Silence also has a soul and love has different tones which can be uttered through different moods of the mind. It could be vocal, vibrant and even violent.
Today's review is about a Bengali movie named Nirbaak (2015) or Speechless.
Nirbaak is an Indian Bengali-language drama film directed by Srijit Mukherji, starring Sushmita Sen, Jisshu Sengupta, Ritwick Chakraborty and Anjan Dutt.
This is one of the best experimental movies that happened in Indian cinema at that time.
In my opinion, the theme of this movie is outstanding. The theme was about silent love, based on 4 stories and 4 stages of love: affection, lust, jealousy and separation. Structure-wise the screenplay format of this movie is quite similar to Chotushkone.
Except for the first story, all three stories are connected with one common bind which is Sushmita Sen. Four different stories about a schizophrenic, a tree, a dog and a dead body.
The story begins with the protagonist (Anjan Dutt). Who loves himself the most, his every act, every emotion are expressive, he was expressing his emotions through silence not in dialogue and you just have to understand and feel it. He always treated him as if his inner self is the only love of his love. This indicates affection in love and he plays his 'affectionate' part by masturbating while believing that he is on his bed with his partner.
The other three stories are about different kinds of love, jealousy and separation. The major players in these stories are a not-so-young couple (Jisshu Sengupta and Sushmita Sen), a tree in a park in love with a girl, a dog in love with a man, and a sociopath in love with a dead body.
Each portion of Nirbaak seems a little too self-esteem, a little too manipulated as if Mukherji looked at his assistants and said let’s do this thing.
Take the bizarre love-making sequence between the tree and the girl (Sushmita Sen). When Sushmita was seated on a bench under the tree and fell asleep, her dupatta was blown away, the tree was watching her close with lust. The tree is then shown to make love with her platonic ally ejaculating juice from its small branch. Director chooses to add another perceptible metaphor. One which would make even David Dhawan happy: a ripe fruit splash on the ground as Sushmita Sen walks away. I'll call this silent lustful desire story.
The third story is a love triangle between a man(Jisshu Sengupta), a woman(Sushmita Sen) and a female dog(Bingi). The final part is about a morgue caretaker who is in love with a corpse. His track features some 90s Bollywood songs which are very aptly used to fill in the silences and take the story forward.
Like all of Mukherji's films, technically 'Nirbaak' is quite sound. It has crispy editing. Wonderful shots of Kolkata during monsoon makes the city and its atmosphere come alive on screen, the setting score by Neel Dutta also blends in well though one misses some classic songs which have now become compatible with Srijit Mukherji films.
Srijit’s bold attempt to make a film on surrealism is respectable, though the film may not reach the psycho for the mass audiences. It might look unusual for people who cannot connect with the unrealistic world. Otherwise, the film stands seamlessly for one to watch it again and again.
On IMDB this movie has a 6.6 out of 10.
I will give this movie 3 out of 5.