One evening in the monsoon of 2016.
I persuaded, pleaded and paid for a colleague to accompany me to watch Budhia Singh: Born to Run.
End of show- colleague in tears and my heart swelling with pride. I had made the right choice. The trip back home on my two-wheeler was hell, as it was pouring like crazy and the roads of Banaras(...ahem), but neither of us complained. An evening well spent.
Manoj Bajpai and Tilottama Shome had stolen the show in Budhia. But as I had mentioned in my
review of the movie, these seasoned actors performed with a certain degree of restraint. My heart said, the Soumendra Padhi I know since our Jeypore days might now have evolved into a fine director with an eye for detail and perfection, but the lover of unfettered acting in me said 'justice denied by a margin'.
No such brakes in Jamtara. Episode after episode as the story unfolds, the actors are allowed to go bombastic. No holds barred dialogues, body language that liberates and magnifies the scope of acting, costume that fits right in, background score that invites anticipation, camerawork that gives away the director's blind faith in the ability of the cast- all of it makes for some worthwhile viewing.
Cinematography needs special mention because this is one web series that doesn't bank on big names or sex(so far!)- just the story and acting. Padhi's money is on the actors and I am glad they have proved him right on every count. Close angle shots leave plenty of room for actors to display their full range and painfully long takes meant that everyone had been a good student on location.
Story-wise, the plot isn't brand new, but the treatment is not your usual run of the mill kind. Caste divisions have not been treated as an undercurrent, but worn on the sleeve, right from the first episode. That scarcity is the mother of all evil shouts out loud in your face the moment you look at Bhojpuri speaking teens making calls to metro-based "clients" or when the plain-looking village tutor negotiates her own price tag. Bold would be an understatement for what Padhi strives to portray through Jamtara. Mahabharat has been strategically wedged between critical scenes. And the characters who quote from the epic remind me of the Laughing Hyenas from Lion King, cunning and hilarious rolled into one.
Shortcomings?
Personally, a disturbingly predictable trend seems to be manifesting into the directorial profile of Padhi. He is good, perhaps even great, with beginnings but not so much with the endings. Anurag Kashyap won't be what he is had Faizal Khan survived.
P.S: Don't worry about the rushes Som, do what the Artist in you says.
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