As I Lay Dying

Just like two of my favourite films this year, the terrifyingly beautiful Stoker and spiritually violent Only God Forgives, James Franco's eighth directorial venture, As I Lay Dying, has garnered mostly negative reviews from the critics. Franco manages to transcend the self-constraining question of 'unfilmability' of the obliquely splintered novel by Faulkner. He uses diverse cinematic techniques, like split-screen and face-on camera address to portray the multi-voiced narratives and fragmented monologues of the characters. The overuse of split-screen is not distracting or jarring, rather it effectively highlights the eerie ambiance of the brooding tragedy, the isolation of characters connected by blood, sense of loss and desire for rebellion, and the constant role reversal of identities. However, he fails to stimulate the comedic undercurrents of the novel in the otherwise fairly admirable effort at adapting one of the most difficult 20th century novels.

Mishawr Rahasya

Mishawr Rawhoshyo is an extravagant manifestation of the much hyped terminology, 'bhinno dharar Bangla Cinema'. Born out of a mediocre director's mediocre vision of a misplaced sense of tribute to Sunil Babu, it's an epic misadventure of epic proportions. Prosenjit's desperate attempts to salvage some positives for this dreadful film is floundered by the clumsy narrative, shoddy editing, deafening background score and miserably inadequate punchlines, bordering on juvenile humour and moralising pedantry. Aryan as the wise-ass History Channel addict, Santu, is a terrible miscast. He mumbles, rumbles, fumbles and tumbles with agonising unease. Just as SRK's grandad cockblocks him in Chennai Express, Kakababu lipblocks his nephew's anticipated liplock. dustu Santu and misti Rini's dustu-misti prem is extraneously pointless but not as annoying as the product placements in the film, ranging from achaar to pain balms. Don't miss Santu's London-lettered Union Jack t-shirt as he breezes past a radical AISA poster at JNU. Neel and Swastika appear as disposable and utterly dispensable vestigial organs throughout the film. Rajit Kapoor, one of the finest actors back in the 90s, is reduced to a babbling, redundantly unmenacing caricature of a lamebrain dolt. Indraneil, despite his enraged snarls and growls, remains exasperatingly stone-faced expressionless. The VFX in certain scenes are strongly reminiscent of Chandrakanta and Alif Laila, and the slow-mo face-off between Joyraj and Bumba Da is so painfully superslow that, for a moment, it gives the impression of a video cassette stuck in a VCR. A tour-de-farce with alarming Orientalist stereotyping and potentially dangerous historical concoction.

Phoring

Phoring is the best Bengali film I have watched this year. Yes, detractors will try and unnecessarily intellectualise the demerits of the film. There are minor hiccups, especially the propensity towards emotional manipulation towards the end, but I choose to ignore them. The refreshing honesty of the film with its non-cerebral simplicity makes inroads into your heart, yet at the same time, explores certain complex themes with a nuanced candor. A gawky young adult caught between the two intersecting, permeable realms of the 'age of innocence' and 'age of experience' embarks on a journey from depersonalisation to self-realisation. The flight-graph of Phoring or the metaphorical dragonfly is beautifully narrated by the director through the prism of spiritual secularisation, starting with his naive conversations with God which finally culminates in the final act of dismissive arrogance where he denounces and disowns 'his' God.