Dev D.

I saw Dev D. yesterday. One of the best Indian movies I have ever seen. There are many brilliant scenes in the movie, but there are some that are just stuck in my mind. So much so that I had to write about them:

1) Dev, tipsy and dopey legged gets into a bus. He sits besides a middle-aged woman. The woman gives him the suspicious, judgmental look that women and men that age and above save exclusively to be thrown with venom at young girls and guys. He reeks of alcohol and grass. The woman covers her nose disgustedly with her yellow dupatta. As with Indian women and men that age and above, she considers it her bounden duty to offer him unsolicited advice on how to conduct every aspect of his life, undeterred by lack of qualification, expertise or experience. Dev continues giving her a blank stare and there when I was expecting an outburst from him asking her to shut up, he goes on and does something very startling. I am still laughing.

2) With his addictions, Dev has lost so much weight that he fits into a medium sized bucket, where he is seated and Chanda is scrubbing him with a loofah.

3) Chunni, who is Chanda's pimp with a heart of gold, has a white wife. She just has a single scene where she opens up the door when Dev knocks on it. It is left to the viewer to figure out how Chunni ends up with a white wife. Most probably one of his lays who he had taken up as a wife later on.

4) The bandmasters are rendering 'Emosanal attyachar' in the background. They are playing the band for Paro and Bhuwan's shaadi ki baaraat. As the song reaches a crescendo, Paro forgetting the Indian bride's suggested behaviour of self-restraint, gives in to the music and begins dancing with gleeful jhatkas. After a while, she realizes her folly and gets back to the Indian bride act, with a sheepish grin.

5) Paro cycling to the fields with a mattress on her cycle, the mattress being where she plans to lay Dev.

6) Chanda is extremely upset that her suicidal father killed himself rather than holding her in his hands and saying a few words of consolation. At exactly that moment, Dev takes her in his hands and says exactly those words.

There are very many small gems like these in the movie, which I can go on writing about. The movie is abso*#$@ingly brilliant. Must must watch! Hats off to Anurag Kashyap.