Rockstar: To that ordinary person inside every STAR

Rating: 9/10 (18 November 2011)

First up i want to say as a gleeful child i sat in the theater and wanted to give as much chance as possible to like ROCKSTAR because i was mesmerized by the sheer musical brilliance of ARR. That being said even if i went in with a hate mood its difficult not to like this IMPERFECT MASTERPIECE, imperfect not in the way it was handled but its an Imperfect story about an Imperfect man inside every STAR. First Half: There are three main things for a life to sustain. A creator, a soul and a body to host the soul. And thats where ROCKSTAR is blessed in having a brilliant director in Imtiaz as its creator, a soul in ARR and the surprisingly perfect body to host in Ranbir! People who didn't like Ranbir for the rich spoiled kid he is must realize if he has this much acting talent he can be as much spoiled he can be! :) The story is simple! "Its the life and lies of Janardhan Jakhar" a.k.a JORDAN. Its how a innocent guitarist who wants to make big goes throe PAIN and when he becomes popular that same pain engulfs him so much that he doesn't know how to handle it! Credit has to be given to the director for creating two wonderfully unique halves that are so diff from each other! The first is about the wonderfully tender relationship between Janardhan and Heer. Its so innocent and realistic that the first half flows as faultless as a river! About the heroine Narghis Fakhri i agree she has been the real letdown in this film but her acting was not bad as such she was shown up by the Beast of an Actor opposite to her who was living the "Role of his Life" in Ranbir! Second Half: Now coming to the second half the half which many did not like. It speaks up about the ordinary guy in "Jordan the Star" wanting for thing to be as simple as it was when he wasn't a star! Its complex i agree and it glorifies a lot about Infidelity which is still "The Unspeakable" when it comes to Indian Cinemas! But its brave its new and it definitely touched me! I have seen countless movies brilliant till climax and faltering in it and when dealing with a movie as complex as this i could see Imtiaz coming up with 100s of ending for this but in the end he played to safe made it a musical tribute to that Janardhan Jakhar inside JORDAN. Advantages of having an open ended climax is that it lets us decide what we want and in the end keeps everyone happy but being brought up with Bollywood the Indian inside us wants the director to end it one way or other another reason why open ended climaxes rarely work in Bollywood! Coming to acting of other cast its difficult to single out anyone in particular because every frame was so dominated by Ranbir but Kumud Mishra ( Katana Bhai) pips over Nargis just because of the chemistry he shares with Ranbir! (Odd to say a third person has more of a chemistry with the hero than heroine but thats the sort of unique film this is!) Now i conspicuously avoided mention about the music till now because the sheer f**king brilliance of ARR deserves a separate paragraph. Now titling a movie ROCKSTAR everything could go wrong with the music but ARR showed us how everything can be made right with it! How every gap can be filled how every untold story can be told and how an untold climax can be ended! Now i surprisingly had the privilege of watching this movie is ESCAPE with English subtitles and that for me made all the difference from making this a nice film to a Masterpiece! Starting from the summary of the hero in "Jo Bi Mein" to the mild subtle variations of "Katiya Karun" as the lead pair's relationship to the beautiful parallelism in "Hawa Hawa" to the wonderful connection between coming of age song "Sadda Haq" and the climax song "Naadan Parindey" to the haunting back ground musics of "Tum ho" and "Aur ho" ARR has lived and breathed life in every frame of the movie! I have seen countless Indian movies never have i seen a theater full of audience sing along with every song! Only the brilliance of ARR turned the usually etiquette filled Sathyam audience into a maniacal Rockstar audience! I read in an interview with ARR that he and Imtiaz spent 3 years in conversation about this movie and its music and this kind of movie deserves that depth! As the end credits roll on we see the lead couple romance in all the places they have been since the start of the movie and to have that vision of how to end the movie when beginning to shoot shows Imtiaz's vision! This is that kind of movie which i can type endlessly about the story plot but i cannot do justice to that movie experience you get sitting inside the theater! VERDICT: Another Indian Movie that is too futuristic for its generation, too complex to understand and too Imperfect to be Loved! Another Movie i hate to see get flopped but destined for it anyway! A movie to be watched in a theater worthy of handling its musical nuances and with an open mind. (and with English subtitles for no obs like me!)