Umrao Jaan

Before going to see Umrao Jaan I read a bad review on the net. I thought to myself, whenever I read a bad review, expectations go low and I invariably end up liking the movie. Little did I know that the movie would have such an effect on me that I would end up writing a review.







To put it in short, the movie before interval is boring, very boring...HYPER BORING!!!
If it weren’t for my patience and the Rs 130/- ticket I would have left by interval time. After the interval it has good pace and story moves on quite well. The movie is 2 hr long before interval. Add to that a string of songs, most of which fail to connect with you. Don’t blame Anu Malik, Javed Akhtar or Alka Yagnik. The songs have good quality of music, ghazal lovers will like them. “Salaam” is hummable. “Agle Janam”, the folk song, can rivet the viewers to their seats for a few moments. The lyrics, very well written by Javed Akhtar and beautifully sung by Alka Yagnik. Then why do the songs bore the viewers so much? Sheer numbers?
Not exactly. It’s Aishwarya! She isn’t Umrao Jaan. She ain't the Umrao we knew. She does all the dance steps well but without the “ada” or finesse. She looks stunnigly beautiful, wearing glamorous outfits but there is no soul. There are tears in her eyes but no emotions on her face. Although she has perfomed quite well, she fails to enthrall viewers in the songs.If only looking beautiful good could make a movie hit, she would have more hits to her credit than her contemporaries.

The saving grace of this movie is Abhiseik Bachan and to some extent Shabana Azmi.
Shabana Azmi potrays her character perfectly. Abhisheik brings passion into his scenes with Ash(although she looks older to him in some scenes). His dialouge delivery is perfect and very convincing.
My favourite part of this movie was the interval. I have just one message for the director of this movie, “Jo ab kiye ho Dutta, aisa na kijo. Agle baar, aisi bore movie na bana ke dijo!”