#Satyagrah : That Sense of "Missed Opportunities"

You watched the promos and as an aam admi identified with the anger seething inside against a corrupt system,  you reminiscence the Prakash Jha – Ajay Devgan combo brewing thunder on screen, you walked into the theatre with great anticipation to realize Satyagrah is an under cooked and over spiced spread whose soul is missing. Made with the right intention the movie suffers from the fatal flaw of a script stuffed with numerous sub plots, lack of focus on developing strong motive or etching out characters and sloppy editing.

                                         

In spite of vehement denial the script is a cinematic adaptation of Anna Hazare’s “Jan Lokpal” movement. It starts with the conflict between chasing money and following value and ends with preaching non violence and importance of staying in the system to change the system, in between it tries to connect as many dots, from the Satyendra Dubey murder case to grass root level corruption, to a rotten political – administrative system, the angst of common men, but fails to connect with the audience. Satyagrah will always remind Prakash Jha , how nearly he missed making a great socially relevant movie, by being either too casual , too self obsessed or making the cardinal mistake of taking the audience as fools. Dwarka Anand’s battle against the system is what each one of us is fighting today. We are as confused with the path, the end and the philosophy as Manav & Yasmin were. We watch their pain, yet it doesn’t torment us. We don’t fume in anger looking at the system’s apathy.  And this is where, Jha in spite of profusely using melodrama fails miserably.

 Amitabh Bachchan and Manoj Bajpayee with their superlative performance stand tall amidst a star cast that looks terribly jaded. Kareena Kapoor’s role as a journalist and activist is as confusing as Arjun Rampal’s presence in the movie. Prasoon Joshi pens a hauntingly melodious “Rash ke Bhare Naina” and disappoints with a dismal “Junta Rocks”.

In spite of numerous cinematic flaws, Satyagrah is a movie that people should watch for its candid intent, for canvassing the socio political activism of last decade, for instilling a sense of “uthkar karne hain kuch kaam, raghupati raghav raja ram” spirit in the youth.

As you walk out of the auditorium that feeling of “missed opportunities” grips you …….