Inkaar Review

OK someone out there is willing to handle the gender issue in the Corporate world while eschewing the style of faulting as with Madhur Bhandarkar. It is not about the Alpha male and his counterpart. It’s also about the Zeemale and the milieu that has comfortably moved to high fashion décor; learnt to wine and dine in propah fashion but has not been able to erase a mind-set that still sees women as second class. This Alpha male is not Amit from Abhimaan who did not accept his more successful spouse in the field of music went through the pangs of playing professional games and quickly corrects himself.
The story takes off with Maya Luthra (Chitrangada Singh) lodging a complaint of sexual harassment at work place against her colleague and one time boyfriend Rahul Verma (Arjun Rampal). A social worker Ms. Kamdan (Deepti Naval) comes to conduct an in house enquiry. The narration now takes a bouncy route with both principle players going front and back with their respective takes on a relationship that had its moments but has since soured. The tragedy is that they stay on to tell the story. Our modern day Henry Higgins and Eliza Doolittle have huge egos and little souls and thus make heavy weather in an ad agency that simply has only clients and parties and is not willing to come down heavily on a structural imbalance at the work place.
Sudhir Mishra pans through contortions dictating logic. In a world where the permanence of a relationship is akin to pics in a revolving kaleidoscope. He raises the issue with consummate skill and all along shows that the issue could have differing perceptions. Gender is not about legalese – that we have in abundance It is about a mind set and there we have arid space. Unwilling in the honest dark precincts of even the film theatre to accept an ambitious lady and her right to charter her course and her career. If men can bed why not women – considering logically they have to!! This double speak some where slips even through Sudhir Mishra’s narrative. Notice how the film points out a finger when Maya faults Rahul for flirting(?) with a model but the angst when the roles are reversed !!
The film refuses to take sides. In a male dominated world it is so easy. Vilipend women and walk on. Nothing new about it and in that context it is a trifle disappointing that the Director is not willing to take a bold decisive stance. That however is part of creative license and out side the scope of a review. This however effects the narration and the script and tells on the final product especially in the claustrophobic finale that contrasts the laid back style for a good part of the two hour film.
The support cast, like in a film dealing with the happenings in the ad world, has characters predictably angling for liquor all the while and this time round are also puking which is perhaps added as a credibility factor. The technical facets of the film are well taken care of. The cinematography, editing, music are all in place. The film however revolves round two characters – played by Arjun Rampal and Chitrangda Singh. Both choose style over substance. While in the case of Arjun Rampal it is not surprising, Chitrangda has obviously lost out on an opportunity to convert the role into one that could get directors running to her doorstep. They still can. She looks gorgeous and is even in the midst of an average performance way ahead of many of her more successful contemporaries.
In the final analysis, Inkaar is a mixed fare. It dares to ask, refuses to answer.

OK someone out there is willing to handle the gender issue in the Corporate world while eschewing the style of faulting as with Madhur Bhandarkar. It is not about the Alpha male and his counterpart. It’s also about the Zeemale and the milieu that has comfortably moved to high fashion décor; learnt to wine and dine in propah fashion but has not been able to erase a mind-set that still sees women as second class. This Alpha male is not Amit from Abhimaan who did not accept his more successful spouse in the field of music went through the pangs of playing professional games and quickly corrects himself.
The story takes off with Maya Luthra (Chitrangada Singh) lodging a complaint of sexual harassment at work place against her colleague and one time boyfriend Rahul Verma (Arjun Rampal). A social worker Ms. Kamdan (Deepti Naval) comes to conduct an in house enquiry. The narration now takes a bouncy route with both principle players going front and back with their respective takes on a relationship that had its moments but has since soured. The tragedy is that they stay on to tell the story. Our modern day Henry Higgins and Eliza Doolittle have huge egos and little souls and thus make heavy weather in an ad agency that simply has only clients and parties and is not willing to come down heavily on a structural imbalance at the work place.
Sudhir Mishra pans through contortions dictating logic. In a world where the permanence of a relationship is akin to pics in a revolving kaleidoscope. He raises the issue with consummate skill and all along shows that the issue could have differing perceptions. Gender is not about legalese – that we have in abundance It is about a mind set and there we have arid space. Unwilling in the honest dark precincts of even the film theatre to accept an ambitious lady and her right to charter her course and her career. If men can bed why not women – considering logically they have to!! This double speak some where slips even through Sudhir Mishra’s narrative. Notice how the film points out a finger when Maya faults Rahul for flirting(?) with a model but the angst when the roles are reversed !!
The film refuses to take sides. In a male dominated world it is so easy. Vilipend women and walk on. Nothing new about it and in that context it is a trifle disappointing that the Director is not willing to take a bold decisive stance. That however is part of creative license and out side the scope of a review. This however effects the narration and the script and tells on the final product especially in the claustrophobic finale that contrasts the laid back style for a good part of the two hour film.
The support cast, like in a film dealing with the happenings in the ad world, has characters predictably angling for liquor all the while and this time round are also puking which is perhaps added as a credibility factor. The technical facets of the film are well taken care of. The cinematography, editing, music are all in place. The film however revolves round two characters – played by Arjun Rampal and Chitrangda Singh. Both choose style over substance. While in the case of Arjun Rampal it is not surprising, Chitrangda has obviously lost out on an opportunity to convert the role into one that could get directors running to her doorstep. They still can. She looks gorgeous and is even in the midst of an average performance way ahead of many of her more successful contemporaries.
In the final analysis, Inkaar is a mixed fare. It dares to ask, refuses to answer.

L.Ravichander.

L.Ravichander.