Noble Intention, Good Execution

Its sad that not many looked beyond a backless Kareena on Kurbaan's posters. Probably, thats where such a well made movie failed to click with the audience- it gave out wrong messages of what kind of movie it was. If you watch "Kurbaan" (which is incidentally on Tata Sky these days), I am sure you will come out feeling happy that there are filmmakers in Bollywood who make serious, issue based films very well.

Kurbaan helmed by debutante Renzil D'silva deals with a set of Muslims in USA who want to teach America a lesson, following 9/11 and their invasions to Iraq and Afghanisthan. Ehsaan Khan (Saif Ali Khan) belongs to this group and wants a reentry to the USA. He befriends and falls in love with Avantika Ahuja (Kareena Kapoor), an unsuspecting Psychology professor in a Delhi University who was teaching in the US earlier. They get married and Avantika is asked to come back to US. She takes Ehsaan with him and Ehsaan tricks Avantika to taking a rented apartment in a Muslim dominated region that has Bhaijaan (Om Puri) and his wife, Aaapa (Kirron Kher) among its other residents. Avantika suspects something fishy here and her fears are confirmed when she learns that her rebellious neighbour, Salma (Nauheed Cyrusi) has been killed by her husband. She confronts Ehsaan only to learn that he is also part of the group and is left with no choice since she is pregnant and her lonely father (Aakash Khurana) in Delhi is also under their custody.

She learns about the plan to bomb an aircraft that has Salma's reporter friend Rihana (Dia Mirza) is traveling in, but is not able to do anything on time. Her voice message on Rihana's phone reaches her boyfriend Riyaz (Vivek Oberoi) who joins the gang only to bust their plans. Does Ehsaan find out about Avantika's intentions" Are Avantika and Riyaz successful in busting the plans of the gang? This is what Kurbaan tries to answer in its concluding reels.

"Kurbaan" does not belong to the entertaining Bollywood film type, something its producers, Dharma Productions are renowned for. Instead it is a hard hitting and realistic film that does not move away from its focus at any point of time. Renzil and Anurag Kashyap have scripted Kurbaan very well with poignant dialogues and excellent character sketches. Renzil also manages to extract excellent performances from his cast. It is heartening to see Om Puri play a character that does justice to his talent. Kirron Kher is adequately subdued and not her boisterous self (thankfully!). Vivek Oberoi gets to play an author backed role after ages and he makes full use of the opportunity. Saif Ali Khan plays Ehsaan very intelligently. Layers are peeled off the character as the narrative progresses and this has been done to excellent effect. The strongest performance comes from the leading lady- Kareena Kapoor looks bewitching on screen especially in the initial reels- she enacts all emotions of Avantika brilliantly- be it her love for Ehsaan, shock when she finds out the truth, her earnestness in helping out Riyaz or her helplessness when she learns about the plans of the terror group. She even dares to go where no commercial Hindi film heroine has gone before with the aesthetically shot love making scene that is extremely integral to the script.

Karan Johar, Renzil D'silva, Saif Ali Khan and Kareena Kapoor can definitly be proud of "Kurbaan"- it is a strong statement against Terrorism- a well intentioned movie that has also been made brilliantly!