Review of Ghajini (2008) by Sovan M — 28 Dec 2008

Ghajini is A.R. Murugadoss's Hindi remake of his own 2005 Tamil hit, which in turn bears a more than passing resemblance to Memento (2000, d. Christopher Nolan).

The film begins with final year medical student Sunita (Jiah Khan) looking for a research project and stumbling across the case of one Sanjay Singhania (Aamir Khan).

Sanjay, chairman of mobile network Air Voice India, suffers short term memory loss meaning he can only remember things for a period of about 15 minutes, after an attack a couple of years ago left him with serious head injuries and his fiancee Kalpana (Asin) dead.

The film intertwines flashbacks of how Sanjay and Kalpana met and fell in love with Sanjay's present day pursuit of those responsible for her murder, a gang headed by a man named Ghajini (Pradeep Rawat).

To be completely honest, I don't think I have ever seen a film where I have disliked the first half and loved the second half to such an extreme extent.

I thought the first half was just plain bad - there is no other way to describe it (without censoring this review). Sunita adds nothing and appears as little more than a framing device for the rest of the film, a weak one at that. There is absolutely no flesh to the character and as a result, her interest and intervention in Sanjay's situation come across as irritating and with little basis.

The development of the romance between Sanjay and Kalpana is built on an amusing premise, but when it is stretched the full course of an hour with songs needlessly thrown in to drag it further, what was amusing eventually becomes tiresome. There was a lack of real chemistry between the two leads, which was further exacerbated by the fact that for the most part Aamir looked awkward as the stylish, gentle Sanjay Singhania.

Its the second half where this film excels - and I mean possibly one of the finest hours of film Hindi cinema has seen in all of 2008. It is tense, thrilling and superbly paced as it races to a somewhat predictable, but thoroughly satisfying finale. I can't help but feel with some slight moderation, the second half could have been a masterpiece of a film on its own.

In the first half, the film gets needlessly caught up in somewhat superficially detailing short term memory loss while simultaneously bungling the also needless love story. We don't really need to know the intricacies of how Sanjay and Kalpana fell in love - all we really need is the fact that they are in love, and there is definitely enough in the second half from which to subtly grasp that.

And that's where the difference in the two halves lies. In the second half, all of that unnecessary excess is stripped away, and the film cruises through on pure, raw emotion and energy and is a much better film for it.

Although Murugadoss has created an enjoyable action thriller, his directing style comes across as over the top on more than one occasion. He seems to feel the need to use excessive visual effects and bombastic sound effects (not to mention an intrusive background score) to try to get key points across. One of his strengths however, both in writing and in directing, was to sprinkle gentle touches of humour into the film.

A.R. Rahman's music is not up to his normally high standards and the songs are unceremoniously forced in to the narrative, yet add nothing.

Aamir Khan really shows his talent as the ruthless, intimidating amnesiac Sanjay. The intensity and menace he gives this side of the character keeps you on the edge of your seat in anticipation of what is to unfold. Asin makes a confident debut as the bubbly, saintly Kalpana. I will be familiarising myself with more of her work in future. Jiah Khan is fine in the parameters of what her role required.

In the end, a brilliant second half if you can sit through the first half, but certainly not the classic the pre-release hype would have you believe.

My rating: 6/10.