The Last Lear

Director: Rituparno Ghosh
Producer: Planman Motion Pictures
Starring: Amitabh Bachchan, Preity Zinta, Arjun Rampal, Shefali Shah, Jishu Sengupta, Divya Dutta
Editing: Arghyakamal Mitra
Screenplay: Anjana Basu, Rituparno Ghosh

The story of 'The Last Lear' centers around Amitabh Bachchan who plays the lead character of Harry. He lives for acting, loves theatre, adores Shakespeare and absolutely detests cinema.

Enter Arjun Rampal playing Siddharth, a movie director, who is very smart. After the bonding between the two, Harry is so much impressed with Siddarth that he is pleased to find a cerebral partner in him and wants to work in the latter's movie. Before the bonding turns into permanent relationship, an untoward incident occurs.

The movie's much-hyped publicity has raised the audience's expectations from the director Rituparno Ghosh who chooses a very difficult subject for his venture.

Let's see how far the director has been able to justify his choice. Rituparno, one of few finest storytellers from Bengal, chooses Utpal Dutt's play "Aajker Shahjahan" as the basis for his 'The Last Lear'. Besides, there's too much Shakespeare in the movie, and this is not suitable for each and every audience.

This subject would have been good at the theater but not necessarily in the cinema. Ritu should carefully note this for future guidance. In spite of all this, the movie engrosses the viewer, and the actors have played their characters so well that they forget about the story and watch their favorable actors busy playing their characters.

While Amitabh Bachchan's performance is par excellence, that of Arjun Rampal is not far off; in fact, it's more noteworthy.

The actor has been soaring higher day by day, especially after his performance in 'Rock On'. Preity Zinta has fared very well by staying effective. Shefali performs well though her hatred for Preity remains a mystery. As said earlier, the story takes a turn after an accident.

The movie lacks clarity as to why Arjun wants a retake? More significant is the mystery about Amitabh's death-defying jump all over again? After all, it's known that Amitabh is unable to see without his glasses!

Though Amitabh Bachchan's performance is the USP of the movie, yet it's not his best. In fact, Arjun Rampal steals the show in this movie. We wonder if Divya Dutta had any role to play. While Jishu is impressive, Prosenjit is okay.

In summing up, we may say that the movie in all likelihood could fare very well at the film festivals but it wouldn't do that well at the box office in spite of its much-hyped publicity.

Though Ritu's choice of the subject has been a difficult one, yet all the cast has performed their best. Arjun Rampal shoulders the movie besides Amitabh Bachchan.