Horrible, fascist and poorly acted

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

This is one of those 'exception to the rule' films, which still gets rated as an essential watch despite being just average and having many major glitches in its execution to put it honestly. So getting over with its weaker points first, the film's basic plot is now widely known to all after the recent controversy over its title and the court case filed by the original Gulaabi Gang's leader Smt. Sampat Pal. A well made documentary on the amazing social work by this famous women group was released just a few days back. And though the film is not entirely based on the real life facts, still it is quite evident from where the idea has been borrowed for its basic theme.Directed by Soumik Sen, GULAAB GANG is a sheer commercial adaptation of a serious mission wherein the women power is shown in full force with some well directed confrontation and action sequences along with many punchy dialogues. But since the director also had the knowledge of music, so to display it loudly he goes on adding numerous average as well as not-required songs in his narration right from the first few minutes to the last. Also including a clearly forced HOLI song in the final moments, in which Madhuri starts singing and dancing right after a pretty serious sequence in an utterly silly manner. So mainly due to this worst feature of the film (i.e. the songs), GULAAB GANG fails to make that desired impact which could have easily been achieved with just a theme song being played repeatedly.The film begins at a very lazy pace coming to the point after a long introduction and the entertaining tension actually commences, once Juhi Chawla enters the scene with her cunning smile. Later it keeps moving as a bumpy ride with some worth applauding high points coming after regular intervals. However many routine seen before sequences hamper its overall pace post the intermission and then the all hurried up, illogical climax ruins the entire build up quite badly.So then why I am still interested in recommending the film for all the Hindi cinema lovers willing to see something great? The reason is that yes GULAAB GANG turns out to be a clear masala interpretation of a relevant theme as expected, yet it gives you something unique and entertaining in few of its well conceived sequences focusing on the powerful clashes between the two veterans i.e. Juhi Chawla and Madhuri Dixit, executed like never before. Its indeed a treat to watch the stunning Madhuri walking with her solid attitude in slow motion along with the pumping music playing at the back. Plus the pleasantly shocking Juhi replying to Madhuri's every move with just a playful, teasing smile like a typical shrewd politician.In fact here I would like to admit that though the project was widely promoted as a Madhuri Dixit film in its entire promotional campaign and print advertisements. But in reality its Juhi Chawla who makes a more killer impact in her first ever role of a vamp unarguably. Hence as an exciting surprise, here we have the beautiful Juhi in a completely new negative avatar played real well, offering a lot more than the viewer's expectations from the talented actress. In other words, where Madhuri's decent attempt struggles to make an instant connect due to her mixed language (accent) or all meaningless songs (dances), there Juhi takes the full advantage of this unintentional flaw and emerges as a clear winner in this on screen contest evidently.Now if truth be told then the only person responsible for this visible imbalance in the two key portrayals is the music composer residing inside the body of the director only, who forced him to put so many songs & dance numbers into the film, which actually weakened the entire aura around Madhuri's strong character of a revolting lady ultimately. In other words, if only this film was made with just a theme song and stressing more upon the balanced depiction of both the clashing characters thoughtfully, it would have surely become a gem of a trendsetter in all possibilities, as it seems.Technically speaking, GG has a splendid camera-work complementing the enjoyable actions sequences of the film superbly and one really keeps waiting for all the tension filled scenes of Madhuri-Juhi together, eagerly. The novelty of a woman standing against another evil woman, moving away from the routine stuff keeps the interest alive and its truly a treat to watch only for these specific scenes alone as mentioned before. In the supporting acts, Divya Jagdale performs a bit over the top in a forceful mode but both Priyanka Bose and Tannishtha Chatterjee are wonderfully natural. All the men featuring in their various negative roles are fine, especially the one playing the local politician forced to face the cruel humiliation.In short, do give GULAAB GANG a chance, especially for the two veterans clashing with each other like never before and I am sure you would not regret the decision made, celebrating this year's Women's Day with Madhuri and Juhi together.

Too many jumps doesn't let the story flow in a linear manner. I understand that there are a lot of by stories that need to be established but the jumps are way too many and the first foray in watching the film is that of disjointedness.And why the delay in embracing the protagonist? And when finally she emerges from behind the veil, the entry lacks voltage.And then comes in the antagonist and she doesn't fail. And the face off well that doesn't fail either. Both stand their ground and it's electrifying.It's not a question of who had the meatier or glamorous role but JC over shone MD. JC was the character and vice versa. I was seeing Sumitra in each frame through all her mannerisms whether it was biting her lower lip or having that clove (atleast that's what I think it was).Considering that the film is all about the leader of the GG, the magic, passion and the rawness just don't emerge. She excels in what she's the most graceful at but otherwise she just sparked intermittently.There was more than a kernel of a story and considering its the directorial debut of SS, a good effort. Much will be expected in the second outing though. The reason why I couldn't add in a better adjective is because of a number of reasons. The number of songs and their reasoning for them to be? And what's with the shoddy editing? Storytelling is an art - why butcher it?All in all it was a valiant effort and as I mentioned earlier given the sheer talent of SS, one expects a whole lot more.

After watching the movie on the first day of its release, I was eager to read the reviews. But i was shocked to learn that critics have rated this film as average to poor. If you watch a film wearing magnifying glasses you will surely find errors in every film. But this film, which is made with such conviction surely deserved better reviews. The highlight of the film is its star cast. Juhi Chawla is excellent as the evil politician. She brings so much life into the diabolic character that you get goosebumps whenever you see her on screen. Juhi is totally believable as as a malignant and immoral lady. Madhuri too has acted well, but something was lacking in her characterization , due to which this does not make one of her memorable performances. Rest of the cast is also good. The actresses who played madhuri's associates have delivered a great act. Despite having no male lead actors, the film is thoroughly entertaining. It is thrilling to watch the confrontation between Madhuri & Juhi. I wish the critics had set aside their double standards and watched the movie from audience's perspective. This film is far better than multi million grossing films which i feel are making fool out of the audiences.

Nothing like a screen-rippingly pitch-perfect morality tale. Soumik sen casts female protagonists: a vigilante group leader Rajjo and a power-hungry politician Sumitra Devi, as the horn-locking leads and delivers a sucker punch. That it has female leads is sensational only when seen in a narrow context of the stars playing them but their character's causes, aspirations and life-paths are more a product of their personalities. Rajjo's fight for social justice and education is as gender independent as Sumitra's power-trip. It's coincidental that Rajjo's fight rehabilitates more women than men as she is working within a society that heaps double the disadvantages on the females. Just like it's coincidental that Sumitra finds herself working within male-dominated party-offices. Not once did I have to sit through lectures against another gender, and that is the film's first victory. The fight here, for justice and Enlightenment of masses goes beyond gender, as it should be. That Soumik Sen is able to then drop the grid of a massy entertainer on this wonderful post female-empowerment battle of wits and sickles is remarkable. Never does this grid reduce or trivialise the seriousness of the underlying issue, but only scales up the action and renders the vigilante group more intimidating than your standard ground-bound lathi fight. The other frill, the melodic song-breaks, barely last a minute before melting into the background score as the incident-heavy plot progresses. The choreography feels natural and stemming from the camaraderie and everyday work these bunch of self-sufficient ashramites of Rajjo indulge in. There are some other directorial decisions which are masterful: the opening cartoon montage literally spells out the bones of the "story". The point of this movie is both enjoying the how we then see the bones being filled with flesh and blood of this aptly located, arrestingly colour-coded human saga and the message corked within it. Bolstered by a terrific supporting ensemble (Divya Jagdale, Priyanka Bose, a mellow Tannishta Chatterjee, and all the guys) the two leads stand tall and deliver the goods like only they can. Juhi Chawla, cast against type transforms herself into the vile Sumitra Devi, a person who has fashioned herself as the ultimate political scion. Her self-satisfied smug grin at any opportunity to brow-beat and manipulate is as compelling to watch as her intolerance for Rajjo's popularity. Rajjo brings out the worst in her, to the point that she's compelled to smuggle arms for the ultimate face-off and throw her gloved-hand approach she was found carping about for much her screen time. It's a scene seeing her go down and kudos to the director to build her up to be an intimidating adversary with an unpredictable arsenal of "moves". Finally, there is Dixit. Being a hardcore fan, I was left underwhelmed by how emotionally contained and restrained her last two screen characters, in Aaja Nachle and Dedh Ishqiya were. She was beguiling in both, but how I ached to see her bare her fangs a bit. She is again a single crusader here, but Sen lets her rip. She nails those dialogues in close-ups, absolutely convinces in action sequences (who wants to watch a CGI overloaded 300 sequel when you see some awesome, well contextualised wire-fights right here!) but what still haunts me, much after the screening's finished, is how she had completely internalised Rajjo's crusade for education. There is this scene where the masterful camera comes down on her as she reads the approval of the funds and the way she hugs that piece of paper, it just summed everything. Another scene sees the camera slowly moving to her hunched with unwiped tears gleaming on her face and an old man sitting with her. This is after a second murder of one of her adopted girls. She packs in incredible amounts of resilience and is a beautiful amalgamation of the likes of Gandhiji, Tolstoy and the real-life Sampat Pal. In a governance-less land, this story about the reluctant, noble vigilantes with mainstream frills gets under your skin with Dixit as the heart and soul. While self-serious, it never sags, and it's got songs, action and comedy as welcome relief.Finally it's beautiful to see the industrious and the substance-filled real heroes of the world being championed, than the Dons, Gundays, Rowdy rathores, Rajkumars etc that has become the vogue of late. I sat through the end credits silently cheering for those incredible people who bettered not just their lives, but the world around them. It all starts with education.