Baapjanma Review: A beautiful story told even more beautifully!

• Review :  Baapjanma (2017)
• Producer : Sumatilal Shah
• Director : Nipun Dharmadhikari
• Star Cast : Sachin Khedekar, Pushkaraj Chirputkar, Sharvari Lohokare, Satyajeet Patwardhan, Akarsh Khurana
• Story : Nipun Dharmadhikari
• Music : Gandhaar
• Review By : Abhay Salvi

Rating : 4.5/5

निपुण धर्माधिकारी लिखित दिग्दर्शित ‘बापजन्म’ चित्रपट तुम्हाला तुमच्या बाबांची दुसरी बाजू जाणून घेण्यास प्रवृत्त करेल! कसा? वाचा आमचा सविस्तर रिव्ह्यू-

Baapjanma Marathi Movie Review :

Nipun Dharmadhikari’s debut film as a director ‘Baapjanma’ is a treat to audiences of all tastes. He has so beautifully incorporated different audience sensibilities to give us a film that can be enjoyed by all. This is what Marathi cinema needs right now more than anything else. This film is conventional in a way that it won’t possibly discover something entirely new, yet there’s a fair amount of novelty to it. 

The trailer of ‘Baapjanma’ gives very little about the actual film. The film wants the audiences to enter the theatre with that little information. The audiences though only realize it when they watch the film. It’s almost a calculative decision by the makers to make the audience perceive one film & later surprise them with something unexpected & refreshing. Out of which one thing I can definitely reveal is that this film is a laugh riot at so many instances! Pushkaraj Chirputkar as Mauli is responsible for most of it. He simply owns his character!

Yes the film is a story about a 60 plus man who has written his will. But the humour as mentioned above doesn’t have the traits of a black comedy. Instead it’s more like harmless light hearted fun. It helps this film to get a certain completeness that Marathi audiences desire for. Sachin Khedekar’s Bhaskar Pandit is a complex character. He isn’t stereotypical in any way & hence he becomes the perfect protagonist for this non-stereotypical story. Among the rest of the characters Madhav Vaze stands out with almost four lines or so throughout the runtime. Last seen in 3 Idiots, this senior actor is actually the little kid who played ‘Shyam’ in 1950s Marathi classic ‘Shyamchi Aai’.

Last year we had ‘Ventilator’ that reminded us that our fathers are as important as our mothers (I mean in our Films). ‘Baapjanma’ makes even stronger connect on that level; but the film doesn’t necessarily try to make the father in this story relatable to all. Bhaskar Pandit as said before is a complex man & the audiences shouldn’t try to find a straightforward moral of this story regarding fatherhood!

Among the rest of the cast Sharvari Lohokare (Bhaskar Pandit’s daughter) & Satyajeet Patwardhan (Bhaskar Pandit’s son) seem to be perfectly casted. Sharvari Lohokare is one of the underrated actors working in Marathi currently here she makes the most of the opportunity. Patwardhan too enacts his role with good effect, of a son who has much against his father yet deep down he loves his father for the few happy memories.

There are a few moments in ‘Baapjanma’ that defy logic however they never disconnect us from the story. Also because they arrive late in the film & the film has already entertained us thoroughly.

Sachin Khedekar continues his top form as usual. This character had ‘Sachin Khedekar’ written all over it. It must be author backed. Yet Khedekar manages to do it differently, had this film arrived say five years ago that wouldn’t have happened. In the last 2-3 years Sachin Khedekar has transformed himself into a polished actor who projects the minutest of details on screen.

In a scene we see Bhaskar Pandit typing a long message to his son through an online chating medium. We see the son waiting for the message to arrive (as ‘typing’ appears on the messenger), but then Bhaskar Pandit deletes it & the messenger shows ‘offline’. This little scene is the soul of ‘Baapjanma’ for me. Nipun Dharmadhikari has managed to modernize our old emotions. They are as effective as they were earlier but now they are presented in a way that actually exists today!

Overall:

‘Baapjanma’ is a beautiful story told even more beautifully. It doesn’t have a formula to it, it organically reaches a complete form by the end of the film & as audiences we take home the whole story with us than just a moral message!