Cookie's Movie Reviews
Good evening. I've decided to expand my mental scribblings and start a new project of taking your favourite movies and painfully scrutinizing them in hilarious ways. So, allow me to introduce my movie review.
Bajirao Mastani
FAIR WARNING: This review, although insightful and delicious, is littered with SPOILERS. Therefore, if you have not watched the movie yet, scroll on down to the Cookie Chart for the Cookie Rating.
After hearing everyone in Bollywood wet themselves over how toe-curlingly awesome the new history/drama/love story Bajirao Mastani was, me and the Blub decided to mosey on over to the local cinema and watch it. After we had sat down and gotten comfortable, she obviously remembered she wanted a big ol' tub of popcorn even though earlier we had walked RIGHT PAST THE CONCESSION STAND. Regardless, after a brief popcorn acquiring mission, we settled in to be dazzled.
The poster above sums it up perfectly; two super hot chicks and one angry looking bald dude with A GLORIOUS MUSTACHE. Seriously, had I known about the mustache, I would have gone to see this in Ultra Super 3D and hoped to get as close as possible to his magnificent man-brush.
Anyway, the movie is about the kingdom of the Marathas, which is in the process of picking a new prime minister or Peshwa. Nowadays, to become prime minister you have to allow yourself to be beaten senseless by politics until at last you stagger into office promising lower taxes and free marshmallows for all. Not so the case back in the day. Baldy-Mo up there gets to be the new Peshwa in the most badass way possible; by splitting a peacock feather in half using a bow and arrow from 20 feet away.
"My administration will TARGET inadequacies in our current system and not BOW down to negative influences"
So, as the King sits there drooling after that feather is neatly split into two, the new Peshwa decides to go on an ass-kicking rampage throughout India, with the eventual goal of terrifying the current Mughal monarchs and flying the Maratha flag in the capital, Delhi. His armies spread through the land, winning lands and defeating enemies in scenarios I like to think go a little like this:
Gimme all your land and jewels and marshmallows and s***, bro!
HELL NO, we the Mughals b****! One dude doesn't scare us! We got an army!
Uhhhh, King Bro, you seen that guy's majestic mo?
LOOK AT IT, we can't top that, even with camels and horses and elephants. That is one godly face decal.
Oh, good point, alright scary warrior bro, take all our s***. Peace.
Ugh...NEXT!
Peshwa does this until one day when he's camping out and he gets a messenger begging him to help a nearby kingdom of Bundelkand, which is under attack. Since BajiWow is too busy shopping for fancy hats, he initially says no. That is until the messenger bursts into his room, kicks his guards' asses and draws a sword in front of him. As a testament to being made out of pure testosterone, our Peshwa KICKS the guy without even lifting his sword and is about to hand out a Maratha style whooping when the messenger's helmet falls off.
Peshwhaaaaa...?
Enter Mastani, the daughter of nearby soon-to-be attacked Kingdom and reigning Miss Bundelkand three years running.
Seeing his comely new guest, Baldy Mo IMMEDIATELY rushes to the kingdom under attack, chops off heads and hands and saves the day. Oh, and he manages to almost kill Mastani because he thinks she was about to kill him but totally saved his life instead.
As Mastani is recovering and starting to fall in love with Bajirao, he comes to visit her and does the unimaginable indecency of giving her his favourite knife, probably as an apology which in my head went like this:
"Hey girl, sorry I tried to stab you and all."
"But, you did stab me...in the heart...with love...I am yours forever now."
"Yeeaahh ok that was creepy. Anyway, I gotta bounce. Here, have this cool knife. Just in case you ever forget the guy who almost made you into a kebab."
"I shall treasure this forever, O Mighty Lord of Lords, why must you leave me? Don't you see that I am forever going to be your #1 crazy fan, even though I've known you all of 4 days and since then you have kicked me and stabbed me?"
"Ooookkkk weirdo. See you around."
Because this unthinkable giving of one's knife to a girl apparently in Bundelkand culture means a marriage proposal. Which Mastani immediately accepts. Even though Baji bhai as no sweet clue of what he has done and leaves soon after to go back to his kingdom and his own wife, Kashi.
Seriously, he left THIS at home for 8 months at a time. THIS.
At this point, the story started to fall apart for me. I know I have described the opening few scenes of this movie in great detail so far but I am not going to be as generous for the rest. The reason is that I felt that after this initial awesomeness, the movie started getting slow and predictable. That was one of the biggest drawbacks I found in this otherwise visually delightful movie. Essentially, Mastani follows Peshwa back to Maratha-land, because she is so in love that she is willing to forgo the difference they have in culture and religion (her being a Muslim and him a Hindu), completely ignore her Mom's warnings of never being accepted in Baji's family and completely ignore the fact THAT HE HAS A WIFE AT HOME.
Because true love triumphs over all else. This twist in the movie really works against the great build up of Mastani as a warrior princess. She skips merrily to BajiBoo and as expected, is treated like absolute garbage by his Mother.
But Mastani doesn't ever give up, repeatedly presenting herself in front of Baji and ignoring everyone else in his court, all in the name of love. Now, I appreciate the message here. That love has no boundaries, and no caste, religion or culture differences can stand in the way of finding one's soulmate. However, the rest of this movie has been stretched out into a 2 hour sob story of how poor, poor Mastani is just a gal in love and how society boos her from all angles. What's even more frustrating is that when Bajirao finds out she is in his kingdom and meets her and finds out that apparently they're married, he AGREES IN A SECOND to take her on as a second piece of arm candy.
Ok, hold on. Back up. Did you want to maybe think about your current super hot wife? No? Ok, how's about the fact that a few days ago, you showed absolutely zero interest in this girl and now, you're agreeing to marrying her? Smooth. I'm pretty sure the first solid advice for men everywhere was born on that day.
Gentlemen, for God's sake, keep your dagger in your pants.
The movie, which had been doing so well, explaining the warrior characters of Baji and Mastani and the more demure but funny character of Kashi starts to disintegrate as we see scene after scene of Baji and Mastani proving that they are above all else. They do this by pissing off Mommy dearest, the Brahmin Bunch and pretty much the whole damn court. Hell, BajiBro even decides to have a kid with Mastani, at the exact same time he has a kid with Kashi.
In this process, what was most painful to see was the devolution of Mastani's character from a don't-take-no-s*** warrior queen to a how's-the-meatloaf-dear housewife.
From this ballsy fire breathing demon hottie.
To this oh-my-I-must-avoid-my-gaze disappointment.
Understandably, the character of Kashi starts to wither seeing her husband's craze for his new wife. That transition was shown well in this movie, her slow realization that she's not teacher's pet anymore. Into her final acceptance that even though her husband has been a total jackass about it, there's no reason for her not to be nice to Mastani. That was a great personal touch added to the movie, the almost reconciliation between the two wives while Baji is out stabbing bad guys in the face and hopefully keeping his knives to himself.
Another area in which this movie lacked was the development of the original storyline. Remember how Baji wanted to plant the Maratha flag in Delhi? Yeah well that story runs face first into a brick wall with the arrival of Mastani and all her overly attached baggage. They feebly try to bring back the conquest storyline by having Baji trick the Nizam of Deccan in the south of India into not communicating with his fellow Mughals in Delhi and warning them of Baji's plans. However, this is done so shabbily that it seems put together last second.
Basically, Baji sneaks into the Nizam's palace and LIES TO HIS FACE saying that he has 40,000 troops to the Nizam's 20,000 and if the Nizam isn't a good little boy, then he's about to get 40,000 spankings. It goes like this:
See these guys behind me?! Multiply by 40,000 motherf*****! Don't you dare tell Delhi I'm coming!
What? No way. Don't believe it for a second. I'm obviously going to verify this the second you leave my cou....
NO VERIFYING. Come on man, don't be a d***. I have TWO wives to deal with and this mustache to maintain. Kya yaar, bhai nahi hai? Aisi baat ho gayi?
Well...ok I guess. Now run along you little scamp :).
Seriously, that is the extent of his great plans to conquer the Mughal empire. A pinky promise with the Nizam so Baji can march on Delhi. It was not fun to watch.
Eventually, Baji decides to march off to war again and while he's away, Mastani and kid are clapped in chains and imprisoned by Baji's eldest son, apparently tired of seeing his Mom being humiliated. When he hears about this, Baji goes INSANE and jumps on his horse and charges out of his camp.....STRAIGHT TOWARDS HIS ENEMIES.
Now, this was masterfully done. The audience expects him to go tearing back to his castle, slap the living Jesus out of his son, free Mastani and then cut to another song and dance involving everlasting love. However, his portrayal of a crazed warrior comes across just perfectly as he nose dives into an ENTIRE F****** ARMY by himself and proceeds to systematically destroy most of them.
But predictable as always, the once Godlike Bajirao takes a hit this time. Happens when your head isn't in the game. The rest of the movie is spent agonizingly watching both Baji and Mastani slowly die without each other, while Kashi, the poor maid who literally does NOTHING in the entire movie except appear a few times looking sad, gets to look sad again. Mind you, Kashi was played by Priyanka Chopra, one of the most (in my opinion) talented character actresses Bollywood has to offer. Yet she was cast in a role of a dutiful and then grieving wife with no interesting back story or character traits. It seemed like a great waste of acting talent.
End scene: Baji and Mastani die and are re-united in death. Love is eternal. One respite is the scene shown Baji going crazy just before his death, running out into the ocean and hacking at imaginary foes as his fever addled brain gives out on him. The acting here was superb. But besides that, nothing happens with marching on Delhi. Go Mughal empire!
In conclusion, this movie wasn't worth the hype. The expectation is far below the reality in this case. Don't get me wrong, the costumes, cinematography and music is phenomenal. They have captured the Mughal/Maratha era perfectly and the set pieces and props are outstanding. So, a visual treat.
But, the movie itself is flat and uninspired. It spirals out of control after a few initial moments of greatness and dissolves into your run of the mill love story. Boy and girl end up together forever and ever and ever, even in death. Bleh.
The Cookie Chart
Pros: Great acting (at times), amazing costumes, mind blowing musical sequences
Cons: No plot after the first 30 minutes, laughably predictable
Cookie Rating
6 out of 10
Raisin Cookie
Looks like a delicious chocolate chip, smells like a delicious chocolate chip until you take that first bite and taste those sneaky bastard raisins. After that, unless you're really hungry, not worth the munching.
