Review of Luck by Chance (2009) by Sheetal V — 01 Feb 2009

Luck by Chance is another one in the whole new genre of 'meta' Hindi movies: movies about the Industry, replete with in jokes, references, actors playing themselves, snippets of gossip thrown in for a Bollywood-crazy audience and a guessing game of which real-life actor/producer/director each character is based on. The difference is, unlike, say, Om Shanti Om, Luck by Chance has an actual story as well, and one that's not too filmi or predictable or boring.

Zoya manages to make the movie so chock-full of amazing moments that often you need to stop mid-reaction so you don't miss watching the next moment. She assumes her audience is intelligent and can get subtle reactions without being spoon-fed (watch how Farhan's character Vikram quietly adjusts his glares when Nikki walia (Isha Sharvani) is being chewed out by her mother (Dimple Kapadia) for her puffy eyes after a night-long surreptitious tryst in Vikram's room). In a quirky twist, the character introduction of Sona (Konkana Sen Sharma) actually occurs in a monologue right at the end - not sure if this was forced by convenience/time, but this twist suddenly wenches the protagonist's hat from Vikram and puts it firmly on Sona's head. That's when you realize that Zoya's moved you and your emotions so far away from where they were three hours ago, and you're rooting for Sona Misra, the naive, likable and ambitious small-town girl - not necessarily for the charming Vikram.

I wonder why, in a story that's such an ode to the 'outsider' in an incestuous Bollywood that often ignores the millions of wannabes knocking on its doors, every character and every key actor Zoya chose, is ironically part of a 'big Bollywood family'. The movie is written & directed by Zoya, the hero is Farhan, both children of Javed Akhtar, Konkana is Aparna Sen's daughter, Rishi Kapoor is part of the Kapoor khandaan, Hrithik's dad was an actor/director/producer and his uncle is a music director.

The heartbreaking competition and the desperation she knows to be true, she shows in the song Sapnon se Bhare Naina - when hundreds of young men enthusiastically and desperately audition for a role they know nothing about, for work that hasn't been negotiated, for a character they haven't been told anything about, for pay they're not even sure they're going to receive. One man says he's done one commercial in two years, his voice breaking. Another wants to do-over his audition so he can do better. A third haltingly asks Farhan to help him fill his forms in English, his voice low with embarrassment. It's impressive that the film has such deep sensitivity and is so rooted to the 'real world' - it's doubly impressive that every character has more depth than the usual single-note cartoons we usually get to see, but the best part is, the movie's such a riot. As Ranjit Rolly (Sanjeev Kapoor) says, the movie moves from highlight to highlight.