Manish, did you catch it? What's your take?

Whoops, just read the entire post. Looking forward to your review.

Reviews people c'mon.

I really enjoyed the film. The story was moving with a good blend of history and story-telling. The only criticism I have is that the female characters were totally throw-away. They didn't add to the film, either in plot or theme. Their parts should have been beefed up or left on the cutting room floor. This movie doesn't need wanton sex appeal or song-and-dance numbers to sell itself.

Movie was so-so,not a true depiction of mangal pandey,actually movie was all about aamir khan and not about the national hero.
At one hand mehta says pandey didn't touch the shudra and at one hand he touches a prostitute,even more bad of a orthodox brahmin (although truly caste system is the varna system and it was based on varnai.e. qualities and karma and not by birth sadly we hindus have taken it wrongly ,Im a working professional,by true tenets of a hindu im the feet of the lord i.e. a shudra,the army men are kshtriyas,but sadly not enough persons dig up the original texts and believe in the notions built up by us,we need to clear them).Thats why people of balis,the native place of mangal pandey are protesting.there was no shooting in balia,though in the starting he says he didn't have so much historical evidence on his life and there is fiction involved.I doubt he should have hurt the sentiments of the people by playing with a persons life,he shouldn't have made the movie.
Lets hope these period films live up the expectations.
happy independence day and abve all homage to our freedom fighters and the men who died for mother india
Jai hind

historial inaccuracies aside, i really enjoyed it - i'd compare it to the desi version of braveheart with corny little dance numbers. though the actresses were not very well utilized, both the lead actors did a great job. i think it's a good flick for relatively ig-nant indian-americans to go see. it was really hard, but i think important, to see how piss poorly indian people were treated by the british back in the day and honor those who put their lives down for today's citizens.

and oh, it's really a kick to listen to brits speaking hindi. even worse than my valley-girl hindi :)

I agree that Rani Mukherji and Amisha Patel's roles were relatively useless, more so in the case of the latter.

Snickered largely at the British woman who attends the party in a lengha, as the same day I'd had an american student of mine show up appropriating a bindi, to compliment her outfit of daisy duke shorts and tight top. ;)

Terrible film. Terrible. I'll write a review in a day or two.

I really enjoyed the movie and thought it did a great job of melding Bollywood formula with historic epic. I liked that it remained resolutely true to its masala roots, especially with the selected medley of songs - item number, holi song, the qawwali in the dargah (as musical tribute to hindu-muslim unity depicted elsewhere in the film), the mujra (tribute to rekha in muqaddar ka sikander*). My only gripe is that the songs were introduced abruptly and jarred with the flow of preceding scenes. One crucial way in which Mehta did NOT hew to bollywood tradition was in the depiction of happy-life-after-being-rescued-from-Sati-thirsty-mob (even Farhan Akhtar killed off Dimple in Dil Chahta Hai!). Oh and I got goose bumps at the end when they fade into grainy b&w images of Gandhi, lathi charges, the marches and Nehru...

*Anything that pays homage to my all-time favorite bollywood genre (70s Bachchan flicks) is OKAY by me.

I didn't much like the film.

I found it bombastic and over-the-top in the usual way of patriotic Hindi films. Some of the dialogue was truly ridiculous, in the vein of: "After a hundred years of the British Raj, the minds of us Indians have grown rusty. But this grease [i.e., from the cartridges of the Enfield rifles] has made them move again..." At times, it seemed like it was a movie about the greased cartridges, not so much the wrongs of imperialism or emergent Indian nationalism. On a more narrative level, The Rising had too much testosterone with nowhere to go: this a patriotic "war" movie without much war in it.

(Maybe the problem was the choice of the Mangal Pandey story to begin with: it's simply not a terribly inspiring event, if you think about it: a soldier shot at a couple of British officers, and was subsequently hung.)

So I don't quite see where the New York Times is coming from with their positive review. And I have my doubts about whether Indian audiences will find this story interesting after, or separate from, August 15. We'll see.

Sorry giuys, posted this earlier under the wrong topic:

Check out this review by someone on another blog, and my thoughts in response:
http://www.naachgaana.com/index.php?itemid=335

I also wish to highlight how memorably Mehta puts in play the question of the complicity of the colonized in their own subjection: The wet-nurse of the beginning returns at the end to save the English child she has grown attached to; Jwala is too quick to transform herself into Stephens' "housewife" (in one memorable line, she tells Stephens, who's trying to prevent her from removing his shoes, that "we" are used to this sort of thing), and Pandey himself would much rather believe the word of his East India Company commanding officers than that of a "mere" untouchable. Most powerfully, Mehta inserts a Jallianwala Bagh moment when he has Khan fire at protesting villagers.
All in all, in Mehta's world, colonialism is not just about the Brits beating up on perennial resisters; rather, here the resistance is itself problematized, and one might even go so far as to say that the resistance proceeds from guilt at earlier complicity. To put it another way, Mehta seems to have a psychological grasp why the initial sparks for the revolt might have come from those who had loyally served the Company-- without losing his grip on the idiom of traditional Hindi cinema.

The question of complicity and resistance is also captured in the representation of the voyeuristic in this film: we see the indian fanner gazing longingly at the limbs of his English mistress; more significantly, we see Pandey transfixed at Heera's auction, seeming more troubled than repelled: he's sickened, but can't tear himself away; and we see this sort of "passive participation" again in the Rasiya song.

Amardeep:

"I found it bombastic and over-the-top in the usual way of patriotic Hindi films. Some of the dialogue was truly ridiculous..."

But this is true of Braveheart, Gladiator and most other testosterone war films, non? :)

chapathi mystery http://www.chapatimystery.com guys think it is OK too. Like you mutineers their name too has something to do with the Rising does it not?

My review is here: http://www.dhool.com/blog/?item=mangal-pandey-the-rising

Jay,

Yes, but that similarity doesn't make it any easier to endure. And both Braveheart and Gladiator have lots of impressive action sequences (blood and gore, to be exact) to satisfy the American version of the 'front-benchers'. The Rising only has a couple of fights, and they aren't especially memorable. (Admittedly, the scene where Mangal obeys the order to shoot unarmed Indian villagers was pretty compelling.)

Maybe they should do a second film about the Mutiny called 1857: The Put-Down, showing the thorough defeat of the Sepoys by the British army. (Get it? The Rising --> The Put-Down)

Also I think that the over-emphasis on the 'cartoos' (cartridge) really becomes a bit silly after it's been the center of attention for more than an hour. The worst part is where Mangal P. is exolling the virtues of the 'charbi' (grease) in raising the consciousness of the Indian soldiers... The whole theater was giggling during that scene in the hospital.

Amardeep,
Must say that wasn't the reaction of the Times Square theater audience on Friday when it came to the hospital scene. Personally, I thought the line "we are all untouchables now, in our own land," was very effective, and represents something very unusual in "patriotic" films, whether American or Indian: an acknowledgment of a viewpoint other than one's own. Pandey is in that scene willing to acknowledge that even the Scotch Catholic who continues to serve the Company has a claim on India. That line for me far removes this film from the mindless jingoism that some have accused it of.

Umair,

I think we just disagree on that line. The caste references in the film were heavy-handed and cliched. There are 'feel-good' gestures at the wrongness of caste in many, many bollywood films, but I often feel that it isn't really sincere. It's just a tokenistic embrace of the untouchable, weaker in this case even than it was in Lagaan.

Other groaners:
--the nurse-maid who suckles the British baby before her own.

--Rani Mukherjee's line: "We just sell our bodies, you've sold your soul."

These are all very obvious images, are they not?

(By the way, though I disagree mostly with the conclusions, I enjoyed reading all the reviews of the film you guys did on Naach Gaana...)

Hmmm, I thought the caste issue was more problematic in Lagaan than here; there the "untouchable" was treated with condescension, and all it takes is one speech from Aamir Khan to shame everyone. Here no real apology is made for Pandey's conduct toward the street sweeper (indeed, I would say that in the hospital scene, the joke's on him). Even his initial outrage at the cartridges explicitly stems from his fear at becoming an outcast in the community...the caste issue WAS heavy handed, except that in most films the heavy handedness stems from the fact that the hero is always shown to be above mere prejudice. Not so here, where Pandey is very much part of the whole system.

PS-- what you refer to as "groaners" are precisely what locate this film in the tradition of populist Hindi cinema. One can of course love this or cringe, but it's important to realize that the makers of Mangal Pandey might have crossover hopes, but they are primarily focused on making a film that will resonate with the home crowd, and in the smaller centers, not just the big urban multiplexes. Lines such as the one you mention immediately evoke a host of masala films from the 1970s and 1980s-- and that, just as much as the events of 1857, is part of the "history" of this film. But I think the tropes of "masala" cinema are used far more intelligently in this film than is ordinarily the case. Take the line to Rani: hers is a befitting response; it is crude and blunt, but isn't it the only obvious response to one whose desire is mixed with equal part contempt; in the moral economy of Brahmins loyally serving an oppressive colonial regime, why shouldn't the casteless whore consider herself superior?

Thanks for your comments re: Naach Gaana...I recently discovered your blog, and was delighted to see that you cover Hindi cinema quite regularly, and look forward to reading through all of those pieces.

reading some of the comments and revies of Aamir's film above I have realized how as the old saying goes food and water have the capacity to change people's thoughts even morals. Anyone praising Aamir's film is not only unpatriotic but an idiot of the highest order because he has just been cheated by this conman and he is publicly telling the tale of how he was cheated. what a conman this guy is- he has the temerity to portray such a great - such a fealess man- such a selfless man in such bad light! Oh my God and these so called Indians find it interesting shame on you - shame! This is how indians are absolutely dead race now and when one guy strikes a blow for the motherland he is portrayed as a womaniser! Oh my God - alas ! These guys are bloody dead! they do not deserve to be called Indians at all!