Autograph - Bengali Movie - Review

[This review may contain some context only pertaining to Bengali cinema, I guess that is expected]

Srijit Mukherji made a successful directorial debut in contemporary off-the-stream Bengali film with “Autograph”. A fresh and bold addition to the elite club of Rituporno Ghosh, Aparna Sen, Anjan Dutta, Anir. A spectacular, blazing, so-far-the-best performance by Prasenjit! So far I always believed he is a good actor only under Rituporno, but he broke the myth really loud. Indranil is refreshing and quite impressive as newcomer. Nandana acted well, but looked old with her facial wrinkles. A classy selection was that of Rudraprasad as the mentor of the hero. Srijit has recently made an appearance in “Gaaner Opare”, and here his cameo was following the trend of bollywood-hollywood directors.

Interestingly the film has a meta in it – a movie within a movie, and that too a remake of Ray's classic, 'Nayak'. How real life meets silver screen, is depicted once again after “Nayak”, a masterstroke by Uttam Kumar. A film superstar whose smile wins thousands of hearts everyday, in reality he laughs making an indecent sound, or how a newcomer changes his way of bossing with course of time, how a superstar admits his sin, crumbles down with his confession in a private moment under the influence of alcohol – lots of such memories. In a bunch of closeup shots of facial expression, without a single dialogue Prasenjit was more than perfect! Truly subtleties were the boldest impressions of this movie.

The music played a major role in this movie. It's truly a reincarnation of Debojyoti Mishra. The ample use of piano in preludes, smart tunes of bass guitar, a great drumming experience – a real good musical bouquet is really a treat here. Shreya Ghoshal, Rupam Islam were as usual great voices. Along with them Anupam Roy, Saptarshi were good too. One major notable part was the lyrics – it's a refreshing journey through poetry– a trail of Chandril's school is dominant. Sreejato deserves kudos for this. Couple of phrases were exciting enough to munch again and again. In totality, “Ontohin” by Shantanu Moitro and Anindyo, got a deserving successor in hall of fame with Debojyoti and Sreejato's “Autograph”. If not I am predicting it too early, after the Jibonmukhi movement and Bangla Band movement, the golden era of Bengali music is coming back again with music from contemporary movies.

The movie had lots of fantastic framings. The sacrifice of learning against money with the coincidence of Bisarjan of goddess Saraswati, a never-thought-to-be-remade, superb improvisation of Micheal Jackson's Thriller – the ghost walking, etc. Another framing was the view of Kolkata from the penthouse of South City – it was breathtaking and somewhere down the corner it nurtured the wish to return home back!

Srijit left his signature style in the concluding frame of the movie. The movie had unwrapped an ordinary human being of regular emotions from the ornamentations of a superstar – a love for having dinner at Hyatt, a love to be seen on the big cutouts, a hunger to prove a producer that he is the real key to success of contemporary movies. With all the incidents that happens in the movie, he reenters the same wrapper back. The symbolism of the last scene depicts the same when he slowly puts on his dark shades, scrolls up the filmed window glass of the car, and slowly the transparency of the same dissolves and he gets no more visible – superb! It really seemed an autograph of Srijit at the end.