Movie Review: "Aarakshan" is a Foolish Fantasy Film

When one makes a movie about an important social issue that touches the lives of countless people, it comes with a responsibility to stay grounded and as real as possible, and most of all, be sincere towards the issue more than anything else. If you are looking at “Aarakshan” as one such movie about the crucial issue of reservations in the Indian education system, then you are in for a big practical joke that director Prakash Jha has played with movie-watchers all across. “Aarakshan” may be a mash-up of several hot topics loosely touched with the intention of gaining on their importance in our hearts, but it is definitely not a movie about reservations. In fact, it would be even unfair to call it a movie about us- real people who live in this society. "Aarakshan" is more like a poor fiction movie with un-relatable characters, that swiftly jumps shamelessly from one important issue like reservation to others like commercialization and politicization of pre-college education without talking much about either of them, but rather using them conveniently to create enough masala to support a completely visionless drama script that is amateur and foolish to the say the least.

“Aarakshan” is a story of one idealistic college principal played by Amitach Bachchan, and how his family and he struggle through the evil world of commercialized education against oppressive politicians and businessmen. And that is all there is to it. It is a shame that the censor board even allowed this film to be called “Aarakshan” (meaning reservation), when all it does is use that topic to create some hot moments in the first 30 minutes of the film, and then, upon realizing that the topic would help little to move the script forward, moves on to create a story about commercial coaching classes and good people fighting against this bad concept. In the end, Prakash Jha doesn’t even care to leave a closing remark about reservations, and tries to make the audience forget that the movie was supposed to be about that idea in the first place. Even if you leave the intentions and relevance of its title aside, it even fails as a movie. The characters shown are completely unrealistic and hard to sympathize with, and their reactions are so extreme and out of this world, that not only do you find them difficult to relate to, but your second guess is bound to see every scene as a mockery of the society we live in. For instance, one of the scenes shows a procession of aspirants from recently reservation-granted communities celebrating outside a leading college’s gate, and the next thing you know is that students from that college belonging to the same community join them in their dance while rest of the college crowd begins to growl like werewolves from old English movies. And within the next few minutes, you see two friends (really, really close friends till a few seconds ago) arguing in the college alley over the new reservation policy like sworn enemies, supervised and instigated by the college’s evil vice-principal (ha ha ha!). My only question is- where the hell does a thing like this happen? Where in India do you see the principal of a top college insulting the vice-principal publicly before all students, and when do you see media reporters stand silently and observe innocently like children, while politicos and police shout and execute evil plans to demolish a poor man’s property standing right in open public? I can go on writing about the accomplishments of stupidity that each scene in this movie has to offer, but I think I’ve made the point. Had Prakash Jha invested as much energy to research and build a credible script as he has in the promotions for this movie, we would have at least something to look at. And even of what he knows, he builds a poor and uninteresting script that nags on tirelessly for 2:15 hours and bores the hell out of you with its irrelevant drama, unnecessary songs and senselessness.

Coming to the performances in the movie which are as eccentric as the movie itself, I would like to begin with Prateik Babbar, who somehow has managed to unlearn every bit of acting I thought he previously knew. Over-the-top and emotionless, he sings his dialogues no better than a lullaby. Saif Ali Khan tries his utmost to deliver fine acting, but is limited by a hollow and stupid character. The same happens with Deepika Padukone, who still needs to learn better to act. The only people this movie does give a chance to act are Amitabh Bachchan and Manoj Bajpai, both of whom deliver heartfelt performances, and are the only saving grace for this movie. In fact watching Manoj Bajpai act as the bad guy makes up the most interesting parts of the movie, and Amitabh delivers true emotions as a man who really believes in what he says. The music is not great, except for the one track “Accha lagta hai” which is nice to your ears. And the direction, well has been said about enough already.

As much as I had hoped to like this Prakash Jha creation, this is a no-brainer. Such a waste of a great topic like reservations and of such fine actors, “Aarakshan” fails at every level.