Santanu4096

Although I don't discredit the potential of art in my country, I do think this film is nothing better than an exercise in frivolity. It's at best a pathetic mimicry of European art films; the kind of films which none cares about. Not only that the acting is bad, the plot is as cheap as it could get. There's no logic, no emotion, just a man going through a frenzy of sexual rendezvous with many women. It's what I prefer to call "export quality" India, because it tries to simplify things for westerners. Others have mentioned that it's meant for the international film festival circuit; and I think, that's completely true.

My opinons aren't quite as bitter, for this film attempts to deviate from the Indian norm of "no nudity" atleast.

Perhaps the first, and the only ever produced movie about the subaltern mileu. Kangal Malsaat (or The War Cry of Beggars) penetrates into the fantasies of the lower-class. Throughout the film, the meandering and misguided communisty party of Bengal is mocked often, rhetorically so. The Fyataru-Choktor alliance aims to rejuveante the subaltern status quo by inciting them into anarchy to rebel against the state. Though comical in its appeal, the film is characterised by its penchant for crude jokes and bashing the left-front Stalinist politics; and it's not subtle, it's explicit as it should be!

Hats off to Suman Mukhopadhyay for pulling it off meticulously. Not only is it full of Bengali cuss words, but also full of filth-filth the bourgeoisie dump, expecting the workers to clean it for them.

One thing is certain: this film doesn't hold back on experiments, no matter how eccentric. The avant-garde style is very unlikely of mainstream Bengali cinema, which nowadays is a rat race of making box office hits.

Rabindranath is a sensitive topic to us Bengalis, and naturally we tend to have a rather conservative stance. This transgressive film crosses the boundary of the "acceptable", venturing into the wild world of experimentalism, mending Tagore in ways that wreck havoc on our traditional mindset, forcing us to reformulate the notion of him and his body of work. The surreal nature of the film may obscure some the plot, yet it adds to the element of mystery shrouding the protagonists and their goals. This film unabashedly criticizes facism through its core message of anarchy that blooms within the women. Though explicitly political in nature, it never ignores the human element; culminated in the last scene of making love.

Even through its rooted in imagination, yet it is strangely realistic as it brings Tagore out of the books applies in a modern sociopoltical context. The cards depict a facist society, where every citizen is a soldier, bestowed the duty of protecting the state at the cost of losing their individuality. This is a feminist critique of totalitarianism.