Masaan Hindi Movie Review

Even as the box office celebrates Baahubali and Bajrangi, Masaan celebrates good cinema. When last did we watch a heart tugging tale told of tears failures gnaws and scars? At a time when cinema eschews suffering as an integral part of life and mirrors a contemporary take of summary refusal of human frailty, we have Neeraj Ghaywan revisiting the fictional space that echoes misery as an integral part of the temporal picnic.
It must be said to the credit of the film that every moment of the 109 minutes is crafted to relevance. The banks of the Ganga is not an excuse it is the stage. Unlike Laaga Chuniri and Raajnaah, Ram Leela, etc., the fame, the streets, the history hardly is relevant. Yet it is the constant backdrop. The translucent morbidity of death and fire on the banks of the holy river, a milieu caught up in its rituals and a new generation fighting to come to terms is told with poignancy and honesty, intensity and is completely stripped of pomposity. The cast turn out their sincere best. Special mention must be made of Sanjay Misra and Vicky Kaushal.
Life chooses and without cause. It scripts without much ado how life can suddenly pick on its victim and throw one out of gear. It chokes and churns. This Namami Gange does not clean, clear or eulogise the river. It narrates two stories, one bitter, one hope filled, running their course till they meet albeit tamely.
Devi (Richa Chada) an IT instructor at a local computer centre keeps her tryst with Piyush (Saurabh Chaudhary) at a local hotel. The evening goes completely wrong. The police arrive and raid the hotel. Inspector Mishra (Bhagwan Tiwari) makes best use of the scenario. While Piyush chooses the easy route, Devi stays to face the brunt. Her father Vidyadhar Pathak (Sanjay Misra) a traditional lower middle class man running a small store on the banks of Ganga with the assistance of Jonta (Nikhil Sahani) finds his world suffer seismic tremors and does what he is forced to – succumb to blackmail. There is no way he wants the escapades of his daughter on YouTube.
There is also Deepak (Vicky Kaushal) in the throes of adolescent romance with Shaalu (Shweta Tiwari). Deepak belongs to a ‘low caste’ and the family spends every wake filled hour arranging pyres at the crematorium on the ghats. When Deepak is not pursuing his academic goals he is busy burning the dead bodies or facing the wrath of his frustrated sibling. The class caste divide in the traditional backdrop is simmering and ready to erupt. Life and Death have other ideas. One night at the ghat when Deepak is doing overtime, life offers its blow. Why does life choose these two for special harsh treatment? No time for metaphysics.
The survivor has to live – nay, make peace with existence. Resolute by compulsion, pushed by inertia the two walk their pathways with bitter sorrow and tears. They move away from the stifling environs in the hope that Time will balm the scar.
As the movie comes to a close, the sparse audience, sober and calm are making their respective efforts to return from the morbid pyres on the banks of Ganga, erase their memories of the haunting grave yard and the haunt filled Masaan and wipe their tears.
Meanwhile Devi and Deepak get into a boat. They seem to address life:
Tere bina kya wajood mera
Ab tum hi ho, tum hi ho
Mera dard bhi
Mera chain bhi

Stars: 3.5
+ Honest narrative
– Raw and disjointed.
L. Ravichander.