My date who preferred her siesta to going to a movie with me yesterday, decided exactly the opposite to day, treated me to a movie and even drove one way! We had a relaxed outing but the movie was anything but relaxing to watch. India has now got its own wanna-be Quentin Tarantinos and rural India provides enough opportunity and story lines to oblige them. This particular one is based entirely in Haryana and the story revolves around the practice of honor killing for same gotra marriage. It gets your adrenalin pumping about a quarter way through and it does not stop except during the intermission.
Gurgaon is where the story begins and moves on to NH 10, National Highway number 10, for the uninitiated. A young urban couple off for a motoring holiday take a country road off the highway and witness a brutal attack on another couple for breaking the gotra code. One thing leads to another and the story ends with a massive bloodletting by the heroine.
The beauty about the film is its simplicity, dark portrayal of a live social problem in that part of the country, and the caste/gotra equations there.
Anushka Sharma comes up with an amazing performance. Apart from playing the lead role, she has also co produced the film and the presence of Anurag Kashyap as another co producer ensures that there is never a dull moment. All the other actors, unfamiliar to me, deliver very credible performances, but it is Anushka who carries the story on her shoulders, and how!
I have just added another actress, Anushka Sharma to my list of favourites! And almost like icing on the cake, one of my old favourites from the 1980s Deepti Naval, delivers a powerful and unexpectedly vicious performance with panache and aplomb. Hard to compare her role here to her unforgettable Miss Chamko role.
I have mentioned in a few of my reviews of Hindi films that I am increasingly getting impressed with what the current crop of producers, directors and actors are coming up with and this is yet another instance of such a conclusion.
It is a film worth seeing for people interested in seeing a heroine oriented story told in a highly professional manner, who can put up with a lot of violence. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and have no hesitation in giving it a [rating=6] rating.