Teenkahon

Teenkahon comes across as trying too hard to be art-house. The checklist seems to be taken care of – it is full of things you'd expect in such cinema. The cinematography, for instance, is a lovely black and white in the first story Nabalok. There are beautiful visuals of the countryside and the Rabindra sangeet is mesmerising. Likewise, the other two stories too have their bits of wonder whether in the form of acting (Sabyasachi Chakraborty is extraordinary) or the theme or some really clever screenplay (in the third part).

But all put together, you can sense that it is trying too hard. None of the stories really pull you in the way they should. It doesn't give the sense of an organically evolved script. Now, this is a complaint which isn't easy to articulate but I'll try.

I'll use comparison. Take Asha Jhawar Majhe, another art house Bengali film that made some waves recently. Nothing much happens through its runtime. Or at least, it appears like nothing much happens. But it all comes together towards the end. It feels like the film crystallises suddenly and my heart felt a firm tug as the lady sets off to work again at the end. Everything seems so right about the film. Masterfully shot, enacted, and directed.

But Teenkahon often feels forced. It feels like a bunch of nice things stuck on a inherently nice idea but they don't really work well together. Often the staging feels sub par and sometimes the acting doesn't come through. One could blame these issues on the inexperience of the director (Teenkahon is Bauddhayan Mukherjee's debut) but this is often a problem of ambition that doesn't match with vision. Mukherjee seems to be full of ambition but without the vision of the master that he seems to aim to be.

It's hard to go wrong with the stellar cast that Bauddhayan has brought together for this film. It's a real pleasure watching Ashish Vidarthi, Rituparna, Joy Sengupta, Sabyasachi Chakrobarty and Dhritiman Chatterjee on screen. They do a fantastic job. Still, the best of the three stories presented here is the one with no big actors. In fact, the main character here is an evil little boy. Which the goes to show that a big cast is all very well, but what's important is the story. The last story, Telephone, starring Ashish Vidyarthi and Rituparna, is so far fetched as to be absurd. The second story, though very atmospheric, doesn't go anywhere. But the first story by the great Bibhutibhushan Mukhopadhyay is marvelous. It has a great climax and I loved the setting of the three friends eating "beguni" (fried aubergines) and drinking tea on a rainy evening as one of them tells the tale of his first love.

This movie revolves around relations not defined by society.As the name suggests three stories neatly told and evidence of inspiration from Masters of Bengali Cinema.. The first story..a story of innocence and love that demands possessiveness and manipulation and the magic of Black and white will tie you up. Second story is an excellent one room show between a husband and a lover of a same woman and the decision to bring forward the one responsible for her suicide.The story is superbly told with cinematography being excellent you will feel connected! Third one is my personal favorite with twists and turns and ....the lust and shadows of human manipulation!!! A must watch for those who understand movies...

Some films make you happy, some films make you sad and some just amaze you. Teenkahon is a film that I would name among my favorites. The film was riveting. This movie is very different because it has stories concerning not only the characters' love lives but their obsessions as well. It is exciting, creative and well worth a few hours of your time. This movie is filled with amazing actors and their performances. Bauddhayan has done a wonderful job with his debut direction. He has portrayed all these three stories with enough delicacy. One of the best things about this movie is that it's very much related to our own life. We all experience those magical moments that make us obsessed at some point in our life. All these three story lines develop methodically and beautifully. I was thrilled with the unexpected ending of this movie. All in all I would definitely recommend it. It's a must watch!!

Teen (=three) Kahon (=stories, story-tellings) is billed as a triptych, but to me, it was not a three-fold story. The film is comprised of three separate stories - powerful stories by their own rights - that were bound together by a single thematic underpinning: all-consuming, obsessive love. None of these three was the typical Bollywood-flavored love stories that are churned out annually by the various vernacular film industries of India. Each story was complex, many-layered and gut-wrenching in their own way.

Some other reviewers have accused this director, Mukherji, of following too closely the other celebrated film-maker from his state, Bengal, the illustrious Satyajit Ray. Ray's influence, given his stature, is perhaps not an easy thing to avoid for serious film-makers of Mukherji's generation, but I didn't get that sense from these three films. Rather, the presentation and the color techniques used changed from film to film - and it seemed that the director has aimed to recreate small vignettes from three different periods of Indian cinema, perhaps his way of paying tribute to the 100 years of Indian movie-making.

I would recommend this highly to lovers of quality International cinema. I understand the language (Bangla), but the subtitles seemed to run from the screen a little too fast, which may make it difficult for non-Bengali audiences to get the nuances.