‘Kahaani 2’ movie review: Wrenches you with truth, Shakes you with thrill

Directed By: Sujoy Ghosh
Produced By: Sujoy Ghosh, Jayantilal Gada
Cast: Vidya Balan, Arjun Rampal, Jugal Hansraj, Tota Roychoudhury, Naisha Khanna, Kaushik Sen, Kharaj Mukherjee
Duration: 2 hours 00 minutes
Bollywood Bubble Rating: 4/5

Lanes of Chandan Nagar..two women, one police officer, strange bonds, mystery..cut, hills of Darjeeling,lost childhood, unheard screams, uncalled love..cut, streets of Kolkata, old walls, older stories, splash of fire..cut, life. What’s the Kahaani all about? Check out our ‘Kahaani 2: Durga Rani Singh’ movie review.

Durga Rani Singh. A clerk at a school in Darjeeling, a woman carrying many scars. She falls in love with Minnie Deewan, a 6-year-old child with no parents. What are those bruises on her tender body? Why do her lips tremble with fear and her eyes seek a shelter? She is as mysterious as the hilly fogs; as her childish abstract paintings. As Durga showers all the affection on the child, she is determined to take Mini away from the misery.

Years later, Vidya Sinha, a woman in her 40’s, lies on a old cramped hospital bed with bleeding stomach and wounded eyes as she vents a gut-wrenching story of injustice. Somewhere miles away, her daughter, captive, awaits death…

How does Durga rescue a childhood? Who wants to kill Vidya Sinha? Who is the secret friend, making way for the distressed souls every time? Sujoy Ghosh nails it with ‘Kahaani 2’.

Shot across the lanes of Bengal, ‘Kahaani 2’ can be summed as a story of a fierce mother who can risk it all to protect her daughter. But apart from that, it is a brutal narrative of abuse in disguise of love, danger in disguise of familiarity. It tells you all things unpleasant; that wealth often wins over truth, that faith is often defeated, that it’s often stupid to show your scars to the world.

But no, not everything is so bad about life. So it also tells you that sometimes, strangers turn friends and as one door closes, opens another; that you’re often gifted with relationships you never expected, and someone somewhere is making counts of what you deserve.

If you watched ‘Kahaani’, then you are already expecting a twist. Just when you say ‘damn, this is not how I wanted it to end’, the page will turn my friend! Vidya Balan is beautiful. Because she is courageous, truthful, fierce. Arjun Rampal does fair justice to his character. The entire supporting cast of the film including Naisha Khanna as Minnie, Kharaj Mukherjee, Kaushik Sen, Tota Roychoudhury deserves a special mention. The only person we didn’t like is Manini Chadha. She sounds rather stiff and has a mannerism which doesn’t flow well with the story.

We loved how the film explored middle class lives in suburban Bengal. Sujoy Ghosh is a master of detailing; thus he exactly knows which radio song should play in background as the city slowly falls asleep post midnight, or how a drunkard mad man’s eyes shine as the lamp post stands alone amidst a lonely night. Tapan Basu’s cinematography, detailed and non-glamorous, deserves applaud. And the other man who has added thrill to every passing moment is Clinton Cerejo. What background music!

Read it all? Okay, book your tickets now!

P.S. Did we tell you that film ends with a Rabindra Sangeet? Not ‘Ekla Chalo Re’ this time, but equally beautiful!

Watch trailer here: