No real poetry in this Bengali film

It is difficult to understand how to react to ‘22e Shraban’ (Baishe Shraban) other than at the gut level, which says it is a hugely clichéd film that belies the promise of a potentially refreshing treatment.

On the face of it, director Srijit Mukherji’s second movie is a pretty slick product, with impressive production values and fairly good performances. But look a little deeper, and you see the same old characters – the victimised prostitute, the disillusioned poet, the young and promising police officer, his independent and modern girlfriend, the girlfriend’s sacrificing ‘boyfriend’, the supportive senior colleague, and last but not the least, the brilliant but rebellious police officer who gets sacked/suspended and, not to forget, his faithful servant.

How many times have we seen these characters before? I lose count.

The saving grace of the film is the production quality and the performances, especially by that now reliable warhorse Prosenjit. But if the Tollywood superstar was looking to break new ground, the character of Prabir Roy Choudhury was certainly not the right choice. It simply repackages the star (who we know by now is a terrific actor too), and gives him gritty dialogues peppered with common abuse words (the ‘Delhi Belly’ effect?). That perhaps is 22e Shraban’s only noticeable contribution.

Veteran filmmaker Gautam Ghose is the surprise element. A man who has resolutely stayed behind the camera shows he is equally good in front of it. The interesting character of the arsonist-poet hopeful, however, is marred by ill-conceived scenes where he is shown rambling and quoting poetry in a deserted night-time railway station. Boring! (The film is dedicated to failed poets!)

Ditto the scenes between Amrita and her standby ‘boyfriend’ Surjo. I mean, can a young man who secretly hopes to bed his ravishing, childhood girlfriend manage to keep his hands off her. A desperate failed attempt to force a kiss on her would have made all the difference.

The film’s misplaced focus on young officer Abhijit’s strained relationship with Amrita blunts the impact of the real story – that of Prabir and his return to active detecting on the trail of a serial killer. I wish there was more of Prabir and his story in the film. The scene in court where the top cop typically loses his cool, however, could have been left out; also, the genius officer playing chess all by himself (more clichés). Why not have Prabir solve Sudokus instead?

The screaming background score is a royal pain. Has Bengali cinema lost its subtlety? The songs ‘Ei srabon’ and ‘Ekbar bol’ are a face-saver though they don’t go with a serial killer story. Given the dark subject, there is hardly any grimness in the film. And the penultimate scenes of cops chasing a suspect down Kolkata’s alleyways are amateurish. Why can’t a cop in disguise trail the suspect instead?

And the set-piece in the finale, which establishes the film’s true intention of repackaging Prosenjit, the superstar, is a little too stretched. A brief, brutal climax would have served the purpose better.

This is a movie that could have been so much better if more thought and innovativeness (I’m not talking originality; how much more original can we be?) had gone into the scripting.

Watch 22e Shraban only if you are a diehard Prosenjit fan and want to ogle Raima Sen. It scores 6 on 10.