Goliyon Ki RaasLeela Ram-Leela Review

Goliyon Ki RaasLeela Ram-Leela Review: The first hour of Ram Leela is absolutely high on spirit, verve, energy and sexual passion. Post interval, the film loses steam. It may be a visual treat, but Ram-Leela no Romeo and Juliet.

Rating: ***

Director: Sanjay Leela Bhansali

Cast: Ranveer Singh, Deepika Padukone, Supriya Pathak, Richa Chadda, Gulshan Devaiah, Abhimanu Singh

The increasingly violent adaptations of one of William Shakespeare’s most well-known plays Romeo and Juliet have progressed from swords and shields to handguns and rifles (and in case of Ram Leela, a deadly betel but cutter…).

Each retains the basic premise, but sets the tale in murkier locations.

When Italian director Franco Zeffirelli brought Romeo and Juliet to silver screen in the year 1968, he faithfully adhered to Shakespeare’s script and set his film in the medieval period of Verona. When Baz Lurmann roped in the chocolate boy Leonardo Di Caprio to play Romeo in the 1996 adaptation ‘Romeo + Juliet’, he retained the name ‘Verona’ albeit for a beach and included drugs and other dopey stuff.

Bollywood has already seen at least three films in the last two years which have taken inspiration from the tragedy of two star-crossed lovers: the Parineeti Chopra-Arjun Kapoor starrer ‘Ishqzaade’, the Prateik Babbar-Amyra Dastur turkey ‘Issaq’ and, of course, Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s latest film ‘Ram-Leela’. The backdrop and locations get an upgradation, with introduction of sand mafia, seedy brothels, adult video shops and guns and ammunition stores. Romeo and Juliet no longer are the two naïve, guileless youngsters who discover ‘love’ when they eyes on each other for the first time. They aren’t harmless puppies who speak nothing except proclamations of love and beauty in immaculate iambic pentameter.

In Sanjay Leela’s world, Romeo and Juliet are rechristened ‘Ram’ and ‘Leela’, which has led to perhaps the second most ridiculous petition against a film title; the obvious choice for the worst is Billu Barber, which had to be renamed Billu after beauty parlor associations found the word ‘barber’ derogatory. American audiences are far more sporting in this matter, taking no objection to film titles such as ‘12 Years a Slave’ (slaves referring to African Americans) and ‘Nymphomaniac’ (which is defined as ‘excessive sexual desire in and behavior by a female).

For those narrow-minded philistines raising their eyebrows and accusing ‘Ramleela’ of misleading audiences into thinking that the film is about Lord Rama, when it includes (in their own words) ‘objectionable and insensitive’ content (which, by the way, has nothing to do with Lord Rama – notice that the lord’s name itself is differently spelt. The term ‘Ram Leela’ is only used as an analogy for Ram’s purpose in the film i.e. to wipe out the increasing malice and violence after returning from his twelve year vanvaas to Ahmedabad), let me assure you that the audiences in the film were absolutely unbothered by the film’s title and its content.

They laughed and cheered at the film’s high points and made cat-calls during sequences that dragged unnecessarily, but there was not a single “I’m a Hindu and I’m offended by Ramleela” walkout. The title has been altered to ‘Goliyon Ki Raas Leela Ram-Leela’ anyway, so there shouldn’t be any problems now. That’s unless a Garba Association brings up an objection towards the association of a ‘sacred Gujarati dance’ with ‘goliyaan’, or even sillier, if the Medical Association comes up claiming that people now confuse ‘medical goli’ with ‘bullet ki goli’! There could soon be a documentary titled ‘India Takes Objection’ covering every single subject matter related to film that has come under some or the other controversy, so keep up with the troll petitioning.

We get back to Bhansali now. ‘Ram’ and ‘Leela’, the revamped Romeo and Juliet, are played by Ranveer Singh and Deepika Padukone. It’s an achievement for Deepika here, who gets ten times the amount of cheers when she first walks into the screen. Our Ram, Ranveer Kapoor, isn’t far behind though, with girls swooning and ‘ooohing’ at his chiseled hunky figure and ‘Man-Hair’ (blowing in the wind during his grand entry), but it’s a straight loss for him this time against Deepika, who’s hot this year with super-successful films like ‘Chennai Express’ and ‘Yeh Jawaani Hai Deewani’. Ranveer’s wardrobe includes jeans borrowed from Salman Khan and bright and colorful tee-shirts, plus he’s got a bushy moustache and a beard to get the Gujarati Rajput look. His accent however goes from being endearing to overbearing, especially when he adopts an aggressive or woebegone appearance for the latter part of Ram Leela.

Like Romeo, he speaks on ‘reconciliation’, albeit more cautiously as the men and women in his city are like murderous pit-bulls ready to knock down anybody who supports peace. Unlike Romeo, he owns a porn parlor (a note to Mr. Bhansali: Cameron Diaz’ Bad Teacher is NOT porn and doesn’t deserve a place in that parlor) and has made love with just about every girl of his caste in the city. He boasts about his amorous conquests, and urges his companions to gatecrash his rival family’s holi celebration so they can get naughty with the girls there. He finds himself enamored by Leela, and in an explicitly bawdy sequence, his holi-pitchaki squirts out a ‘thick liquid substance’ instead of water (!). She’s blown away by him, and joins him in raas garba. It does not go down well with her family; she is the daughter of the Saneda clan, which is at war with Ram’s clan of Rajadis. In the film’s beginning, we already see how a small tussle leads an all-out war between Rajadis and Sanedas, with glass-bottles flung and bullets fired by both parties, even at children. Plus, her mother, a despotic, malevolent, heartless, vindictive naagin played by Supriya Pathak, has already found an NRI man for her.

However, Ram and Leela fall in love. In a beautifully composed sequence, Bhansali bathes Deepika’s character in softer light as Ranveer sees her sitting dreamily in her balcony. Both are sexually attracted to each other, and both use sexy, corny SMS lingo to get close to one another. The subtitled English translation shall not be as funny and cute as it is in Hindi, so American viewers may find these scenes ridiculous.

The first hour of Ram Leela is absolutely high on spirit, verve, energy and sexual passion, and Bhansali opts not to deviate from Shakespeare’s original plot structure. After an hour and fifteen minutes, he does, by placing the segment of the murders of Leela’s brother Kanjibhai and Abhimanyu Singh’s character BEFORE Ram and Leela’s conjugal scene. After interval, he slips, and his film becomes an overload of noisy emotions, violence and revenge schemes.

This happens the instant Bhansali deviates from the play’s succinct structure to include self-indulgent high-fashioned settings and melodrama that recall his earlier films ‘Devdas’ and ‘Saawariya’. His subtlest attempt to date is ‘Black’, which had to remain more restrained because of its protagonist Michelle’s disabilities; when his characters aren’t deprived of the five senses, they speak, move, entertain, then distract and finally, just annoy the audiences. Ranveer Singh rambles and yells too much, and he seems unable to convey his character’s motivations post interval. With veteran actress Supriya Pathak, the problem is that the cause for her character’s rancor and animosity towards the Rajadis and her own cruel nature towards her children is sketchily delineated and insufficiently justified. There film chooses cheap jokes over dialogues to help us understand the character’s motives, and there are just too many characters introduced who divert our attention from Ram and Leela and pour cold water over their heated passion.

While the film gets back in shape during its denouement, its digressions after interval make it tough to bear, which is a shame as the things go very smoothly before intermission. This proves Sanjay is no Shakespeare when it comes to storytelling. But he’s a wonderful visual artist. Just look at how he composes his scenes and allows light to pour in or filter through windows and doors. More than Ram and Leela, it’s the film’s visuals you fall in love with.

In the end, Ram Leela feels like a 155 minute long dhoom-dhadaka fire-cracker celebration that keeps you entertained for

an hour or so and then simply assaults your senses. Bhansali should tone things down by a couple of notches.

ourvadodara.in Rating Guide:

* = Avoid!!

** = Rent It / TV Premiere

*** = Book The Cheapest Seats

**** = Book The Best Seats

***** = Book The Best Seats + Buy The DVD!