Teenkahon

Starved of watching Bengali films on big screen in Dubai, Abhijaan 2015 - the Bengali Film festival in Dubai was such a great opportunity for movie lovers to watch Bengali films... and that too such great films like TeenKahon. What a stellar movie Teenkahon is... absolute stunning ending... the treatment is also very different. While the first act reminded us of Apu in Pather Panchali and it was very evident that Ray had a huge cinematographic influence on the director. The less we discuss the third act, the better it is for those who still haven't seen the movie. Incredible climax. Cannot give a 10 out of 10 only because I didn't get the second act so much, although Sabyasachi has never given such a stupendous performance in any of his movies. Rituparna has evolved so much since her early days - she even acts through her silence. Ashish Vidyarthi has given a kick-ass performance as well. 3 different stories, different treatment - a whiff of fresh air in Indian cinema alibi this Bengali film. Given a chance for a remake, I would be keeping the elements of rain and child as a common thread in all the three acts.

Good wishes to both Buddy and Mona and the entire think tank of Lamb Little... this is just the beginning of story telling for you... your journey begins only now!

It's hard to go wrong with the stellar cast that Bauddhayan has brought together for this film. It's a real pleasure watching Ashish Vidarthi, Rituparna, Joy Sengupta, Sabyasachi Chakrobarty and Dhritiman Chatterjee on screen. They do a fantastic job. Still, the best of the three stories presented here is the one with no big actors. In fact, the main character here is an evil little boy. Which the goes to show that a big cast is all very well, but what's important is the story. The last story, Telephone, starring Ashish Vidyarthi and Rituparna, is so far fetched as to be absurd. The second story, though very atmospheric, doesn't go anywhere. But the first story by the great Bibhutibhushan Mukhopadhyay is marvelous. It has a great climax and I loved the setting of the three friends eating "beguni" (fried aubergines) and drinking tea on a rainy evening as one of them tells the tale of his first love.

Teenkahon comes across as trying too hard to be art-house. The checklist seems to be taken care of – it is full of things you'd expect in such cinema. The cinematography, for instance, is a lovely black and white in the first story Nabalok. There are beautiful visuals of the countryside and the Rabindra sangeet is mesmerising. Likewise, the other two stories too have their bits of wonder whether in the form of acting (Sabyasachi Chakraborty is extraordinary) or the theme or some really clever screenplay (in the third part).

But all put together, you can sense that it is trying too hard. None of the stories really pull you in the way they should. It doesn't give the sense of an organically evolved script. Now, this is a complaint which isn't easy to articulate but I'll try.

I'll use comparison. Take Asha Jhawar Majhe, another art house Bengali film that made some waves recently. Nothing much happens through its runtime. Or at least, it appears like nothing much happens. But it all comes together towards the end. It feels like the film crystallises suddenly and my heart felt a firm tug as the lady sets off to work again at the end. Everything seems so right about the film. Masterfully shot, enacted, and directed.

But Teenkahon often feels forced. It feels like a bunch of nice things stuck on a inherently nice idea but they don't really work well together. Often the staging feels sub par and sometimes the acting doesn't come through. One could blame these issues on the inexperience of the director (Teenkahon is Bauddhayan Mukherjee's debut) but this is often a problem of ambition that doesn't match with vision. Mukherjee seems to be full of ambition but without the vision of the master that he seems to aim to be.

Teen (=three) Kahon (=stories, story-tellings) is billed as a triptych, but to me, it was not a three-fold story. The film is comprised of three separate stories - powerful stories by their own rights - that were bound together by a single thematic underpinning: all-consuming, obsessive love. None of these three was the typical Bollywood-flavored love stories that are churned out annually by the various vernacular film industries of India. Each story was complex, many-layered and gut-wrenching in their own way.

Some other reviewers have accused this director, Mukherji, of following too closely the other celebrated film-maker from his state, Bengal, the illustrious Satyajit Ray. Ray's influence, given his stature, is perhaps not an easy thing to avoid for serious film-makers of Mukherji's generation, but I didn't get that sense from these three films. Rather, the presentation and the color techniques used changed from film to film - and it seemed that the director has aimed to recreate small vignettes from three different periods of Indian cinema, perhaps his way of paying tribute to the 100 years of Indian movie-making.

I would recommend this highly to lovers of quality International cinema. I understand the language (Bangla), but the subtitles seemed to run from the screen a little too fast, which may make it difficult for non-Bengali audiences to get the nuances.

This is a movie about the obsession that can be created by love. This love can be as innocent as a child, as dramatic as the husband of an unfaithful wife or as mysterious as a person who can go to any extent to achieve the woman of his desire. The best part of the movie is that it tells three (Teen) stories (Kahon) which took place in three different times. And the beauty is that each one of them is shot based on the time when those stories were taking places. The way of shooting a film has evolved from time to time and this change can be observed as we move on from one story to another. Amazing concept which gives you the feeling of traveling through time. My personal favorite is the Third one which was the story from the Director himself, but I will always admit the depth of obsession can only be felt through the second story where a betrayed husband is obsessed with the lover of his unfaithful wife.