CAST: Pavail Gulati, Saiyami Kher
DIRECTED BY: Ashwiny Iyer Tewari
Abhay Dubey played by Pavail Gulati is introduced to the audience in the most dramatic and unconventional manner – in a public toilet. He lives in a slum in Kanjurmarg and the maker has made no attempt to dress up his environs to make it palatable. It’s a real slice of life that we want to avoid when we go to watch a movie. He is poor, his father is an autorickshaw driver, his brother an alcoholic, and his mother is bedridden and on the verge of dying. Abhay is an intelligent student and has scored 94 percent and is hell-bent on making it big in the real world, by hook or crook. Pavail has made sure that Abhay immediately has the audience’s sympathy. The scene which explains the reasons for him being late to the college, a monologue of around 5 minutes, is clap worthy.
Far from this stinking world, in the lap of nature in Konkan, we meet our heroine Manjiri (Sayami Kher), another brilliant student for whom life is a beautiful poem. Her father has taught her to see poetry in everything. Therefore, when she meets Abhay as her classmate in Mumbai in a literature class where Yeats is being taught, she sees Namdeo Dhasal in him. For her, his coarseness and rawness is beautiful, lyrical, and poetic. The two meet, fall in love, and marry.
The first two and a half episodes of the series streaming on SonyLiv are absolutely splendid. Be it the background score, the cinematography or the writing, the dialogues or its delivery, everything has you mesmerized. However, as with many well-intentioned projects, it fails to sustain the momentum and becomes a labyrinth of love that gets on your nerves as it converts to Abhay’s rags to riches story.
Pavail Gulati has played Abhay convincingly and so has Sayami Kher brought Manjiri to life. However, the major issue lies in the one-dimensional characterization of Manjiri
The story, screenplay, and dialogues are by Saumya Joshi. The dialogues for the most part are appropriate while the story and the screenplay degenerates with each episode as the character of Abhay keeps hamming about getting rich.
The cinematography by Navgat Prakash is breathtaking, especially the way the scenes in the slum are shot. Music and BGM and Santosh Narayanan is in line with the story and so are the meaningful lyrics by Kausar Munir.
The scenes between Manjiri are brilliant and her father played by veteran Marathi actor Girish Oak. Ashwini Bhave as Manjiri’s mother is completely wasted and she gets no screen space.
Faadu is streaming on SonyLiv
