Movie: Hawaa Hawaai
Director: Amol Gupte
Cast: Partho Gupte, Saqib Saleem, Pragya Yadav, Makarand Deshpande
Rating: ***1/2
Amole Gupte is back to his home ground, and this time he merges sports along with his ensemble cast of children in “Hawaa Hawaai”! Beautiful is the word I have for him, both aesthetically and emotionally!
The four kids (Ashfaque Bismillah Khan as “Gochi”, Salman Chote Khan as “Bhura”, Thirupathi Kushnapelli as “Murugan”, and Maaman Menon as “Abdul”) provide genuine laughter, and their attitude they carry throughout is exceptional! No slap-stick comedy whatsoever, and no “not-suitable-for-their-age” kind of dialogues. They together form a character arc of their own and make sure it doesn’t deviate till the end. Kudos to Amole Gupte for handling them well! Partho Gupte is adequate enough and pulls the innocence of the age very easily.
The editing by Deepa Bhatia (TZP, KPC, Rock On!) is the best of the year from Hindi Cinema. Pure magic! The climax where the skating race and another fatal race from the past are merged, is flawless! And there is another song at the beginning, where children from two different strata of the society are shown in parallel visuals in their day-to-day routine. This portrayal and depiction was spot-on, and it was the game-changing point from where you just don’t want to end “not liking” the film.
The songs (Hitesh Sonik – background score, KPC) are brilliant. Perfectly capture the essence of the film, and form a backbone for the story-line along with the background score. There will be few moments where you feel that you are watching a musical! Now that’s special ain’t it?! The music is not heart-pumping or adrenaline-inducing, but instead follows the “subtle is powerful” template and scores big. “Sar Utha ke”, “Ghoom Gayi” are memorable numbers that you will surely be taking home with you!
The flaws – artificial acting by some of the supporting cast, and the amateurish feel created by them. There is a bit of overdone melodrama too. But these are forgettable when you catch the overtone of the story. The end is just not another straight out-of-the-blue win, but instead, one which is very meaningful and driven by the message of not giving up one’s dreams.
A must-watch for children, and moreover the parents, who should know how privileged their kids are to live in this generation! Don’t go expecting a “Taare Zameen Par” or “Goli Soda”, or nothing much “mainstream”. But you will be satisfied nevertheless!
Review by
Akilan Nagarajan, Founder| Reviewpuram (fb.com/reviewpuram)
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