Parineeta was written by Sharat Chandra Chattopadhyay who also wrote Devdas. In most of his work, Chattopadhyay often wrote aboutBengali society, its people and class structure.
In adapting the novel Parineeta, Vidhu Vinod Chopra changed the setting of the movie from turn-of-the-century to 1962, Calcutta. Narrated by Amitabh Bacchan, we are led straight into a wedding – complete with the colorful costumes, loud music, evenlouder singing and of course, the ever so slight hint that all may not be too well with the bridegroom Shekhar (Saif Ali Khan), resplendent in his "“dashing"” outfit. A brief visit next door in fact proves there is indeed a vibe of some sort between Shekhar and Lolita (Vidya Balan), a young woman who now appears to be married to someone else.
After a series of flashbacks, we learn that Shekhar and Lolita were childhood pals, from the time Lolita was adopted by her aunt and uncle (who lived next door to Shekhar) following her parent’s death. Though the family lived in a grand house, her uncle’s family was not wealthy and a ten-year-old Shekhar grants her access his pocket money, making the cupboard in his bedroom Lolita’s personal ATM machine.
The friendship proves to be a strong bond between the two until Shekhar’s father Nabin Roy (Sabyasachi Chakravarthy) – a very ruthless businessman, introduces his son to Gayatri, daughter of his business associate and Lolita catches the attention of Girish, a steel tycoon on holiday in Calcutta. After seeing Lolita in Girish’'s company in a series of events, Shehkar is consumed with jealousy in each instance. But after a mercifully short sequence of events, he finally confronts his feelings for Lolita, and it turns out she feels the same way about him(yay!)
Just when things appear to be turning out well, a ploy used by Roy senior to gain ownership of Lolita’s house backfires and leads to a series of misunderstandings, and the plot makes a neat 90-degree turn. To say more would reveal too much and what is mentioned below may qualify as spoilers.
I liked almost everything in this movie. That said, I am not a Hindi movie freak – I only watch films with English sub-titles and tend to avoid films with long song-and-dance routines (I find them very annoying). Parineeta has a wonderful soundtrack – a grand total of five songs, of which different versions are played very subtly in the background at various stages. (My favorite song was “Kasto Mazza” which is sung on a train)
Saif Ali Khan was amazing and perfect for the role of Shekhar Roy. Everyone else was superbly cast, including Sanjay Dutt (who is usually seen riding a motorcycle in a hailstorm of machine gun bullets and somehow emerging unscathed in all the movies he makes) as a latter day Lakshmi Mittal-like tycoon. The person who really made an impression was Vidya Balan - –reportedly Parineeta was her debut –and she’'s just fabulous. In the word’s of Jude Law'’s Alfie –"The girl is a “showstopper!" In an age when every other actress relies on a pair of false eyelashes, colored contact lenses and a total of six expressions to portray a character, Vidya Balan simply sails through the movie like she’'s been acting all her life.
There was just one scene in the movie that made me roll my eyes and that was the birdfeeder being used to break down the wall at the end of the movie. I mean, WTF??!! That wall turned out to be a pretty sturdy piece of bricks and cement, considering it was built in a single day. Shekhar first tried to kick it down, then used a shovel, an anvil and finally uprooted a birdfeeder before finally managing to break a few bricks and bring him closer to his beloved Lolita. That was such a Sanjay Leela Bhansali scene and it almost ruined an otherwise perfect movie for me.
Now on to the comparisons between Chopra’'s Parineeta and Bhansali’'s Devdas.....IMO Parineeta ranks several (meaning few dozen) levels higher than Devdas. At the end of Devdas, I was left reeling with two thoughts "“What the hell was all that about” and “I want those 200 odd minutes of my life back!” At the end of Parineeta, I was surprised it had all ended so quickly and at 130 minutes, this is one of the shortest Hindi films I have ever watched.
Bhansali’s over-the-top direction of Devdas weakened an already bad script and acting (and for those of you who insist Aishwarya is a great actress – get real, she’'s not) and made it a messy, loud and over long dancefest. I would not have really minded the same birdfeeder scene at the end of Devdas. It would have made more sense. Now that I have watched Parineeta, I can'’t help but wonder – if Paro (Aishwaray Rai) had spotted a birdfeeder in the garden whilst she was running towards the gate to see Devdas - who lay dying on the road outside, would she have uprooted the damn thing (a la Shekhar Roy) and smashed through the wall to be with Devdas as he breathed his last?
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