Tehzeeb breaks no rules in film making

It was on a lazy weekday morning that I caught up with Tehzeeb on a sattelite channel. Directed by Khaled Mohammed and starring Shabana Azmi, Urmila Matondkar, Dia Mirza, Diana Hayden, Arjun Ramphal and Rishi Kapoor in a guest appearance, the reason why Tehzeeb had caught my attention was its extremely talented star cast.

However, Khaled Mohammed misses the bus big time as far as filming Tehzeeb is concerned. The movie deals with the conflicts between a mother and a daughter. The mother here is Rukshana (Shabana Azmi), a famous singer and her daughter Tehzeeb (Urmila Matondkar) feels that her mother had neglected her and her mentally retarded sister (A highly irritating Dia Mirza) to pursue her career and that she was having an affair knowing which her father, Anwar (Rishi Kapoor) had committed suicide. Things had never been well with the mother- daughter duo even reaching a stage where the daughter elopes with a budding writer, Salim (Arjun Ramphal) and gets married to him.

5 years later, the mother visits the daughter and her family to renew ties with them and what the family members go through is what the film is all about. The movie has a very interesting premise, alright and it starts off very promisingly. However, the script loses its steam halfway through and starts fumbling as it progresses towards the culmination, something that was so evident in Khaled's maiden directorial venture- Fiza. Khaled establishes the characters especially that of Shabana, Urmila and Arjun very well in the first few scenes itself. The weak links here are Dia Mirza's characterization and performance and the casual manner in which the conflicts between Rishi and Shabana have been picturized. There is unnecessary focus on Arjun Ramphal's character as well and the track involving him and Diana Hayden only serves to increase your irritation.

Santhosh Sivan does not have much to do with his camera. Editor seems to have been on vacation. Production design and clothing departments deserve special mention. The biggest disappointment is AR Rahman who provides uninspiring music. The songs serve as speed breakers and have been inserted into the narrative for no rhyme or reason. Background score is also not upto the mark.

Performance wise, both Shabana and Urmila try their level best to induce life into their half baked characters with reasonable success. Rishi Kapoor has very little to do. Diana Hayden irritates. Surprisingly, it is Arjun Ramphal who impresses the most with his greek God looks and extremely casual performance.

To sum up, Tehzeeb starts off unconventionally but falls into the melodramatic mood post first half that spoils the impact that it could have created!