Dhobi Ghat

Title: Dhobi Ghat (2010)
language: Hindi, English
internet

synopsis: There are 3 interweaving storylines: a painter named Arun (Aamir Khan) trying to regain his muse, an American banker, Shai, is on sabbatical to take photos, and a washerboy, Munna, (Prateik Babbar) who lives in the slums and has aspirations to be an actor. Their stories revolve around each other as this movie looks at the different classes of people in India. ((Sorry this synopsis is kind of crappy. It's hard to summarize this movie))

The Good
+ a score from Gustavo Santaolalla, who's style is becoming quite recognizable but perfect for films such as this. He also did the score to Babel, also a movie about interweaving storylines.
+ Fantastic directing from a first time director (Aamir Khan's wife Kiran Rao).
+ Prateik Babbar, as often said about this film, is really the star. I was always left wondering more about him and his thoughts.

The Bad
+ There were some things that were kind of confusing to me, mostly the character Arun. I felt like he was the least developed of the 3 characters and had the least explained about his motives/drives.


Final Thoughts: This movie is a character study or a slice-of-life film. Therefore there isn't really an ending to it, or often people will say "what was the point?" I love these kind of films, but for some reason, I just didn't get as sucked into this film as I often do for this genre. I love that this is from India and so different from the stereotypical cinema coming from there, but there was just something that was lacking from it and unfortunately I can't put my finger on what that 'something' is. To quote an online friend of mine: "The most interesting character was the city of Mumbai".

Rating: 3/5

Favorite song None, since there wasn't anything beyond the background score