Manjhi

Rating : 6/10
Release Date : 21st August, 2015
Time : 120 minutes
Director: Ketan Mehta; Writers: Mahendar Jakhar, Ketan Mehta based on a true story; Music : Sandesh Shandilya
Starring : Nawazuddin Siddique, Radhika Apte, Gaurav Dwivedi, Tigmanshu Dhuliya, Prashant Narayannan, Pankaj Tripathi, Ashraf Ul Haque



It’s an incredible story.

A man, Nawaz, in one of the most impoverished districts of India, with no means at his disposal, deciding to create a path through a rocky mountain, to ensure the fate that befell his beloved wife (Radhika), doesn’t happen to anyone else. He takes 22 years to hammer his way through and create a path. Overcoming countless obstacles – weather, lack of support from his father or the villagers, corruption, bureaucracy, the upper caste folk – he persists and succeeds.

However, strangely, I didn’t find the story all that inspiring. There was a touch of madness to his resolve, he lost a lot in terms of his relationships (friends or children) and got made a fool by the scheming bureaucrats and the mukhiya of his village

Nawaz gives a great performance, is very believable and Radhika is very good for the brief while she is there but I couldn’t help feeling that there was nothing new in the film – casteism, politicians bleeding the country dry, impoverishment – we’ve seen it all and (sadly) are almost inured to it…The humour is good – earthy and spicy, the music is very good

This is a story that needed to be told but perhaps it would’ve been better off as a short film, documentary or even a chapter in our school curriculum – making it a feature film made it stretch a bit too far.