Fanaa

"Fanaa" is not a word in common parlance. In Persian, Urdu, and chaste Hindi, it means "annihilated", "destroyed", or in the context of the latest offering from Yash-Raj Films, it signifies "devastated, ravaged, or consumed by love". Any film bearing such an intriguing, if somewhat grandiose, title would have the onus of living up to enormous expectations. In addition, this is Kajol's first film after a self-imposed hiatus, while Aamir Khan, paired with her here for the first time, is also seen infrequently on screen due to his reputed fastidiousness in choosing movie projects.

I say good for them, for this is a superb collaboration between the actors. Aided by strong writing, a different story, able direction, and slick production values, they make it an entirely worthwhile proposition.

The story—as much as I can divulge in a review—starts off in fairly formulaic boy-meets-girl fashion: Zooni Ali Beg (Kajol), a beautiful blind Kashmiri young woman, comes to the big city (New Delhi, in this case) for the very first time, after having lived a sheltered, happy life in a pristine little town in Kashmir. Right off the bat, she meets a tour guide with the gift of the gab and a roving eye named Rehan Quadri (Aamir Khan), and against the better judgment of her friends, takes up with him.

Aamir looks a bit long in the tooth to be playing Romeo, but does so gamely, and successfully gets the smitten Zooni to agree to a no-strings romance. This is where I realized that the times, they are a-changing: sweet, blind (in more ways than one), sheltered Zooni is so consumed by love that she permits Rehan to bed her before he weds her, a phenomenon that is exceedingly rare (or used to be) in Hindi films. Her parents agree to the match, and the footloose Rehan readies himself for marriage to just one woman.

Then hell breaks loose. Rehan is killed in a terrorist bomb blast, or so we are led to think, while the Indian authorities launch a search for the criminal mastermind that planned this and several similar attacks. Years later, a Major Ranjeev, bearing a disturbing resemblance to the dead Rehan, shows up. So what are we to think?

From this point on, the film takes off into novel terrain, becoming an extremely satisfying viewing experience. Differing perspectives of nationalism and terrorism are explored—one man's terrorist act may also be looked at as a fight for an independent homeland—as well as conventional familial and romantic relationships. Notions of love, loyalty, betrayal, patriotism, and morality get turned on their head, making for a pretty complex film. Is this overly ambitious for a commercial Hindi blockbuster? Perhaps, but the intellectual sophistication of the film-making team more or less pulls it off. There are some plot holes, but they can be overlooked in the interests of the big picture.

Kajol grows in stature as an actor with every film, and her Zooni goes from naive and school-girlish to anguished widow and conflicted wife—a challenging character arc, by any measure—yet, she makes it truthful and believable with her wonderful transparency. Also wonderful is that neither motherhood, nor her absence from the screen for five years, have dimmed her youthful looks or charm. If anything, she is more svelte, and her face shines with increased character. Kajol has been blessed with sublimely expressive eyes, and now that she has acquired more life experience, they register even greater pain. One almost feels like looking away at times, to allow her privacy in her grief. I welcome her return to the screen, and if she displays similar care in choosing her next project, it will be worth the wait.

Aamir Khan picks his projects with a mix of sensitivity and savvy, and presents the film-going public with a different persona each time. He contrasted his feisty village yokel role in "Lagaan" nicely with the glib, self-absorbed urban youth undone by love in "Dil Chahta Hai", so that in the same year, folks got to see two completely different Aamirs. I haven't seen his "The Rising: The Song of Mangal Pandey" or "Rang De Basanti" as yet, but I am confident that he burrowed deep into the souls of the characters of those films, too. Here he inhabits the skin and soul of Rehan Quadri/Major Ranjeev with total conviction and allows you into the thought processes of these men. He does look too old to do the romantic shtick demanded of the Rehan character, but comes into his own while playing the older Major Ranjeev, a profoundly troubled man dealing with adult ethical, ideological, and moral conundrums. To comment any more on his performance would be a disservice to the plot twists of the film, so I shall stop right here.

The director, Kunal Kohli, handled the fun and light-hearted "Hum Tum" with aplomb, and here he tackles subjects far weightier than those of the Rani Mukherjee-Saif Ali Khan film. His occasional missteps result in some unevenness of pace and tone (which some judicious editing would have remedied), but with the overall wallop the film packs, these are minor lapses. I personally felt the second half of the film needed no songs, but that is my own quibble. The millions in the majority would have none of that, I'm sure. Aamir and Kajol do their own singing in a small but powerful scene, and this, I felt, was far more effective and poignant than the over-produced orchestrations of Jatin-Lalit and the vast array of playback singers they assembled.

Rishi Kapoor, Kiron Kher, Tabu, and others offer strong support, while child actor Ali Hajji as young Rehan is amazingly unaffected and natural.

After witnessing the combustible chemistry between Kajol and Aamir (why were they never paired together before?), and being privy to the volatile, seismic shifts in their relationship in this film, I conclude that "Fanaa" is indeed the title that says it best.

This is hands down the best romantic film since .....well in a long time , all the people i know who haven't liked this film is because its got impossible situations in it and its slow in the 2nd half all i have to say : stop watching Hindi films then and continue watching 25 sec ads which have diminished your attention span .

The characters are given amazing dept and lo and behold they take the film to an all new high .Kajol has proved shes the best actress of her generation and with this film is giving serious competion to her late legendary aunt nutun as the best actress of the family .

Aamir is splendid though i felt his character got a bit sketchy in the 2nd half not his fault the director and writer could have made his motives more clearer for us . however what ever hes given to work with he electrifies every scene hes in .

kudos to all the crew especially kunal kohli

Fanaa- This truly is a good movie- not just in the entertaining sense. There are a few bloopers, of course, but they may be easily overlooked, an easy enough thing for sensible and regular watchers of Indian cinema.

True, Aamir and Kajol have performed brilliantly, the cinematography is excellent and the music heavenly. The background scores are worth more than a mention.

But the movie goes deeper and makes one think about the power of love and our utter helplessness before it... how it shapes one's life and choices. The importance of choice is given the limelight in this movie- the choices that are so unique and personal to each of us, given the same situation. It also asks, importantly, how much can love forgive?

Put yourself in the place of these characters as you watch the movie and see how much is asked of you at each step, what strength is required to make the choices they make.

This movie, in some ways, is a lesson in love. It puts to shame our cautiousness, rigid moral standards, emotional walls etc in love. You cannot walk into love with tiny steps, wearing a steel armor and praying not to get hurt. There is no such thing as going too fast or too slow, or all these clichés we've come up with to explain relationships :)

To love, you truly HAVE to be free. At heart.

The second half of this movie seems to be largely inspired by "Eye of the Needle" which I had watched twenty years back. It starred Donald Sutherland. "Eye of the Needle" has the backdrop of World War II. A German spy gets marooned on a desolate British island colony, probably Gibraltar. He falls in love with a woman who stays on the island with her crippled husband and their son. She too falls for the hero. When she learns about the hero being a spy she mercilessly shoots him. The tag-line of the movie ran like 'it is easy to love an enemy but difficult to kill a lover' (not verbatim). Replace the island by Kashmir made inaccessible in winter. Replace the German spy by lost husband terrorist. Crippled husband by alcoholic father. Presto, you get "Fanaa".

The story writer (who won a Filmfare award for this movie!) owes us an explanation.

After all the recent pornographic movies such as Murder and the like, it's really refreshing to have a D E C E N T Indian film which the entire family can watch. Sure the film wasn't brilliant but it beats the other crap Bollywood has been spewing out ever since the arrival of Mr. Imran-Gigolo-Hashmi. What a treat to see Kajol on screen again. She truly is the gem in the crown of Indian cinema. And as for Aamir...well, his done it again. After his stellar performance in Rang De Basanti, he pulls off the role of Rehan with immense warmth and passion. I know this is probably a pipe-dream, but it would be fantastic to see these 2 set the big screen ablaze again. Kudos to Kunal Kohli for reminding the world of what a true Bollywood film is made of!