Madly Bangali

Anjan Dutta matures over each of his films...
Today when I stepped out of the theatre (Nandan - I), there he was - standing with a friend inside Nandan premises, observing the reaction of the audience of his movie Madly Bangali, immediately after watching it. I suppose its a matter of great satisfaction for any director to come in direct contact with the mass audience who has just watched his film at a theatre. Probably to study the expressions of the audience and to get an idea as to how far did the audience enjoy his movie, Anjan Dutta was standing near the gates of Nandan when the 6:30pm Sunday evening housefull show ended.
Those who have watched the Bollywood film Rock On! may feel there is a strange similarity between Rock On! and Madly Bangali. Both deal with rock bands, involving a bunch of youngsters, some of them have supportive girl friends and some are only devoted to music. In later part of their life, some of the band members look back and find that their once formed music band life was quite meaningless and seemed funny at the moment. Both the films are about a comeptition in which the band wants to take part and occurance of a number of events before that, including politics and tiffs on minor issues among the band members.
Madly Bangali obviously outperforms its Bollywood counterpart in the acting of Chandan Sen, who stands out throughout the film as a South and Central Kolkata's dada or don. He mentions a number of times of his super connection with Lalbazar Police Department and hence nobody dares touch him. His dialogues, and often Bengali slangs (pode cellotape mere debo and ketejhulie rakhbo) define his character very well. The same can be said of Saswata Chattopadhyay, who has small but significant role of a caring father of one of the band members, yet who is a jobless drunkard, sitting at home and drinking away to glory.The supporting role by Sudipa as the mother of the 21-year old who indulges into all sorts of addictions and as an onscreen wife of Saswata, is very indicative of the family background of Neon, one of the band members.
Among the four youngsters, the role played of the character Baji deserves mention. He is the Muslim member and the film touches the issues of terrorism as well as communism through him and his brother Sultan. Anjan Dutta has made a distinction between politics and art through this character. The meaning of religion as explained by the Director had hushed the audience for a moment.
The characters of Pablo and Benji require more maturity, which I am sure they will develop over a few more films. The problems of modern fast-paced life among the younger generation also find a footage in this film. Issues of teenage pregnancy, lack of knowledge of use of protection during sex and drug addiction have been well dealt with. The character played by Supriya Devi as Anjan Dutta's Pishima seems a forceful insertion. The film could have done well even without the narration of her bygone days. The recurrent askings of Anjan Dutt for a desi phone to call up his Pishima tickled the audience throughout the film.
Lastly, the acting of Anjan Dutta and Lew Hilt, as old pals catching up with each other every evening over Jack Daniels, show much matured acting among the naive performance of the young band members.