Tribhanga

Give it a try. It is a nice and simple story and brilliant acting from its star cast. But like always few curse words would have been avoided, cus i haven't seen a lady in her 40's using so many curse word, specially if she comes from a decent family.

Anuradha Apte (Kajol), an accomplished Odissi dancer is suddenly summoned to the hospital due to her mother Nayan's (Tanvi Azmi) having suffered a cerebral stroke, leading to coma. Anu arrives with her daughter Masha (Mithila Palkar) and brother Robindro (Vaibhav Tatwawaadi), rather nonchalantly, as she is not really emotionally connected to her mother, to the surprise of Milan (Kunal Roy Kapoor), who is penning Nayan's autobiography.

Tribhanga is a glimpse into the past of the three women across three generations, and how their respective choices of living their lives influenced and shaped that of the next generations. It's a domino effect in which Anu who suffered the effects of Nayan's choices, ensured Masha's childhood remained protected, and Masha in turn, rejoicing to live amid a large, joint family even at the expense of her individual freedom and values.

The subject is sensitive and has been handled with flourish by director Renuka Shahane. Kajol obviously gets the lion's share of screen time and is the central character - she delivers a strong performance that on a few occasions comes out as rather loud and over the top. Tanvi Azmi and Mithila Palkar have comparatively smaller roles, but don't fail to create a deep impact by holding their ground. Kunal Roy Kapoor is delightful as the outsider who connects the three women and helps reestablish mutual respect and appreciation. Tribhanga is a remarkable effort to showcase family values in modern times, and would have been even better if the events were better connected and the characters of Nayan and Masha were given more screen space. Baba Azmi's cinematography is par excellence.

Movie would have been a good but Kajol spoiled it with her overacting.

The film slices together three generations of women from one family in a human story about complex relationships, secrets and lies. The story is quite melodramatic, but the delivery is pulled off with a certain touch of restraint and authenticity. This is of course in contrast to the well-known paradigm of the traditional Hindi family drama where even simple stories were portrayed with overstated sentimentality. This is not to say all of it does not exist here, it does, but the film works as an emotional melodrama, which focuses more on the drama part of it, and it's watchable all through. Spoken in several languages and having no songs, the film is very focused around its story and I'm sure many viewers might relate to many parts in it.

The narrative style is mostly conversational, which I love and always find engaging, and it heaveily relies on the presence and quality of its actors, on the dialogue and its delivery. Sadly this is exactly why film is not fully realised as far as handling of its important themes goes, such as child abuse and marriage conflict. Being such massive subjects, their presentation feels quite lacking and makes the entire project feel a little shallow sometimes. This is also true, in some ways, of the way the relationship between the older mother and daughter is portrayed. We hardly see balance there. Interestingly, the relationship between the next generation of women is better portrayed despite being given less screentime or importance.

Kajol's starry presence in such a film could have threatened the director's quest for low-key simplicity, but it's Kajol after all - a naturally gifted actress whose deep proficiency in the tiny nuances of the human experience has soared above even the limiting constraints of commercial Hindi cinema. Her Anu seems tailor-made for her, considering both her on- and off-screen persona - fiery, intense, brash, and brutally honest, but goodhearted and loving all the same. Okay, she gets to drop many F bombs, which is a little forced, but she captures the highly irritable nature of this woman who always seems on the verge of explosion and, above all, the person beneath the tough exterior. One is left hoping she'd keep experimenting with complex roles.

The supporting cast wavers, but even better is Tanvi Azmi, who gives perhaps the film's most affecting and fully convincing performance, which is measured, profound, nuanced, and composed all at the same time. Among the other players, Mithila Palkar seems to do the best of the little she's given, and she's decent although it's a big challenge to act opposite such strong performers as Azmi and Kajol. Even less convincing though is Kunaal Roy Kapur, who is not bad but who just feels very self-conscious playing this self-conscious and moralistic role. Director Renuka Shahane, herself an actress, does her best with this feature despite the restrictive nature of its setting and script. Her film is not great, but it's enjoyable and involving.

Tribhanga (Netflix film) review :

Noted actor Renuka Shahane's directorial debut called Tribhanga explores multiple relationships through its three main characters transcending generations - grand mom (Tanvi Azmi), mother (Kajol) and her daughter (Mithila Parkar). Packing in the inter-familial conflict with feminism, child abuse, gender bias and whole lot of women centric issues, it appears the debutant director has bitten off more than she can chew.

Not that it is a bad effort, on the contrary, Renuka deserves praise for handling certain scenes with the right amount of grace and sensitivity. Like the scenes involving the step dad played by Kanwaljeet Singh (endearing). But somewhere, the screenplay appears hurried up to pack in every element at crisp one and half hours which makes me wonder if it was more suited for an elaborate web series than a film.

Expectedly, Kajol is excellent in the main role. The actor clearly rises above the script here and how!! Tanvi Azmi is equally good as her mom who sacrifices a lot to follow her writing passion. Mithila Parkar leaves a mark even in a small role.

On the other hand, the male characters appear ill written and totally caricatured. Kunal Roy Kapoor's performance borders on buffoonery and irritates to the hilt. Vaibhav Tatwawaadi, playing Kajols brother, isnt able to justify his character at all. The problem lies in the writing which is obviously tilted towards the female cast at the cost of crucial male characters. Indeed, a balance was needed here to make the resultant conflicts more identifiable and relatable.

Another drawback is the needless cussing done by Kajol's character. Sorry but all those F words only act as a distraction.

All said and seen, even with all its plus and minus, Tribhanga is one of the better films I caught in recent times on Netflix. Forget the AKs and Dolly Kittys out there, you can watch Tribhanga if you have subscribed to that OTT app. A one time watch, yes!!

Regards, Sumeet Nadkarni.