Ram-Leela

Ram-leela (Review) – The latest offering by Sanjay Leela Bhansali comes from his own factory. The caption of the movie 'Goliyon ki Raasleela' is very apt to the story. Ram-leela as claimed by the filmmaker is inspired by William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. The screen adaptation of the same has 2 families the Saneda's and the Rajaadi's in the town of Ranjar in Gujarat. These two familes rule the place. The 2 families have a 500 year old feud and hatred between them. Ranjar is a town where every individual moves around with rifles and knives and firing bullets at the snap of the fingers and there is nothing that the law keepers can do about it.

The two protagonists Ram and Leela played by Ranveer Singh and Deepika Padukone are members of either families. Ram, a member of the Rajaadi's is now back with the family after a long hiatus in Ahmedabad and runs a video parlour. He however differs from the attitude of his family and does not believe in violence. He along with his friends visit the Saneda's on the occasaion of Holi in an attempt to make friendship with the women of the community assuming that no one would recognize them amongst all the colours. As expected, Ram sees Leela and they instantly get along like a house on fire. They fall in love with each other. Ram starts visiting Leela secretly and vice versa. They both have an intention of breaking the rivalry between the two families. When turn of events add fuel to the burning rivalry between the families, Ram and Leela elope and get married only to be tracked down overnight and brought back. This forms an entertaining, engaging and an elongated first half. What happens later? Will the families break the ice and unite? Will Ram and Leela be able to play foil in bringing the families together? The answers to these form the engaging second half and climax.

Sanjay Leela Bhansali who is known for making movies with serious drama promised another movie in the same genre with the trailers and teasers of Ram-leela. He has also managed to pull it off as the screenplay of 2hrs and 35 mins which seems more than its duration never makes you feel restless and also keeps you engaged. The setting, the costumes and the look of the movie are sure to take you into another world. They all look picture perfect. The performances by all the artists are worth appreciating. Supriya Pathak who plays the head of the Saneda family pulls off her character with elan. Ranveer Singh in a particular scene where he interacts with Supriya Pathak is brilliant. Deepika Padukone not just looks beautiful, but also portrays her character to perfection. Music by Sanjay Leela Bhansali fits in brilliantly to the movie. The first half may have the songs frequenting but you can forgive Sanjay Leela Bhansali for that. 'Mor Bani Thangat Kare' and 'Laal Ishq' come with the start and end credits respectively. 'Tattad Tattad' is for the front benchers. 'Ang laga de' has been picturised beautifully. The most popular track 'Nagada Sang Dhol' is a treat to watch on the big screen not just for the song but also for its brilliant choreography and mannerisms by the actors.

There are few filmmakers like Sanjay Leela Bhansali and Tigmanshu Dhulia who can give you dramas like this which satisfy the appetite of both the class and mass. Watch Ram-leela for it will give you a satisfaction of having witnessed two and a half hours of good story telling. My verdict - 7/10

I watched this film with mixed expectations. On one hand, I had seen the Nagada Sang Dhol and Lahu Muhn Lag Gaya clips on you-tube - exactly what caught my eye and made me want to watch it. On the other hand, a- not-so-good rating and most reviewers claiming it was very bad were lowering my expectations. I did, however, watch it, and I loved it.

The film is intense, wonderfully directed and benefits from great acting. I am not familiar with any of the actors; nor with Bollywood films in general, which I do not find appealing because of their over- dramatisation of... pretty much everything. And mostly, poor acting. This is where Ram-Leela stands out. Apart for a few scenes, the director made use of the actor's skills, and pushed them to the point they save the sometimes-poor script. There's great chemistry in there, as well as some more than convincing acting, all in wonderful colours and costumes.

I had a hard time understanding why it's got such harsh reviews, given how good it is, but reading them I realized what the problem is (and probably why I liked it): Ram-Leela is not a film for puritans. While it seemed quite tame to me, certain watchers found it "vulgar", or too sexual. From my point of view, it's aligned with European films. What it lacks in plot-line (although decent), makes up with daring performances and honest acting. As for those claiming it's not a love story, I agree: it's a battle of egos, and most important, a battle with the self for each of the characters. This could have been emphasized more, but you can't have everything.

Goliyon Ki Raasleela Ram-Leela, one of the most anticipated movies of the year releases with all its bang and reveals itself as least related to stuff for which it had been declared controversial.

Sanjay Leela Bhansali's take on Romeo-Juliet, despite a known script, seems quite refreshing. The visuals, nobody questions, is by far Bhansali's best. Utterly flawless. You might want to compare the flawed VFX effects of movies like Krrish 3 and Ra. One and find Ram-Leela's visuals standing far ahead of them. The symmetry he puts in, the pattern he develops in every visual is like the best artist would.

SLB's poetry, dialogs and expression are so well that you might want other directors to get training from him. The professionalism is of Hollywood standard.

The songs are already chart-topping (Nagade Sang Dhol was No.1 on i Tunes for 7 consequent weeks), and when you watch them in the movie you feel mesmerized. So well choreographed are these dances that you couldn't stop yourself from thinking of performing them on some occasion. Though a bit raunchy, Ishkiyaon Dhishkyon seems more funny than vulgar. Priyanka's item number gives mph effect.

The strongest part of Goliyon Ki Raasleela Ram-Leela is the star performances. We do not doubt that Deepika Padukone, who has established herself as an equal of the Vidya Balan and Shaban Azmi only betters herself with this movie, giving her critics a yet bigger challenge. She, as Leela, is flawless. You wouldn't be watching Deepika Padukone, but Leela in the movie. Though in Cocktail, Ye Jawaani ha Deewani and Chennai Express, Deepika was the soul of the movie, here she has to share it with Ranveer Singh who acts equally well. This is his best performance so far. In fact, this is the best performance of the year by a male actor. Richa Chada is shockingly real as Leela's sister-in-law and Supriya Pathak, though sounds a bit like Hansa, is exhilarating and fear-inducing. Every dialog she delivers is pitch perfect.

The perfection that Bhansali has expressed in all the aforementioned topics gets polluted by the flawed script. Though in the first half you do not notice how time passes with the songs, acting and the chemistry setting fire to the screen, the second half takes a U-turn. The second half begins with impracticality, which moves on to deal with various serious topics, which is exceptional to a love story. What becomes a problem here is the absence of effective execution of these scenes. The sub-plots are in abundance but all last for so less time that the tears of Leela and Ram do not reflect on the audience's eyes. Before the audience could feel the pain, the scene changes. The ending becomes more like a fairy tale which ruins all the realistic happenings of the movie.

Despite its flaw, Goliyon Ki Raasleela Ram-Leela stands as WORTH WATCHING. One must definitely watch this class-and-mass movie for entertainment, visuals, star performances, songs, and by far the best adaptation of Romeo and Juliet by Bollywood. Go fall in love with Ram-Leela!

Director Sanjay Leela Bhansali returns with a bang with this highly commercial venture based adaptation of William Shakespeare's romantic classic "Romeo and Juliet", showcasing excellence with great technical and lead work. The director brings the Desi adaptation on screen with high gloss and great moments 25 years after what the 1988 Hindi classic "Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak" (Dir: Mansoor Khan) had brought. This film lies among his best works "Khamoshi" (1996), "Black" (2005) and "Guzaarish" (2010) with some nice twists and moments. The flaws in the film lies with the over melodrama and even over romantic factor in the film as well as its length which could have been cut down by editor Rajesh Pandey who also succeeds in bringing some great moments in a slick yet stronger form. The film's cinematography by Ravi Varman is excellent where every frame is painted well with sheer excellence and the execution of the shots by Ken Metzker in his DI work has been put up well. Production Design by Wasiq Khan, reminds of the brilliance of Bhansali's previous genius Nitin Desai in the director's previous works. The choreography is brilliant too and the music score by Bhansali and Monty Sharma is colourful, foot tapping and beautiful. The dialogues (Siddharth and Garima) are good and are also loaded with some nice punchlines worth of Taalis and Seetis. The screenplay by Bhansali and his team is good with its nice structure. In performances, Shruti Mahajan: Take A Bow for her selecting a brilliant supporting cast with Sharad Kelkar, Richa Chaddha, Abhimanyu Singh, Jameel Khan and Barkha Bisht who fit well in their respective roles. Supriya Pathak Kapur is excellent and is worth to look out for. In the lead, Ranveer Singh and Deepika Padukone come up with a sizzling chemistry as well as great performances, with the latter showcasing more excellence. Overall, this film is worth your ticket. Just sit back and enjoy the celluloid based vibrant splendor.

Ram Leela: Film opens up with colors, guns and a mahool was tried to be created but it was simply studio environ and thus provided a fake feeling. But Bhansali has also shown tremendous potential as a director when you consider certain aspects. Credit to him to get out some exceptional performances from his cast, Deepika is definitely improving with every outing but he deserves applaud to get some real stuff out of Ranveer Singh. That's where Motwani was found wanting in Lootera. Ranveer's hot bod is flaunted with precision and no one will complain about it. Supriya Pathak as Deepika's mother deserves special mention here for her performance. Priyanka was simply mind blowing in her class title track, as well as Deepika in her red ghagra 'Dhol' song....both of them have some exceptional choreography with equally fantastic dance. Deepika also looked like a queen seductress in her act on bed while 'Ang laga De' was playing, in fact she played that role uninhibitedly in whole movie. Songs are pretty good except 'Ishqyaun' that reminds you of Govinda-Raveena of 90s, simply bogus. Chemistry is intense between the lead pair, it becomes hard to take your attention off.....you tend to drown in their acts, where their electric smooches are icing on the cake. Only worry is that it started too spontaneously. Cinematography is great, but there are places where you feel this should have been real instead of studio and animation. Bhansali saab please understand movie is supposed to be real and theater is drama unless you don't want it to be otherwise. Editing is done beautifully, you hardly get to cry about length or unwanted stuff. Screenplay is the weakest link of the movie, transition of Ranveer from lover to don and an unconvincing end without much weight will leave you dissatisfied. If you want to watch a fitting end, go for Romeo + Juliet starring Leonardo and Claire Danes (1996). All in all film has Bhansali's stamp-theatrical, lots of perfect scenes and moments.....but it fails when you talk of the whole package. Definitely a watch, but don't expect it to deliver as a movie. This is a classical example of how you can fail to deliver even when you succeed- 3.3/5