12 film personalities who will change your movie taste for sure

Till 2010 my taste for movies included trashy flicks which were filled with nonsense story lines, unbelievably stupid action scenes and unnecessary plus useless love story angles, but then I came across the works of few film personalities which include directors and actors from Hollywood, Bollywood and even Tollywood (bengali films) which actually made me believe that what all I was following before were simply the different faces of utter nonsense. Directors and scriptwriters changed my taste with their creative mantras which had their own originality and actors did it not only with their magnificent acting skills but also by choosing the right movies to star in. This list that I have prepared includes all of them but just a disclaimer; while preparing it I didn't had any sort of ranking for the arrangement, it’s just according to whoever flashed first in my mind.

1) Quentin Tarantino

Beginning with Reservoir Dogs  in 1992 he went on to make the best known crime movies like Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown, Kill Bill vol. 1 and 2 and Death Proof to name a few which were successful both critically as well as commercially.  His fictional history film Inglorious Bastards starring Brad ?Pitt and Christoph Waltz was also a gem. He has recieved many industry awards including two Academy Awards for Pulp Fiction and Django Unchained both under the category of 'Best Original Screenplay' and two BAFTA awards for the same movies and under the same categories as mentioned.

2) Brian De Palma

Best known for suspense thrillers but when his name comes to my mind, I remember an evergreen classic of his i.e Scarface released in 1983 starring Al Pacino, it was a remake of 1932 film of the same name; it told the story of Tony Montana, a Cuban refugee who arrives in Miami with nothing and rises to become the most powerful drug kingpin. 

His other successful works include Carrie, Dressed to Kill, The Untouchables and Carlito's Way.

3) Anurag Kashyap

To be honest, I hate Bollywood, 80 % of the films produced in Bollywood are copied ones. The directors and scriptwriters don't have any original idea of their own and the rich producers love to drain their money into giving these directors the chance to create crap.
On this mud made of garbage films , if you are looking for a lotus, they are the Anurag Kashyap movies produced under two of his film banners, A K Films and Phantom. Acclaimed for making often realistic films and having newcomers in most of his movies he has earned a cut following. Almost all of his movies are worth watching but the memorable ones are Satya (1998) (for which he was only the scriptwriter, the film was directed by Ram Gopal Verma), Black Friday (2007), DevD (2009) - a modern adaptation of Devdas, Gulaal (2009) and the latest one Ugly (2014). His latest release is Bombay Velvet.

4) Al Pacino

Well known for playing mobsters and gangsters on screen, Al Pacino's acting got such strength that you will remember his portrayed characters more than him. Some of the best known classic characters are that of Michael Corleone in The Godfather, The Godfather 2 and The Godfather 3, Tony Montana in Scarface, Arthur Kirkland in ..And Justice for All  and Carlito Brigante in Carlito's Way. He also played biographical roles like that of Frank Serpico in Serpico (1973), Sonny Wortzick in Dog Day Afternoon (1975) and Benjamin "Lefty" Ruggiero in Donnie Brasco (1997). During his acting career he had been nominated 8 times for oscar out of which he won one, he won four Golden Globe and two BAFTA awards. 

5) Robert De Niro

After being turned down for the role of Sonny Corleone in The Godfather in 1972, he was chosen for the role of young Vito Corleone in The Godfather part II released in 1974. De Niro became the first actor to win an Academy award speaking mainly a foreign language. After gaining popularity for the role of a dying Major League Baseball player in Bang the Drums Slowly (1973) his collaboration with the renowned director Martin Scorcese started. Some of the most memorable characters for which I recommend him include that of a small time gangster Johny Boy in Mean Streets (1973),  Travis Bickle in Taxi Driver (1976), David Noodles Aaronson in Once upon a time in America (1984) and as Maximilian 'Max' Cady in Cape Fear (1991) etc. Just like Al Pacino he too has many biographical roles to his credit, most of them in Martin Scorcese films, the examples include boxer Jake LaMotta in Raging Bull (1980), Al Capone in The Untouchables (1987), James Conway in Goodfellas (1990) and Sam Ace Rothstein in Casino (1995).

6) Uttam Kumar

 

Regarded as one of the greatest actors in the history of Indian Cinema he was known by the honorific Mahanayak. Throughout his career he earned commercial as well as critical success and he remains a cultural icon. He managed to have a huge fan folowing mainy concentrated in the regions of XWest Bengal and Bangladesh. A metro station in Kolkata was renamed in his honor. His earlier movies were mostly flops and he was even dubbed as the 'Flop Master General'. He came to prominence after getting a contract with M P Studios for the film Basu Paribar but his breakthrough is considered to be the film Agni Pariksha in 1954. He mostly did commercial cinemas and that too mainly the romantic ones. His pairing up with Suchitra Sen (grandmother of Riya and Raima Sen) was so much applauded by audience that the term 'Uttam-Suchitra film' became enough adjective to attract viewers to theatres. Still my favorite Uttam Kumar starrer till date would be his movie with master filmmaker Satyajit Ray that is Nayok. This movie tells the story of a superstar who while travelling in a train to Delhi to recieve an award recounts about his own life, how he was an ordinary man doing theatres and then acted in movies much against his teacher's wishes and later on rose to be a superstar. The story was very much inspired by his own life, Satyajit Ray wrote the script of the movie keeping Uttam's character in mind.  Uttam Kumar died at the age of 53 on 24th July 1980 after suffering a heart attack while filming Ogo Bodhu Shundori.

7) Soumitra Chatterjee 

Another superstar of bengali cinema who had his own speciality, while Uttam Kumar is remembered for his evergreen commercial cinemas by the majority of audience, there was a target audience who had their eyes for art cinemas or parallel cinemas, Soumitra Chatterjee was their Nayak. After his debut in Apur Sansar in 1959, the third and the last installment of the magnificent Apu trilogy, he became a regular in Satyajit Ray films such as Abhijan in 1962, Charulata in 1964, Aranyer Din Ratri in 1969, Ashani Sanket in 1973, Sonar Kella in 1974, Joi baba Felunath in 1978, Ghare Baire in 1984 and Ganashatru in 1989. He worked with several other notable actors also of that era including Tapan Sinha in Kshudista Pashan in 1960 and Jhinder Bandi in 1984 and Mrinal Sen in Akash Kusum (1965). He is still an active actor in films.

8) Satyajit Ray

Drawn into making independent films after watching Vittorio De Sica's italian movie Bicycle Thieves, he made his first movie in 1955 namely Pather Panchali which won 11 international awards. For his film Ray did the scripting, casting, scoring, editing and designed his own credit titles and publicity materials. He did not only make movies, through his movies and short stories primarily aimed at children and adolescents, he created several iconic characters including the detective Feluda and  the scientist in his science fiction stories Professor Shonku. He was awarded an honorary degree by Oxford University. Ray recieved many major awards in his career including 32 Indian National film awards. In 1992 he was awarded an honorary Academy award. In the same year he was awarded Bharat Ratna by Government of India. 

9) Srijit Mukherjee

This director came into prominence after directing his first feature film Autograph released in 2010 which was a commercial as well as critical success. Till date he has made only six films which are Autograph, Baishe Srabon, Hemlock society, Mishawr Rawhoshyo, Jaatishwar and Chotushkone. \Out of these movies Jaatishwar which was a musical, won 4 national awards at India's 61st National Film Awards. Also he has won the National film award for best director and best original screenplay for his sixth film Chotushkone which was a psychological thriller. All his movies are worth watching except Mishawr Rawhoshyo. His next film is Nirbaak starring Sushmita Sen and Jishu Sen Gupta.

10) Martin Scorcese

But every director's movie is not perfect, sometimes you may feel monotonous at some parts of the movie. But this is rarely the case with Martin Scorcese. Starting with short films which had long names such as What's a nice girl like you doing in a place like this? in 1963 he made his first full length movie Who's that knocking at my door which was a black and white film starring his fellow student Harvey Keitel. It was Brian De Palma who introduced him to Robert De Niro. During this year he worked as assistant director and one of the editors in the documentary Woodstock. In 1972 Scorcese made Boxcar Bertha for B movie producer Roger Corman. His next movie was Mean Streets starring Robert De Niro and Harvey Keitel followed by Alice Doesn't live here anymore in 1974 for which actress Ellen Berstyn chose Scorcese to direct her, she won an academy award for her role. Scorsese's body of work addresses such themes as Italian-American identity, concepts of guilt and redemption,machismo, modern crime, and gang conflict. Many of his films are also notable for their depiction of violence and liberal use of profanity. He has directed landmark films such as the vigilante-drama Taxi Driver (1976), the biographical sports drama Raging Bull (1980), the black comedy The King of Comedy(1983), and the crime film Goodfellas (1990), all of which he collaborated on with actor and close friend Robert De Niro. He won the Academy Award for Best Director for the crime drama The Departed (2006). With eight Best Director nominations to date, he is the most nominated living director, and is tied with Billy Wilder for the second most nominations overall. Since the epic historical drama Gangs of New York (2002), he has also been noted for his collaborations with Leonardo DiCaprio. 

11) Anjan Dutta

Before a director he is also a songwriter and a serious actor, his direction started in 1998 with the film Badadin in 1998 but one of his movies that is my favourite till date is The Bong Connection released in 2006 which talks of NRI bengalis and Indian bengalis and their different perspectives about each other. His notable films include Madly Bangalee, Byomkesh Bakshi, Ranjana Ami Ar Ashbona, Abar Byomkesh,Dutta vs Dutta and Byomkesh Phire Elo.

12) Rituparno Ghosh

Rituparno Ghosh was one of most acclaimed film directors of India, and was himself an admirer of Satyajit Ray. His films glorified womanhood and closely and sensitively portrayed women's lives, feelings and sufferings. According to Bollywood actor Anupam Kher, Ghosh had wonderful understanding of the female psyche. In his last films he addressed issues of homosexuality and gender.Ghosh was a researcher and admirer of Rabindranath Tagore. He made three films directly based on literary works of Rabindranath Tagore— Choker Bali (2003), Nokuadubi(2010) and Chitrangada (2012). In the film Asukh (1999) Tagore played an invisible role. In 2012, Ghosh made a documentary based on Tagore's autobiography, 'Jiban Smriti', for the Government of India Ministry of Culture. He has won many national film awards for his movies including Unishe April, Dahan, Asukh, Utsab, Shubho Mahurat, Chokher Bali, Raincoat, The Last Lear, Sob Choritro kalponik, Abohoman, Chitrangada. He had also won many film festival awards such as Golden Leopard award, Golden Crow Pheasent and Crystal Globe. He died on 30 May 2013 after a heart attack. In response to his death Amitabh Bachchan tweeted, "Ghosh was a sensitive artistic minded gentle human being".

Movie Review: Kill the Messenger (2014)

Jeremy Renner’s first production starring himself as the main patrogonist follows the story of journalist Gary Webb (Jeremy Renner) who wrote a three part investigative series named Dark Alliance in 1998 which stated the involvement of CIA in supporting cocaine trafficking in US.

The film starts with newspaper headlines and news flashes all over the screen focusing on drug abuse in America. Then the film comes to the timeline of 1996 when Gary Webb, a successful journalist leading a happy life with his wife and three children is at the moment working on the case of so called drug dealers being accused of narcotics dealing falling victim to the Government for convicting them and seizing their properties without any evidence of their illegal trade. The movie without wasting much time straightly comes to its objective when Gary receives a call from a lady informing him about her boyfriend who sold drugs for the Government. Gary first disbelieves but then collects the possible evidence from her. With further investigation and a series of testimonies from the linked people including “Freeway” Rick Ross (Michael K. Williams), Danilo Blandon (Yul Vazquez) and Norwin Menesis (Andy García) etc he finds out that cocaine was brought into US and CIA was encouraging it to support in raising funds for the ongoing Contra war. 

Gary Webb starts suspecting himself being followed and is also warned by the agents not to go any further with the investigation and his story but he writes the book anyway naming it ‘Dark Alliance’, which gets published in San Jose Mercury News in August 1996.

 The media under the govt. influence has somewhat unexpected response showcasing it to be fabricated and fictional for not having any real source or evidence from CIA itself. Moreover the real trouble starts when Gary finds out that he and his family being spied on at night. In order to keep his family out of all this trouble he leaves his home and moves to a motel alone. The situation gets worsened when he finds out that all the people he had earned the testimony from are either missing or have changed their statements claiming to have never met him. Later on Gary decides to resign from San Jose Mercury News when they declare that they made a mistake that they did not had enough proof that the top CIA officials knew about the cocaine trafficking. 

The film ends with Gary receiving Journalist of the year award and handing over the resignation letter to his editor. The end credits reveal that Gary Webb was never able to earn a living as a journalist and was later found dead with two gunshot wounds to his head, the court ruled it as suicide.

The film has a brilliant cinematography; shot in documentary style at some instances, makes it a very convincing one. Michael Cuesta’s direction for this biographical movie is very appropriate. Most importantly with most of the realistic movies, no matter how great and original they are I find them sometimes irritatingly slow (except for Martin Scorcese films) and before watching this movie, this is the same issue I feared but the film had the right speed for it’s screenplay. Jeremy Renner does a very natural job as Gary Webb. He had both, the right expression to portray the various moods and at the same time the desired style that fits best to the role. This is also one of those few movies that a movie geek would remember for a lifetime.   

Movie Review: Vertigo (1958)

Vertigo is considered an Alfred Hitchcock classic and is one of the best movies made in history of cinema. It is a psychological thriller directed and produced by Alfred Hitchcock.

The story is about detective John Scottie Ferguson (James Stewart) who has fear of heights. John retires from his profession after a police chase results in his partner falling from the roof due to his fear from height.

The next day, a college friend of John, Gavin Elster (Tom Helmore) asks him for a favor. He asks him to follow his wife Madeleine (Kim Novak) and find out to where she goes, not that he doubts her faithfulness but he suspects that she is being possessed by someone.

 He follows her and finds out that she is constantly hinting about her being possessed by Carlotta Valdes, in the graveyard she was staring at Carlotta Valdes’s grave, at a palace she was staring at Carlotta’s portrait. He learns from a book store owner that Carlotta Vandes had committed suicide after having left out by her husband who also kept her child with him. From Elster he learns that Carlotta Vandes his wife’s great grandmother. He also learns that her possession of Carlotta was not due to obsession, in fact she never had heard about Carlotta. 

The next day he again follows her to the bay and sees her instantly jumping into the water after throwing away the flowers she bought. He jumps into the bay and saves her. He takes her to his home and lays her on bed. When she wakes up, they talk and he inquires about her being found in the bay. They meet again the next day and he takes her to show old evergreen trees grown big, she later on tells him about the other world she often drifts into after her fits return. The next day she again comes to see him and tells him about the old San Francisco sites that keep haunting her. 

He takes her to those places and tries to research more and more into Carlotta’s past in order to cure her. Her fits again seem to return when she faces an urge to go to church, he after seeing the height of the church, follows her there, he sees her climbing the stairs, he follows her but stops at a point where he remembers he has fear of height. He sees the girl’s body falling down from the window. Although the jury passes the verdict that Madeleine’s committing suicide was the result of her mental illness, he is driven by guilt of not having saved the women.

 He constantly dreams about Carlotta’s necklace that Madeleine used to wear. Eventually he drives into the hotel room where Madeleine used to stay and meets Judy Barton who looks like Madeleine. She shows him her identity proof and domicile after a lot of convincing. He then asks her to have dinner with him just to remind himself of his love that he lost. She agrees. Now the suspense is revealed that the girl who ran on the stairs of the church was Judy and the girl who was thrown down from the ledge was the wife of Elster. It was Elster’s plan to kill his wife. She thinks about writing a letter to John explaining him about his plan but out of anxiety and fear of losing his love forever, she tears the letter. John and Judy start to love each other. John convinces Judy to dress like Madeleine. When he sees her wearing Carlotta’s necklace, he deduces that she is the actual girl who ran up to the church stairs. He takes her to the same church and forcefully takes her up the stairs while reciting her and Elster’s complete plan, he faces his phobia of height again and again but somehow overcomes it with his anger. When they reach the crime site, she tells him that she actually loves him and begs for forgiveness, in the meantime a nun appears at the spot, Judy while kissing John, almost startled by the sudden distraction by the nun, steps backward and falls from the church building to her death. The nun terrified by the site rings the mission bell and a startled John stands on the ledge in horror.

The movie was too long and thus became slow at some parts but that is acceptable considering the long screenplay movies which were made at that time. The suspense shown in the movie was thrilling and the story was it’s biggest plus point. No doubt Alfred Hitchcock is considered the master of suspense.

The best thing about the movie was that the suspense in that film was very entertaining and at the same time did not require too much brain to understand, this quality lacks in movies made nowadays. I believe that if a director is unable to explain his movie properly, it is the result of poor direction. I hold this case true for the movie Prestige. It required me one repetition and an hour of internet research to understand the film. The concept was excellent but the director failed to convey it to the audience properly.

It is after a long time that I watched a classic and happy to have chosen Vertigo.

Movie Review: Bobby Jasoos

Whenever people talk about detectives, the image of James Bond, Sherlock Holmes, Feluda etc popup in our mind. Bollywood has started to treat the subject from a different angle, it started with Joe B Carvalho which was a disaster, and actually it deserved to be a disaster. Before that there was Barfi too, it was not exactly a spy flick but still a little bit detective touch was there but that film was also criticized for more than half of the scenes copied from Charlie Chaplin and Jackie Chan films. Now the latest entry into this race is the movie which I am going to talk about today.

 The story is set in Hyderabad. A small time private detective (Vidya Balan) who aspires to work in a private detective firm pursues her spying passion by solving neighborhood cases of little account. Her name is Bilqis Ahmed popularly referred to as Bobby Jasoos. She has least interest in household work and therefore is most of the time neglected by her father. What drives the story is the one chance she gets when a man named Anees Khan (Kiran Kumar) approaches her and offers her huge amount of money to find a girl. He doesn’t provide her any solid identity of the girl except a birthmark. She enthusiastically takes up the case and finds her, after this he offers her more amount to find another girl, and this is how the story proceeds giving the audience a twist at the end. Do not be too enthusiastic about it because the twist is not too much unexpected kind of. The story also has a touch of romance and emotions but I am sure that’s not exactly what audience is looking for; still, seeing the storyline, the emotional touch was a necessity.

This is the most easy going decent detective comedy which although has a villain angle but does not actually have a villain. It is one of those movies for which you can hold your patience and wait for it to air on television or subscribe on DTH. The movie does not have a very good storyline but the storyline is not bad either. A decent one time watch which entertains you at some moments, that’s what the movie is.

Vidya Balan was excellent in her character, she is a middle class unmarried girl who aspires to make it big; in all her looks that she possesses, be it the Jyotishi who reads palm for free, a bangle seller, student etc she was perfect throughout. Ali Fazal as Tasavur, Bobby’s friend who eventually falls in love with her, was also justified for his character. All the others specifically including Kiran Kumar as Anees Khan, Arjan Bajwa as Lala and Rajendra Gupta as Bobby’s father were great with their characters.  

Final advice, this movie is a decent watch for all those who are brain licked by watching Joe B Carvalho. This film is ten times better than that. The comedy is funny though not too much tickling but at the same time the writers and directors had not taken the help of illogical situations and characters.

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Movie Review: Raging Bull (1980)

When I was small I used sports like boxing and wrestling as a means of excuse to beat my friends or pick a fight with them. My parents used to stop us and lie that everything shown in there is false, was it really false? I used to wonder. If I had seen Raging Bull at that age, provided that I also know it’s a true story, I would have had known the actual truth.

Yes, Raging Bull, released in 1980 and directed by Martin Scorcese  was a true story about a boxer named Jake La Motta who was also known as “The Raging Bull” and “The Bronx Bull”. The film was adapted by Mardik Martin and Paul Schrader into a screenplay from Jake La Motta’s memoir ‘Raging Bull: My story’.

The film starts with showing an aging and overweight Jake La Motta practicing a comedic routine. The rest of the film then shows in flashbacks starting from his first loss in 1941 from Jimmy Reeves to his arrest in 1958 for introducing underage girls to men in a club he owned in Miami. The movie basically shows the character of Jake La Motta, his relations with his brother Joey La Motta and wife Vikki LaMotta. How he lost everything due to his rage and sexual jealousy was what this movie intended to convey.

 He hated it when he saw his wife talking to other people, and frequently slapped and scolded her. One of the important reasons for his victory in the ring was his jealous rage against his wife which he used to take out on his opponents, the most important being Tony Janiro whom he had brutally beaten up after his wife had made an offhand comment about him that he has a pretty face. His jealousy became more and more violent day after day, he started to slap her and beat her and eventually also started to suspect his own brother Joey La Motta to have had intimate relation with her.  After a long argument about this matter with Joey, which also forms an iconic scene of this film, Jake’s suspicion makes Vikki sarcastically shout that she had sex with Joey and other men, Jake brutally beats Joey up at his own house, in front of his wife and children, when Vikki tried to stop him, she was slapped too. He later regretted his action and was able to convince his wife about not leaving him but was alienated away by his brother. After defeating Laurent Dauthuille in 1950, he tries to make contact with his brother for reconciliation but to no success. By 1956, Jake and his family had moved to Miami where he has grown overweight, and owns a nightclub La Motta’s. 

After he stays out all night, Vickie informs him that she wants a divorce; he is later arrested for introducing underage girls to men in his club. He tries to bribe his way out by using the jewels from his championship belt but is jailed in 1957 after which he sorrowfully punches the wall and crying in despair over his misfortune. In 1958 he is back in New York and lands upon his brother Joey, he asks for forgiveness constantly; Joey elusively forgives him. The film cuts back to where it started and ends with a biblical quote.

There is no need to comment about the movie’s screenplay and Martin Scorcese’s direction, me not being a fan of sports also enjoyed the movie. The film stars one of the best actors in the history of cinema, Robert De Niro and one of my favorite comedians Joe Pesci. Needless to mention about Robert De Niro’s acting, and Joe Pesci as his brother succeeded to obtain himself the tag of one of the best supporting actors in history. I think somehow somewhere Martin Scorcese also knew that some of his characters can be best portrayed by Joe Pesci and now realize that his super hit collaboration with Robert De Niro in movies like Raging Bull, Casino and Goodfellas is incomplete without the support of Joe Pesci. 

Movie Review: Angshumaner Chobi (2009)

This Tollywood movie which is also a debut film of Atanu Ghosh, features the story of four people, Angshuman, a director from Italy who comes to Kolkatta to make a movie; Madhura Sen, a onetime national award winning actress who now works in Jatra; Pradyut Mukhopadhyay, a depressed 72 year old man who was once a superstar but now has nightmares of his makeup man nagging him and Neel, a gigolo who is having an affair with Madhura Sen.

 Angshuman (Indraneil Sengupta) comes to India from Italy to direct his first project which is a biographical movie based on the life of a 72 year old celebrity painter who suffers from Dementia and his 31 year old nurse. People whom he wants to enact the lead roles at any cost are Pradyut Mukhopadhyay (Soumitra Chatterjee) and Madhura Sen (Indrani Halder). Pradyut Mukhopadhyay was a superstar of his time and now has chosen a life of exile, he does not wish to act in movies anymore. He frequently dreams of his makeup man nagging him and shouting that his part has finished thus he should wipe off his makeup.

Madhura Sen had won a national award in her debut film and because of her arrogance and tantrums; her career declined and now leads a life of frustration and acts for jatras. She has a secret affair with a gigolo named Neel (Tata Roy Choudhary), who is passionate about dancing and astronomy.

Madhura and her husband Sudip, who was once her big fan, have no contact with each other, yet they are not divorced. Madhura receives news of Sudip committing suicide; CID crime branch officer Sourya (Ananya Chatterjee) suspects it to be a case of homicide. Angshuman in the meantime seeing all this is still determined about making his film.

Every fresh filmmaker has to struggle to make his first feature film, what kind of struggle they go through may vary. In this movie, it is shown what kind of struggle Angshuman, a young director who studied filmmaking in Italy has to go through to make his first feature film in Kolkatta. Firstly he had to convince yesteryear’s superstar Pradyut to come out of his lonely life and start acting, then he had to convince Madhura, who signed for the script easily but her brief conflict with Pradyut, and then her husband’s murder case, her affair with a gigolo and her tantrums were obstacles on his way towards the completion of his film shoot. It was not just Angshuman’s story, whatever obstacles occurred from Pradyut, Madhura and Neel’s sides were a part of their own sufferings.

The direction and writing style is a mix of genres capturing emotion, little bit humor, thriller and tragedy. It is one of those movies which someone would watch only once but then that onetime watch for him will be necessary. With a powerful story, the movie also has powerful star cast with actors like the legendary Soumitra Chatterjee, Tata Roy Choudhary, Indraneil  Sen Gupta and Ananya Chatterjee along with special appearances from Bengali film industry’s renowned artists like Sabyasachi Chakravorty, Rudranil Ghosh and Kaushik Sen.

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Movie Review: Grace of Monaco

Produced by Uday Chopra of YRF studios and Arash Amel, who is also the writer of this movie, Grace of Monaco shows the life of actress Kelly Grace after her marriage with Prince of Monaco, Rainer III. At that time there had been a dispute between France’s Charles De Gaulle and Prince Rainer III, at the very time she was also considering returning to Hollywood to star in Alfred Hitchcock’s film Marnie.

Grace Kelly’s (Nicole Kidman) married life with Prince Rainer III (Tim Roth)  was not a very pleasurable one, her husband is busy most of the time and due to the dispute between Monaco’s Rainer III and France’s Charles De Gaulle, the prince was already distressed. She realizes that the royal family of Monaco stress more on luxuries and politics than family and as a naïve, everything she says have consequences hence she is told to say nothing at all by the Prince. During the same time director Alfred Hitchcock also proposes her to return to Hollywood with his next movie Marnie. She at first refuses but later considers doing that film. 

Prince at first is supportive but the council members oppose her decision fearing that it may result in studio publicizing the movie in their name to which Grace’s publicist assures them that Alfred Hitchcock has agreed about not publicizing the film in their name. They agree and decide to keep it a secret for time being; however someone from the family leaks the news to the newspapers. Although Grace is eager but due to public outcry, tells Hitchcock that needs some time to decide whether she would do that movie or not.  She decides to investigate the matter herself.  Deciding not to be naïve anymore, Kelly starts to learn customs and traditions of being the princess of Monaco; she takes personal French tuitions and learns about the historical importance of Monaco. Grace Kelly finally rejects doing Alfred Hitchcock’s Marnie. Later she suspects that countess is the traitor and spots her meeting a French detective. Much later Rainer and Grace learn that Rainer’s own sister is the traitor who had hired the French detective and the countess to handover Monaco to Charles Gaulle so that she can take over the thrown as princess. In the end, people of Monaco accept Grace Kelly as their Princess.

The movie only has the power of star cast, apart from this; I can’t find any reason to recommend it. The objective to show a particular scene in the movie had not been properly conveyed. Firstly I don’t understand why such a story has been adopted into a screenplay in the first place, I mean it’s not like Grace Kelly had a very extraordinary story or something. She was an actress and had difficulty in adjusting to the royal family, that’s it. The public outcry due to her return in movies gave her the need to behave like a princess. And at the same time the conflict and conspiracies happening which were not necessarily true because when the movie starts, it’s written that it is a fictional account of the life of Grace Kelly.

Overall, there’s no point watching this movie. If you have already seen this movie and have a different opinion then do let me know in comments. If you want to rate my review then go to this link