvisu76: Yeah, the religion angle was nicely done in the flashback, showing how befuddling the various rites and rules can be to an outsider. But once they get-the-guru-on-TV angle began, the religion angle became toothless.
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Anu Warrier
December 21, 2014
Saw it yesterday, enjoyed it thoroughly while in the theatre, and then came out wondering why I felt so dissatisfied. Perhaps I expected more from the Hirani/Aamir combine.
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Aran
December 21, 2014
BR: BTW, did her lips really look botoxed? i thought she was pouting…
Okay, I guess I have my answer. Men CAN fall in love with botoxed lips when they can’t even figure out that’s what they are. 😀 BR, did you completely miss the Koffee with Karan controversy when she came in with blown up lips? So, yes, they looked botoxed. Have been looking botoxed for a while. In this movie all I could see whenever she was on screen was how ghastly she looked. A shame because I kind of liked her before this.
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Bunny
December 21, 2014
@BRangan: I have a question (not criticism). Since you have been an admirer of Subhash Ghai, wasn’t he too a formulaic filmmaker in his ‘glorious years’? You even yearned for an incremental reworking of Ram Lakhan’s format. But that was formula. But you consider Ghai an auteur, a filmmaker whose work ought to be taken seriously. Shouldn’t Hirani be viewed in the same light? (Just curious. No offence intended towards the mighty Ghai.)
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brangan
December 21, 2014
Bunny: Yes, Ghai too is a formulaic filmmaker. But that formula is a generic masala formula (eg. the presence of a Strong Mother Character, or Mythical Hero-Villain Showdown At the End) — and Ghai, at his peak, picked and chose from these formula elements and did not repeat them. For instance, “Hero” is very different from “Karz” which is very different from “Kalicharan”. There’s a formulaic sensibility in these films, but the films themselves aren’t reiterations of the same formula.
A closer relation to what I call formula in Hirani’s case would be Shankar, whose vigilante films are all reworkings of the same formula. So much so that, in Tamil cinema today, the very presence of a second-half flashback (which explains why the vigilante hero is doing what he does) makes people exclaim, “Oh, this is like a Shankar film”.
But even Shankar did not make four similar films IN A ROW.
About this part of your comment: But you consider Ghai an auteur, a filmmaker whose work ought to be taken seriously. Shouldn’t Hirani be viewed in the same light?
I don’t know if I consider Ghai an auteur, but I do take him seriously. In fact, that whol generation of masala cinema I take very seriously — in the sense that I think it is seriously worth analysing and discussing.
And I take Hirani seriously too. This is a serious, considered review. Had I not taken him seriously, I would have approached this review with a more contemptous, sarcastic tone, the way I do the Bhandarkar films.
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Rajesh Shah
December 21, 2014
@BRangan Regarding the “hero getting discredited” moment, PK did had a moment although it wasn’t exactly the same. This is when PK realises his remote control was sold to the Swami. Until now PK was always under the impression that the Swamiji was getting connected to a wrong number with a duplicate god at the other end. He never considers the possibility that the Swami was a fraud. Realising that the swami is a fraud would have been a shock for him; especially considering that he comes from a society where no one lies.
Regarding the movie, there were hardly any surprises in the movie basically because Hirani follows the same formula as his other movies and the concept remained hardly new after OMG. Also, the movie went downhill after the one sided romance was introduced and the final confrontation was more used in resolving the love story between Jaggu and Sarfarzh rather than duel between PK and the Swami.
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vimal
December 21, 2014
@ Aran : “The only reason it seemed to be in there was because Aamir needed to be bigger than us mere humans by ‘letting her go’. Ugh.”
hmm… I dont think so, I thought the inclusion of the love track was to showcase that he learnt how to lie; you know, he becomes like one of us.
@ BR : But I feel, they couldve still made the love track subtle by having only that final tape recorder scene. Whats your take? Dont you think it would have been a shocker to the audience as well to know that PK was actually in love with Jaggu through that one good scene, instead of a song and an ‘I love you jaggu’ scene ???? And again, how does he know how to ‘write’? Even if he got the writing skills by holding hands, how does he know english to write ‘I love you Jaggu’ ? Maybe that bhojpuri woman knew english too! And, I always wondered what nit picking meant ! 😛 😛
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Aran
December 21, 2014
Vimal, that is still a ‘he is better than us and we taught him something awful’ thing. It is hardly a mark of distinction if he becomes like one of us by learning how to lie. 🙂
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Sonia
December 22, 2014
I must admit this is the first time I have agreed with you.
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aravind86
December 22, 2014
Skipping to the end of the article and the comments section to rant, in the faint hope that someone will notice and take action next time 😛
Why the hell does Mysskin not release his movies in Mumbai? 😦 Happened with Onayum Aattukuttiyum, and now Pisasu. Just one show per day at least please?
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Anu Warrier
December 22, 2014
it reminded me of that film where an enterprising man paints pictures of gods on walls so that people stop urinating on them?
If I remember right, there was a scene like that in Mahesh Manjrekar’s lovely little satire – Pran Jaaye Par Shaan Na Jaaye (which was originally (and I mean that in both senses of the term) named Pran Jaaye Par Chaawl Na Jaaye.
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Santa
December 23, 2014
BR, In your review for I Hate Luv Storys, you wrote this of Imran Khan: “IMRAN KHAN HAS, IN HIS REPERTOIRE, about one-and-a-half emotions, and I mean this as a compliment. Too often, good acting gets mistaken solely for the ability to do anything (and everything) – and that’s impossible to ask of every actor… some of the best performers play the same part over and over, astutely redistilling their essence into characters of different shapes and sizes”
Would love to hear your thoughts on why the same yardstick cannot be applied to directors, ie if a Hirani or a Bhandarkar have discovered their ‘winning’ formula, then why should they stray outside? Or is it just (in this case) the preachiness and moralizing that you find irksome?
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An Jo
December 23, 2014
It might be a formula but a well-oiled formula I must say..
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vaidya
December 23, 2014
Yes, the Gods on the wall scene would be from Such a Long Journey. Have only read the book, but I doubt any filmmaker would skip that!
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sridharvisu76
December 23, 2014
@brangan please watch Cavalry (and The Guard) starring Brendan Gleeson.
Would love ur reviews on them. I liked how they dealt with such subjects.
First half of PK was good.Second half felt like watching Vivek / Santhanam types comedies on gurus (and not their good ones)
I also hate how they selectively target Hindus….but just brush on Conversion issue and School girls wearing Burkha as though those are the only problems with other religions.
They could as well have not talked about other religions. that would have been wiser. These are calculated scenes which I hated.
Also such a great actor like Sushanta Rajput wasted in this movie.
And seriously Earlier Church scene with Cat in a basket. Is that supposed to be a suspense (everyone guessed it) to be revealed later. Sad. Seems very formulaic and cheated.
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JPhil
December 24, 2014
I viscillated between watching -at my local cinema -a new malayalam movie by priyadarsan and pk. I m glad I chose the latter .Priyan s ‘new’ movie is a remake of malamaal weekly which itself was handsomely ripped from watching ned devine .for all the -valid- plaints about deja vu in pk, atleast there is a commitment to screenwriting which the rest -like Priyan- seem to have not heard of…..
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JPhil
December 24, 2014
Vacillated, rather 🙂
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sridhar270
December 24, 2014
SPOILERS ALERT
The church scene was quite a silly scene. I wondered if the person who wrote the letter googled for the most generic template possible and just left that as is. How can a letter like that be written with NOT ONE personal mention?! And to think, two people read that letter and understood the meaning for their context! Either some really dumb people or the most catch-all breakup letter ever!
Or worse, if the letter was still left at the registration place, there would have been countless more last-minute cancellations. I think that might be a subject for a movie by itself.
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brangan
December 24, 2014
Rajesh Shah: the final confrontation was more used in resolving the love story between Jaggu and Sarfarzh rather than duel between PK and the Swami
Actually, I thought the Sarfaraz-Jaggu bit was used to win the battle againt the swami, so I didn’t have a problem here. In the sense that, instead of directly confronting the swami and proving he is fake, pk discredited the swami through other means. So this part worked very well for me.
vimal: Yes, that final tape recorder scene alone might have made for a better love track.
how does he know english to write ‘I love you Jaggu’ ?
haha – I guess these are common enough words that there’s isn’t really a problem here.
Santa: See, when a ‘light’ actor acts in a ‘light’ genre (rom-com) and he doesn’t really have a range, then it isn’t as much as a problem. I think I’m going to write something about this “formula” thing…
JPhil: atleast there is a commitment to screenwriting…
I agree. There are two aspects to narration – the WHAT and the HOW. I had a lot of issues with the WHATs in this film, but the HOW was beautifully done. Every i dotted, every t crossed — the form was perfect, even if the content left me wanting.
sridhar270: Yes, I’m surprised at the silliness of the church scene, hinging on that cat. Such an important letter and not ONE personal mention. Surely they could have cooked up a better parting sequence.
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Vikram Sonni
December 24, 2014
Hi BR, saw Pk…agree on the first half flashback being very good.. Second half with all those people shedding copious tears in front of the TV made it exploitative and deja vu (remember the FM radio station in late raho munnabhai that too on a worldspace receiver)…net net it felt like a cross between ET, OMG and touches of all of hirani’s earlier work…but enjoyable nevertheless (me is a mainstream filmgoer after aal)
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Priyanka
December 24, 2014
Yeah I agree completely with your take on the “formula” (I’m looking forward to your piece on that). And while I do understand the outsider-changing-things formula, I also thought there was a similar emotional graph in his films. For example, when Sharman Joshi commits suicide in 3 idiots and the bomb scene in pk were both the lowest, saddest parts of the film till then, which is followed by the big emotional reveal (here the Sarfaraz bit, there the part about Virus’s son). And even the bittersweet Disney- type farewell (I mean the feeling behind a sad goodbye of a character- or even something like the Toy Story 3 ending) is repeated in both films: here when Pk leaves and in 3 idiots when Rancho leaves the college. This is followed by the happy return scene, where Pk comes back (even this was Disney like to me) and when Rancho is reunited with his friends. Obviously though, I agree that Pk worked better than 3 idiots, and it was also so original. I mean how many people decide to make a movie about an alien, a bandmaster, a baba, and a heroine with a boycutt named Jaggu, and all somehow interconnect to religion and make for a warm, funny story? (Oh and I think the spunky heroine defying her father bit was also repeated in both films)
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Anu
December 24, 2014
Regarding the letter – I thought she’d be able to recognize his handwriting considering the poetry she’s been reading….
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chhotesaab
December 25, 2014
I liked the movie …… It did remind me of Raju Hirani’s earlier movies – yes there is a certain sameness in the way he treats his movies, with literally same actors in similar characters, similar light music, similar tendency to resolve grave issues with simple, ‘unrealistic’ , broad strokes kind of solutions etc …….. but I still enjoyed it. As opposed to Madhur Bhandarkar’s heavy handed treatment of various topics, his is a more light-hearted handling, which works – atleast for me.
As far his resolving all the grave issues in his various movies in broad generalized strokes, I feel his approach is – I want to make a feel good optimistic movie for my audience, make them laugh, cry (in a happy way, sort of), address a particular social issue to make the audience think about it (not solve it for them in a real life realistic way), start a discussion in a way amongst my audience, but the emphasis from the start to finish is going to be on feel good, optimistic part.
Time will tell what kind of a filmmaker he will eventually be recognized as. If he is remembered in this cynical day and age half as fondly as Hrishikesh Mukherjee, I think he will have done well.
Yes, Anushka’s lips were distracting (I agree with many here, I liked her a lot before her disastrous lip job !), and that dance sequence with Jaggu to cheer her up seemed too forced, even too a thick skinned tolerant movie watcher like me ! I totally agree with the comment that if his love interest was left as a suspense only to be revealed later through the tapes, preferably after he had already boarded his spaceship, would have worked much better.
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Partha
December 25, 2014
@ br…
why should raj kumar hirani make a different movie, just to show that he is a more “complete” filmmaker. Granted he has used a middling template for most of his movies, but i always liked the narrative in betweens of the hirani movies much more than the actual main idea. The song about “love is a waste of time ” in pk, the first part of the munnabhai movie where sunil dutt explains to a thief why the restive crowd is agitated was superb. It is these slices of life moments where hirani excels. Why should we ask him to be someone else, as long as he comes up with these gems. After all doesn’t every filmmaker have a signature?
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rothrocks
December 28, 2014
Just saw it today, having read the review earlier. I loved the film. Yes it’s a formula but imo one that works because Hirani is such an awesome old school storyteller. It’s no surprise then that he wins over class and mass at a pan India level. There may be similarities to OMG in terms of the questions asked of organised religion but then OMG itself was inspired, to a much greater extent, by an Australian film.
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Jawahar
December 29, 2014
The final confrontation between Saurabh Shukla and AK seems to be a precis of the chapter “The Grand Inquisition” from Fyodor Dostoevsky’s “The Brother Karamazov”. Incidentally the song “Aasman pe hai Khuda…” also happens to be from the film “Phir Subah Hogi” based on Dostoevsky’s “Crime & Punishment”…
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sigloxx
January 2, 2015
‘“pk”… Funny, yes, but now it’s begun to feel like formula’
What has also been formulaic of late have been your reviews. Your tactic of approaching a film through screenwriting principles make your reviews seem like ones written by Syd Field or Robert McKee. By doing so, you are not critiquing the film the way it is but instead are projecting your own fantasy version of the film as your review.
I agree that some films need to be looked at through screenwriting principles but others like pk, Oh My God, Madras, Rang Rasiya etc. need to be approached on the basis of the director’s/screenwriter’s sensibility.
As for my own take on this film, I reiterate what I had written on this blog for ‘Oh My God’:
“It was utterly didactic and depressing. Replete with fallacious arguments and naive deconstructions, OMG is (a painfully long) ‘filmed theatrics’ of the forgettable kind. It seemed suspiciously the story of a dogmatic atheist (armed with a premature notion of God) metamorphosing into a Hindu fundamentalist. A less arrogant filmmaker/writer would have begun with a character and explored the God-like aspects in him. But the presumptuous blue-eyed Captain of the 20cr ship chose to start from ‘God’ and, by reducing it to the lowest common factor, make it palatable for front stall cackles and gold class tears.”
The same holds true for pk as well. In addition, I feel that if a director is taking an “aggressive” stance against blind religious beliefs, he/she automatically, unknowingly start promoting atheism as a religion. Such is the “film form” because it’s essentially propaganda – and propaganda is a very conservative and right wing form.
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vijaymay8
January 5, 2015
Atlast watched PK-a hilarious fun ride all the way.
And thanks to all its advertising agents (fringe outfits), it is the highest ever grossing Indian movie and is growing stronger even after 2 weeks of its release.
But this ‘PK’ is no ‘alien’ to many Tamil movie buffs like me, as the questions regarding the existence of God have already been raised by many of the stars earlier, ranging from M.R.Radha of yesteryear to Vivek of the present day.In fact one of the scene in the movie ,where a paan-smeared stone is deified as god, already got featured in a popular Vivek movie.
Nevertheless its hugely entertaining and that is what is needed by today’s audience.
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PS
January 11, 2015
MAJOR PLOT HOLE (and also, a Spoiler Alert:)
If by holding hands PK could read the other person’s mind, then in the confrontation scene with Swamiji, after holding Jaggu’s hand HOW COULD HE FIND OUT THAT Shahnawaz was not disloyal? Jaggu didn’t know that herself… How could she transmit that to PK through her hands?
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