[vc_row][vc_column width=”2/3″][vc_column_text]A top Chartered Accountant student and a street photographer. What would you connect between these two professions other than the student being clicked by the photograph on the streets, say India gate, on a busy day? This movie will take you on a ride where these two professions meet and develop a friendship, a romance, a shared love which is beautiful to experience rather than talk about it. The film Photograph opens with a scene with Miloni (Sanya Malhotra) being overburdened by the expectations of her family as she is an all-India topper in CA exam, her father is advertising the success of her daughter at every possible place and in every possible way. Her family boasts of her academic excellence on the dinner table and the discomfort on her face and in her body language will tell you that this is not what she wants; there is a demand of some homely love from her parents which remains unrequited. One fine day, at the Gateway of India, a photographer clicks her picture and she leaves without taking the photograph. The words that let her take her photograph are “Years later, when you see this photo, you’ll see the same sunlight on your face, the same wind in your ears, thousands of voices in your ears. These will all fade away.”
On the other side, there is Rafi (Nawazuddin Siddiqui) whose much adored grandmother has stopped taking medicine and has kept a demand that she will only take medicine again when Rafi marries. Rafi is concerned about both, his grandmother and about marrying. On his way home, a lot of people remind him that his grandmother has stopped taking medicine because of him and he is irked to the core. He writes a letter to his grandmother telling her that he likes a girl whom he aspires to marry and attaches the photograph of Miloni that she had not taken back. The next task is to name her and radio comes to help. Title song of a classic movie, Noorie is being played and taking an inspiration from that, Rafi names her Noorie. Grandmother is thrilled to know this and leaves for Mumbai on a short notice to meet Noorie.
Now, Rafi has to find Noorie and convince her to meet her grandmother and she agrees to meet her. How Rafi finds Noorie and how he convinces her to meet his grandmother has not been shown in the movie and it has been left open to the audience to imagine how that happened. This movie is perhaps not about turn of events, as other movies are; this movie is an experience which you feel as the movie scales ahead. The streets of Mumbai, the gateway of India, the rain of Mumbai, the chowls, a middle class home, these are the only venues in the movie yet they feel so complete. The scenes in the movie are not chain of events; they are rather frames which demand to be lived.
Noorie meets Dadi (Farrukh Jaffer) and Dadi gifts her anklet which seems so normal, yet so special to Dadi. She comes back home to find her maid, Rampyari, with similar anklet and asks her about it. The only communication that Miloni does at home is with her maid, Rampyari. I do not know the reason behind it, it might be because she has nobody else to talk to or because her closeness to Rafi can be solidified by clues from Rampyari, the village, the farming, the food, everything brings her closer to Rafi. There are two traits of the lead character which have been discussed at length, that Miloni doesn’t drink Cola because Campa Cola is out of production now and Rafi eats kulfi at the end of every month as his father used to do. There are subsequent meeting of Miloni and Rafi which give a new reason for both of them to come closer. The characters have not been stated in the movie, they have been developed, scene after scene so that you observe and deduce what they are like. This adds a whole lot of dimensions to the movie. Miloni doesn’t speak much and her face is almost always blunt but she shakes her foot in nervousness. The director wants you to notice that.
The ending of the movie has been left rather open and undescribed, the director wants you to interpret it. The ending scene where Rafi explains the obvious ending of any movie, where actor and actress face initial hurdles only to unite in the end is an indication of many things. It could an indication of their blossoming romance which is about to see hurdles or it is about the conclusion and union of both after a tough start. Or it is as abstract as the movie is? Have you seen the movie? Let us know your take on the movie in the comment section below.
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