Nude - a film opinion

After a long time- since Dunkirk, saw a movie in the theater and like Dunkirk was a movie worth watching for the sheer experience of beautiful cinematography, play of light and shadows in a dark room, in your face acting and enchanting background music. I am sure that the movie wont have left a similar mark on my mind to write about, had I seen on the laptop or even a large TV.

For the past few years, particularly after acclaimed film “Shwas” the Marathi films have changed the look and are now more polished and visually appealing. With the new breed of directors, access to technology and most importantly funding through the able production houses as Zee and even mainstream Bollywood production houses putting in funds, there is no excuse for Marathi cinema to be rough and low budget. The film justifies all the money and efforts put in the making by giving one different experience in your own mother tongue.

The film is arguably naked and yet very subtle and sensitive to the delicate condition and situation of the main character and carries the story forward at a set pace and philosophy.

Ravi Jadhav, a renowned director and alumnus of J J previously has done mainly two genres, one being light teenage comic love stories such as Balak palak  and Timepass series and biopic tragedies like Natarang and Balgandharva. I would call biopic films tragedies because at the end, even one knows that the lead person achieved greatness what we remember is the tragic events that happened and they overshadow the happier times. Nude unfortunately follows the same trend and I personally felt little disappointed as throughout the film the character of Yamuna is shown a fighter and a strong person, losing out the battle in the end. I would have liked a more positive or at least a neutral outcome.

Being an Art fellow of JJ, Ravi Jadhav gives best technical performance through all the fields of Cinemetography, composition of shots, locations, colours, lights and shadows, music, costumes and detailing. I am crediting everything to the director as he is the captain of the ship and he is the one who has to get it out of the people and artists assigned to the tasks. Music and Cinematography is exceptional and use of high end technology and latest methods are clearly visible. The opening title written composed and sung by Sayali Khare is a audio visual treat. It re maine in the back of your head till the end and beyond. Where the picture scores technically is the detailing of the composition of shots. There is hardly any continuity errors (except having same set of hung cloths in multiple panning follow shot across the nalah in the slum) and small small details such as overgrown and dirty nails of Protagonist and washed out frames of deities on the wall show the dedication to perfection. There are many memorable shot compositions where use of dark filters, light/shadow and proportions are very well thought out. I especially liked the scene the night before the first posing, Yamuna is pleading the deities on the wall in almost total darkness with a red “zero watt”bulb hanging above. I also loved the shot on the beach where in there is a prominent 2 point perspective with reference to sand, sea and the sky. The shot is very monochrome and that intensifies the effect. There are many excellent slow motion panning, follow and dolly shots but somewhat felt there were far too many far too often.

The entire film is about symbolism. The pace of the film itself is very uniform and is reminiscent to the actual process of creating an art form. The very first major event where Yamuna sees her husband with his girlfriend and takes a dip in the river and walks back drenched fully clothed yet naked was a very powerful symbolic shot where the journey of her getting in the profession of nude posing begins. Another remarkable shot is while in the sculpture training class where all the students are practicing and massaging the clay preparing it for modelling, Yamuna while posing imagines the first night after marriage where her husband plays with her cheeks the similar way to name a few. There are few clichés as well where Yamuna passes the baton in a kind of way Chandrakka passed her baton to her to a new model who is little sceptical about the nude modelling for the art class.

The performance of Yamuna and Chandrakka are outstanding and deserve lot of appreciation. The sheer presence of Chandrakka ( Chhaya Kadam) as an authority figure gives comfort and confidence to Yamuna (Kalyani Mulye) and Audience as well who are by mow become a part of Yamuna’s life and are feeling concerned about her. Yamuna shows the vulnerability even thinking about suicide (well audience thinks that way) or may be not but always comes triumphant and more confident with every obstacle and difficulties. Chandrakka has been the pivot to the lives of Yamuna and Lahanya (Madan Deodhar) and for the beginning of Mumbai lives, provides all the moral comfort and sense of security and stability in the horrible conditions of the slums. The stark contrast between the creek waters of Mumbai slums and clear pristine riverfront of Nipani is used by Ravi Jadhav to show the contrast of lives with respect to living condition.

Another main character played by Om Bhutkar though is not convincing. He puts in his full efforts though is probably weakened by the story and the character play. The cliché of him being unknowingly falling for Yamuna and ultimately giving her an imaginary name of Chitra was a far stretched scene. He somehow doesn’t convince to be a fine art student and the natural body language, the look the actions are not similar to other students who are probably real students of JJ. Never the less I think it is a missed opportunity by Ravi Jadhav to empower the character more positively. No discredit to Om Bhutkar as he probably follows the instructions and the script.

The performance of supporting cast of Lahanya and college professors is good and absence of any leude gestures or proposals is a welcome feature in the story.

Ravi Jadhav must be applauded for avoiding this stereotype film story even handling a sensitive topic of nudity. There is ample symbolic nudity but never has it come to your face in a dirty way.

Where the film loses the plot and the grip over audience is the last 20 minutes where things start falling apart where Lahanya has been shifted to Aurangabad to protect Yamuna’s identity.  The scene where the so called Sansriti Rakshak storm in JJ and blackened the portraits and Yamuna showing courage and continuing the posing for the sake of education is a very stereotype scene. The applause by the students fail to get an applause from the audience and the general feeling of “Why!!” is predominant. The director could have just made a strategic point against the censorship and political interference in Art by only showing a news of Malik (M.F Hussain renamed) being forced in exile. 

The news does flash for a second or two but does not create an impact in the lives of Protagonist in terms of loss of employment or insecurity. The whole scene of sansriti rakshak is played like a street play (Patha Natya) and proves nothing but disrupting the flow of the film. 

The urge to make a political point could have been avoided or at least could have been shown in a non-obvious manner. The fight of art and authority is a long drawn one and there have been forever a conflict between total freedom of art and rules and regulations of a society. A film is a perfect platform to link both and Ravi Jadhav attempts to make a note.

The climax, the ending is the overall gist of the film. It decides the impact the film has on the audience and is the most important last 10 minutes of the story. Audience leaves the theater and takes the ending with them and not the entire movie. Generally most of the endings are very predictive and obvious and there are very few stories which are generic in nature where there is a superb opportunity to score high in the ending. The art of finishing the story is as difficult as to plate a fantastic cuisine. Even the ingredients, the cooking, the smell is top notch, if presented in a shoddy way kills the appetite. Master Directors are masters because they do the endings great. The art of finishing is so difficult though that even the master like Christopher Nolan find it difficult. The greatest ending ever of ‘Inception’ is taken to the bottom by the obvious endings of Dark Knight Rises where the Audience is presumed dumb, stupid and is spoon fed. I have seen a great ending in Marathi as well in ‘Deool’ which I think is a complete and one of the best marathi film ever. 

Nude presented Ravi Jadhav that same opportunity but I think he just threw that away. It so felt that the ending is directed and written by his junior or assistant director and felt like unnecessary addition. The fighter nature of Yamuna is lost is suddenly she seems so vulnerable. There is a continuity error here as well where in one shot after Lahanya abandons the art for money, she tells the professor that she will continue her posing only in the college whenever required but will not pose for private artists. This shows that she is still willing to not let the study suffer due to the circumstance and in the next shot walks in the sea. Final shot of Lahanya being literally small physically, mentally and most importantly morally visits the gallery and does everything what should not been done. ( there are few technical shortfalls as well).  The ending would have been so much better and wowed me had the last scene been avoided. It could have been even better if the film ended while the professor goes away to get tea (??) (from where and what’s the point in Mumbai rain) and Yamuna just walks away to the sea.

Personally I would have applauded a very positive ending where Lahanya grows up to be an artist and initially shocks to find his mother’s profession but understands accepts if not, includes it in his art. For the sheer artwork and technique, though there is a mention of this wish by Yamuna to Chandrakka some where in the middle of the film and would have been a predictive ending, it would have continued the fighting spirit of Yamuna and I would have personally appreciated.

The film is a second watch worth. My only advice is that to watch it in theater and not on a small screen.

Any how the film shows tremendous promise in local cinema than mainstream box office culture. The very fact that I felt like writing about it after such a long time says it all. The film has its flaws and has its shortcoming but at the same time has something that will make me add it to my favourite film list.

Shirish Ganu

04-05-2018