Apr 10, 2010 03:06 AM
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Time is changing rapidly and so are our movies. Lalbaug Parel is one such movie that will be remembered as a turning point in the history of Marathi movies for its powerful script and direction. Mahesh Manjrekar completes his wonderful hat-trick after giving us superb social-based movies like Mi Shivaji Raje Bhonsale Boltoy and Shikshanachya Aaicha Gho. The movie is all about the mill workers of Mumbai who have contributed equally to the development of this city but who never received any credit for it. On the other hand, the story takes us deeper into the yesteryears of this city when the city lifestyle and living patterns were very much different from what it is today.
The plot starts in the year 1982 and focuses on a family who is always struggling to make their ends meet. The head of the family Anna (Shashank Shende) lives with his wife (Seema Biswas) and works as a mill worker but has not received his dues for last six months due to which he is not able to provide enough to his family. The eldest son of the family Baba (Ankush Choudhary) is a struggling writer and is always aloof from his family but somewhere within he really bothers about the family. The second eldest is Mohan (Vinit Kumar) who is more interested in cricket than in anything else. The third eldest is Naru (Karan Patel) who is always ready to fight for the poor and is regarded as the local bhai and the last of the siblings is Manju (Veena Jamkar) who wants to better family condition and works in a beauty parlor. Each member of the family is in the desperate attempt to uplift the financial condition of the family and how they handle each situation is what Lalbaug Parel is all about.
To be very honest, compressing the main plot of the movie in few words is nearly impossible because every event in the movie is linked to each another so well that we feel that we are witnessing bitter truth on screen and that is really something that we haven't watched so far in the history of Marathi movies. The story moves like a smooth ride and keeps you involved throughout the end. Apart from the strong storyline, Lalbaug Parel has some really good star cast that keeps us involved through their superb on-screen performance. Siddharth Jadhav as Speedbreaker shows his talent right from the very first scene when he makes a comic entry. On the other hand, we have some staggering performances from Sachin Khedekar as Rane and Vinay Apte who are a part of mill union leadership and struggles for the rights of mill workers. Apart from that Kashmira Shah, Satish Kaushik, Ganesh Yadav and Sameer Dharmadhikari are brilliant in their character roles and play an equally important part to keep up the tempo of the movie.
Technically, Lalbaug Parel is very strong because it has a good script that is complimented with awesome screenplay by Mahesh Manjrekar and Jayant Pawar. Interestingly, I found that the action in the movie is more realistic that what we normally see in Bollywood movies and credit goes to Pradyuman for delivering superb action sequences which are so real to life. Ajit Reddy shows his talent with photography and camera work which is excellent and shows you every minute detail of the Mumbai in 1980s. Mahesh Manjrekar gives us yet another shocking reality about the the city of Mumbai which has been developed on crushed dreams of millions of mill workers who were once the pride of the city but now they are nothing less than extinct dinosaurs. However, the length of the movie might upset you because the movie is a bit long. The movie is simultaneously released in Marathi and Hindi (City of Gold - Ek Ansuni Kahani) so you can watch in any of the version you prefer.
However, I would recommend Lalbaug Parel only for those who are interested in watching strong and different scripts.
