Ashtralle just missoo: a review

Not a lot of people are aware of it, but Ashtralle Just Missoo was supposed to be a short film originally. The movie made heads turn when Rohit took  a giant leap of faith and decided to turn it into a feature film. And he decided to do it all with no budget. It takes balls to do that. The gambling has definitely paid off.

Having seen most of Rohit’s short films- a good bunch of brilliant short films which include ais pais, dishkyaav(written by Rohit Padaki, directed by Aditya Raveesh), tony joot- I was ready to be blown off my seats when I went into watch AJM. I had no doubts of Rohit’s directorial abilities, and I was already a big fan of Naveen and the lethal combination made my head trip just thinking about it. It would be wrong to say that I didn’t really expect to see a masterpiece when I watched the movie last Sunday at K H Kalasoudha.

The movie works for many reasons. For a moment, let’s put aside that fact that the movie was made for no money- just so that it doesn’t bias our judgment. One of my friend maintains that to him visuals matter the most in any movie he watches. Let’s start with that.

The visuals is one of the most intricate parts of a movie. Any movie for that matter. Many cinematographers and directors fail to realize that the right camera moves and lighting enhance the mood of the scene. That the camera dictates how the audience perceives the scene. Rohit and Nagarjuna seem to have understood this quite well. There are no extraneous frames that take all the lime light, instead the scenes are shot just right. Every frame in the movie is treated with surgical precision, and the seamless cuts between them can be attributed to Naveen hwo was the editor of the movie apart from other things.

 Atleast half the movie is shot at night, and this needs a special mention because it was such a visual treat! In a night sequence, bad lighting can ruin the entire scene. Not only did Nagarjuna manage to light the scene right, but he made brilliant use of shadows! That is a mark of true genius. The last time I saw something like that was in a Manirathnam movie. There is just this one shot of silhouette, I am a sucker for silhouettes, and it was done really well with the backdrop of the bright orange setting sun.  It goes on to show that a humble DSLR is much more effective than a cinematic camera with the right hands using them. If Nagarjuna could pull off such cool shots with a DSLR I can only imagine what he could do with a movie grade camera. Naveen’s grading seemed a little inconsistent in places, but that is something that can be easily overlooked.

The second thing that took me by surprise was the original score by Tejas and Richard. Apparently there are seven songs, I didn’t keep count. And the songs fit in seamlessly within the movie. Truth be told, I had no idea how Ninnanodalende would be used in the movie. But the song works perfectly well within the movie. I wasn’t aware of the background score until the movie had progressed quite a bit. Composing songs is one thing, but scoring the BGM is an entirely different animal altogether. It doesn’t overwhelm the audience, instead it seasons the movie, enriching the scenes, reflecting the emotions on the screen. If that isn’t a compliment, I don’t know what is! First it was Poornachandra this year, and now it’s these guys! Looking forward to more stuff from Richard and Tejas.

As far as the performances are concerned, everyone, and I mean EVERYONE you see on screen have played their part to perfection. Naveen Kumar is gonna go a long way in his career. When most people in the industry bank on their names or names of people they know to get ‘successful’, this guy is gonna make it big with his talent alone. Apeksha Ghaligi as his girlfriend Veda, fantastic. Rohit Padaki as Jogayya makes a strong impact. In fact, some of the most powerful scenes in the move involve either Jogayya and Shankru or Veda and Shankru. Even the characters who grace the screen for just a little while, be it Shivatejaswi Hiremath as the telgite goli gambler and the two others who accompany him, or Chetan Royie and Aditya Raveesh as Shankru’s friends, the chota Don and his sishya(Ramesh- Suresh) Samarth Madhusudan Rao, Girija Lokesh as his mother, I just wanna name them all! I really hope Rohit gets to do a bigger movie with the same crowd.

Now, my favorite part- the story. Having watched Dishkaaav, which Rohit had written, and having been to the script discussion of his unmade Swalpa reeloo thumba realloo, I have figured out Rohits’s characters for the most part. Or atleast I think I have. His protagonists are not your average commercial hero types. They do not possess unbelievable herculean strengths, just like you and I. They have very little aspirations in life, up to a point at least, just like you and I (unless you want to be Gandhi, you don’t have high aspirations). They care a lot about the little world they have built around themselves, and as long as they are happy with their lives they just don’t seem to give a fuck about anything else, like you and I. His protagonists are very close to life, a reflection of the oppressed, depressed, ‘the fuck is wrong with the world?!’ youth of today who seek immediate gratification.

Shankru is the same. There were a lot of times when I really connected with the character, especially when he is pissed off when people keep telling him how to live his life. And when he arrogantly replies that he has figured everything out but he hasn’t a clue! The movie flows freely through events in the first half, a little too freely. Maybe it was the inconsistent arrival and departure of characters, but it seemed like the entire first half was ruled (is that the right word?) by Naveen. Secong half seems a little more ‘tighter’, especially with the arrival of Jogayya. Suhas Suyameendra had a Luca Brasi-esque presence on the screen. Although he doesn’t utter a single word, he is intimidating. A little bit. Gave me goose bumps.

I really liked the way the movie ended. The epilogue, if you may. It speaks volumes about the maturity with which Rohit can handle stories. Even though it is a romantic/comedy/Bhatt-rish style flick, it is that last scene that really speaks to you in a way the movie doesn’t. It goes against all unwritten, self-imposed conventional rules of the movie making in the industry. I really hope that we can see new projects from the team.

I wish the story had received a little more attention, and that some of the characters had been developed further. However, the movie works despite its flaws, mainly because the good parts in the movie trumps the not so good parts and you come out of the movie hall satisfied, and having been thoroughly entertained. My verdict, a strong 3.5 stars.