Haraamkhor

I love art movies and Nawazuddin Siddiqui is one of my most favorite actors. Whenever I hear that his movie is out - I want to see it.

We saw "Haraamkhor" at the theater but didn't bring our daughter with us. I was told that it will have some sexual content and lots of bad language.

The movie is set somewhere in rural India, the landscape is bleak and dusty. The heroes are a 15 year old student Sandhya (Shweta Tripathi) and a school teacher Shyam (Nawazuddin Siddiqui). Sandhya lives with her father - a policeman and Shyam - with his wife.

Although we were warned by the note on the screen about a serious problem that Indian government schools are having, especially regarding girls, I had no idea about how will this "female problem" will be depicted. I was actually expecting some horrible female abuse (current Indian trend). But there was none of that.

The lead female personage Sandhya came up as rebellious, expressive, strong and "modern" girl. We do not see the "tradition" here, the caste etc...After watching it I felt that "Indian village may not be that bad after all". I found more positives than negatives in it.

There wasn't a lot of bad language either. I didn't even notice it and while there were some naked backs, it wasn't too sexual.

Of course, the acting and the dialogues were amazing, my husband thought though that the scene with the windmills was overdone, but I liked it. I take it as if local people probably would watch the same scenery again and again (as there is not much to look at in a small village).

There seemed to be two parallel stories happening in the movie at the same time. One was the Sandhya's and Shyam's "chakkar" (affair) and the other one was the little boy's Kamal's (Irfan Khan) one- sided crush on Sandhya. Those two stories seemed to intertwine very little with each other somehow, meeting only occasionally.

It was fun to watch the act of Mintu (Mohd Samad) and Kamal (Irfan Khan), because they were kids and acted effortlessly and naturally. I was wondering if they were the real village kids picked up from there and asked to act or were they some young geniuses...I thought one needs a lot of guts to run around in underwear and pull off whatever they were pulling off.

The magnetism between Shyam and Sandhya was weird and amazing. She was just a 15 year old and Shyam was probably 25 - 30 or so...The young actress face created some sort of magic on the screen when together with Shyam.

Sandhya's father, the police inspector (Harish Khanna) was a very interesting character too. He was distant, skinny, a little philosophical. He too was not a stereotypical police officer and it was nice to see it.

I rated this film 9 stars because despite all of the things that I loved: the cast, the location, the photography, the dialogues, the humor (yes, there was some good humor), the "mood", the music, there was something about the story where I hoped for some more completion, more power (?!). Although perhaps it's the type of story where completion is not possible: the whole film seemed like a fragment captured by a camera of someone who passes by...There seems to be no defined beginning and no defined end and it doesn't seem to matter...Maybe that was the director Shlok Sharma's idea?

Other than that I enjoyed the experience, the calmness, the humor and the realism of "Haraamkhor". It felt like peeping through a keyhole into someone's village, someone's life.

Shlok Sharma's 'Haraamkhor' is a bold attempt, that works in parts. Actually it works when the supremely talented cast gets a chance to score. Otherwise, the film just goes on.

'Haraamkhor' Synopis: A sleazy teacher gets involved in a sexual relationship with his teenager girl student.

'Haraamkhor' is bold & realistic. And that's its plus, without doubt. But Shlok doesn't know where to go beyond a point. The sub-plot, involving 2 boys, one of whom is in love with the leading-lady, is funny, but gets monotonous after a point. And the final 20-minutes go haywire. Shlok begins the film very well & the laughs are pretty good in the first-hour, despite the perverse behavior of its despicable protagonist, but beyond that, it begins to falter. Shlok's Direction is good for sure, but the Writing isn't tight enough to hold your attention throughout.

Now coming to the performances! 'Haraamkhor' is a yet another triumph Nawazuddin Siddiqui. Nawaz is brilliant here, portraying a part so hard to like yet hard to snub. Right from his body-language to his expressions, Nawaz is a scene-stealer. Also in excellent form is the underrated Shweta Tripathi. Tripathi, 31, plays a 15 year old with innocence & charm. Both of the actors make 'Haraamkhor' memorable, with their effortless performances.

On the whole, 'Haraamkhor' gets lost mid-way, but the acting remains strong. Give it a chance.

The way of showing the story was very engaging. The characters of shyam's friend and Shyam was well scripted. Actions of every character in the film were thoroughly justified. Nawaz was phenomenal as always. Shweta tripathi who played the role of sandhya in the film also did a great job. The way, the relationship was shown between sandhya and her teacher was flawless in my view. At the end, i also had started to think that how they are going to end the story, the way they did it was really good. Angles of shots and scenes shot completely fit in the story. Keep making this kind of movies. Thanks for making it. Will cherish it for many more days.

plot is good . acting is superb by all character. must watch for all. not at all boring . ending is thrilled. movie starts with good speed and its doesn't feel bore at all. nawaz deserves this role,no one can do better than him. sandhya and kamal is must watch role, they justified their role. editing is good. it raises the recent topic of society. no bullshit in the movie. its worth than more in Bollywood. movie is short duration so no lot of dance , bullshit drama. simple story but clinch dialogues. if this movie would have released ,this would have got lot of appreciation but i don't know about Bollywood. this movie is better than other crap in the market. no songs,means no time wasted on all fancy dresses. plot looks funny till end ,but it thrilled at the end because of the twist in the story

I was pleasantly surprised to have seen this film; one in which Sharma really shows his Shakespearean writing chops. We're thrown into a small village in India, where word gets around very quickly and everyone knows everyone. I'll leave my summary so far as to say that a relationship develops between the main characters and the character development does the rest.

Coming in at a very snappy 90 minutes, the film does a lot with very little. Character development is pretty solid, although you could guess where each character is going to be at the end of the film. A few small twists don't change the fact that the story feels very very classic. Shakespearean is the right word to describe it; some quotes from Shakespeare even make the final cut of the film. The dramatic sequences are broken up by moments of comic relief - a very theatrical move that I don't see often in such dramatic film. The dialogue is solid, with no major gaffs at all. The plot makes sense and the characters, although driven by their own desires, are largely smart in their decision making. These are all positives.

But I think perhaps the dedication to a kind of tragedy limits the potential of this film. For example, there are numerous scene cuts in which the audience must make the mental leap in plot from the last scene to the current one. The sheer amount and sometimes the size of these leaps can be quite disorienting. Furthermore, it does seem a little lazy. There are some moments in this leap that I'm sure the audience would have loved to witness. Alas. Soundtrack is quite weak although it doesn't hinder the narrative too much. But if I have one major gripe with the film, it is that the final climax of the movie seems to be based on a major plot hole. This is not to say I don't believe it could happen (sure it could), but that I don't quite believe in the motivations behind it.

In any case, the film was extremely solid and did its best with the tools that were laid out in front of it. I would have liked to seem more of the development of the relationship so as to make the audience more invested, and perhaps a more sensical closing to the film. The film falters only because of some core elements of how the story was structured, although everything in between was done quite well.