Shanghai – The New Tinsel Town of Bollywood

Edited By: on June 16, 2012
Shanghai Movie Review

Image Credits : Madaboutmoviez.com

Shanghai is a story of the paralyzed political system in your country where anything and everything is linked with bitter politics and lobbying. It is about a construction company’s dilemma in constructing a housing project successfully on a slum area, amidst all the protests and agitation.

Shanghai is a story of the paralyzed political system in your country where anything and everything is linked with bitter politics and lobbying. It is about a construction company’s dilemma in constructing a housing project successfully on a slum area, amidst all the protests and agitation.

Told in a complete different style, Shanghai is quite a modern day film with very well known and prevailing issue in our society. It’s the social stigma of land grabbing and hooliganism of promoters and builders that collectively has ruined the situation of the poor. Dibakar Banerjee has acquired a different style, as he is known for his inevitable and out of bound characteristics, to try and portray something that is for long prevailed in our society.

The film revolves around IBP, a construction company who wants to build a multinational building project by demolishing Bharat Nagar, which is a slum where thousands of people resides in the heart of the Capital, Delhi. Here comes Prosenjit as Dr. Ahmedi, who strictly opposes IBP’s move to convert Bharat Nagar into a complex. But he suddenly experienced a life threatening accident while the protest against IBP was in motion.

The film shows you off the multiple facets of people on power, which includes even the CM of Delhi as well. It is certainly a brave attempt of Dibakar Banerjee to show politicians and bureaucrats in such a light, pointing directly to the high command in Delhi. Besides this, the film also unfolds the struggle of Kalki Koechlin, and Emraan Hashmi to put things into an order, amidst the puzzle they were dealing with. The film amalgamated emmense suspense and drama to create an ambience of fear and terror in the public minds.
Talking about the performances in the film, the first name that needs to get mentioned is Abhay Deol. He, as a South Indian officer, had stolen the limelight from the likes of Emraan Hashmi and Prosenjit Chakroborty from the film. His diction and expressions were bang on target throughout the film and were clean and precise. Prosenjit, given a chance has proven his worth as well. Though he had very little screen space in the film, yet he scored really high being the protagonist in the film. To put an end to his serial kisser tag, Emraan Hashmi has done something very special in this film, which had started from Once Upon a Time in Mumbai, through his acting. He has played an immensely strong role in the film that needs sheer hard work and diligence to perform. Though Kalki had tried her best foot forward, she needs to hone her acting skills a bit more, when it comes to portraying a character so strong in a realistic film like Shanghai.

Talking about the technicalities of the film, Dibakar this time hasn’t experimented the way he did in his last film LSD, but this time he has gone a step further. Excellent use of camera and few exuberant shots had made the film look commendably artistry and a treat to watch. He has used the lights properly while shooting and has given prominence to the camera movement rather making it a stiffer affair, giving it a spontaneous feel.

Editing by Namrata Rao has been steeply constructed so that the film doesn’t lose its essence and pace. The juxtaposition of images through continuous cutting had given the film a sleek look that was desired in terms of telling the story in a concise manner. Cinematography by Nikos Andritsakis is equally commendable as he had taken charge of the camera movements and other details that gave a complete new life to the film. Music by Vishal-Sekhar has also been the high point in the film using the songs as per the need of film with precise lyrics to support the plot. Songs like “Imported Kamarriya” and “Bharat Mata ki Jai” are complete satire to the prevailing socio-economic condition of our country, which is exactly what Dibakar has tried to portray through his film.

The film fights a battle for its identity that whether it’s a commercial film based on realism or an art film portraying the realities, it is the audience to decide whether they want to dance on “Imported Kamarriya” or sense the meaning beneath the item number.

  • Shanghai Movie Review
Purnangshu

About Purnangshu

Purnangshu has completed his Graduation from Calcutta University in Mass Communication and presently pursuing Post Graduation in Film and Television. He has a niche for film and an ardent parallel cinema lover. He has a vast interest in exploring films and has written many film reviews till date. He has also served as a Trainee Journalist at Kolkata Film Festival 2011,playing a vital role there. He has an endevour for sucess in future with the medium he thinks is the most powerful,i.e,film and television. He has a passion for writing and has a blog as well where he posts regular short stories written by him. He had also done Content Writing for various organisations and individuals for clients all over the world and has a great experience is quality content development.Had been a part of prestigious Kolkata Film Festival as trainee journalist as well.He had done a documentary as well on Kolkata.

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