05 December,2021 08:41 AM IST | Mumbai | Mayank Shekhar
A still from Bob Biswas
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Whether or not this is actor Abhishek Bachchan's finest performance - still think that was Guru (2007), and in a less obvious sorta way, Bol Bachchan (2012) - it is, without doubt, his toughest role so far.
Chiefly, because he plays a character, Bob Biswas, that is already associated with another gentleman, Saswat Chatterjee, who in a nine-minute role in Sujoy Ghosh's Kahaani - you can watch the compilation of all his scenes on YouTube - merged so well into the Everyman in a Kolkata crowd, that he immortally stood out.
Which explains a full-fledged feature entirely centred on the role from the 2012 hit film. The only other such instance for a Hindi movie that I can instantly recall is Taapsee Pannu in Naam Shabana (2017) in a prequel of sorts to Baby (2015) - and that was a bit of a hollow disaster, to be honest.
In this case though, no matter what Abhishek does for his part, he's likely to be compared to the original. And as it is with biases towards originals for anything, he's quite likely to be compared unfavourably. That slight unfairness is a given, to start with.
Further, this is also Abhishek sincerely weaning himself away from all mannerisms, tics and tropes that we've come to identify with him as a mainstream Bollywood star for over two decades. He shows up overweight, balding, deeply unattractive, largely shorn of his characteristic smile and intense dialogue delivery - holding scenes by virtue of being understated alone.
What do we know of Bob Biswas soon as the spin-off titled on him starts? Nothing. Which is also true for Bob Biswas himself - he's lost all memory. And therefore, the lead character has to regain some of the stuff about himself that the audience would be aware of, if they have seen Kahaani. That is, a man who's a life insurance agent by day, and a contract killer by night, likely in the employ of certain cops.
Over this we see a new world created around Bob as well - as a regular middleclass man, with wife (Chitrangada Singh) and two kids. Besides Vidya Balan, of course, and the fact that the film was a suspense-thriller on a mainstream Hindi screen after long, what's that one thing you remember most about Kahaani? Kolkata, the city, captured with immense love and attention to detail.
This is as true for Bob Biswas - right down to yellow Ambassador cabs, egg rolls and the brown, street chowmein! The art direction even during indoor scenes is exquisite, to the say the least. Which I suspect is what first separates an A-grade production from lesser ones. You can feel its milieu. The motorazr cellphone with Bob Biswas suggests the film is set around the same time that Kahaani was.
Left to itself, as with Kahaani, this would have been a Bengali film. In a way that Amitabh Bachchan, playing up the old bhadralok in Piku (2015) was.
His son Abhishek, one must acknowledge here, is half-Bengali himself - although of the âprobashi' kind, since his mother, Jaya Bachchan, grew up in Bhopal. That said, perhaps trying to avoid a caricature, he consciously plays Bob not as a Bong - keeping his accent neutral. But for "Nomoshkar", which is Bob's trademark.
At no point though does this take away from his convincing powers as a performer. Between Abhishek and Bob, unless the judgment is clouded by comparisons, the audience is likely to remain on the ride, altogether believing in the dark world the lead character occupies. Which is? Getting chased down by snoopy cops on one end, and an arms dealer fronting as a pharmacist, the lovely, old Kali Da (Paran Bandhopadhyay), for an ally. Full marks there.
At the centre of it all is a novel "blue drug" that no one's heard of, like the "gochi" from Sacred Games 2, that the young in Kolkata are addicted to. Portions of this plot - written by Sujoy Ghosh; his daughter Diya makes her directorial debut with this - can seem too casual and contrived.
Here's an issue you're more likely to face, and which makes this a tougher film to pull off still - the humanising of a serial killer. All said and done, Bob Biswas kills for a living. And there's something unconsciously unconscionable/uncomfortable about a series of scenes that deal with deaths in bulk, where it doesn't matter who dies, where, how and when.
Life, like the film itself, carries on as if not much really happened. Even neighbours and bystanders don't care, let alone detailed investigations post the said murders.
Despite suspense thriller for a genre, I enjoyed Bob Biswas more as a character-driven movie, rather than a plot-driven pic. The sheer lack of pre/post-release buzz - with none of what I'm watching being over-hyped already - somewhat helped. This is a relatively underrated film that I guess will eventually survive its shelf-life on an OTT platform. Felt the same about Kahaani 2 (2016) too, by the way.
