DIL BECHARA

‘Dil Bechara’ is the latest Bollywood film with a direct digital release that stars Sushant Singh Rajput, Sanjana Sanghi, Sahil Vaid, Swastika Mukherjee and Saswata Chatterjee. The movie is directed by Mukesh Chhabra with AR Rahman scoring the music and produced by Fox Star Studios. This movie marks Sushant Singh Rajput’s last outing as an actor and is streaming on the OTT platform Disney+Hotstar.

First things first, grab a couple of tissues before you start watching ‘Dil Bechara’, an adaptation of John Green's novel, The Fault in Our Stars. Without Sushant, this one’s going to be really hard. The movie, as seen from the trailer, opens on this note - “Once upon a time, there was a Prince and a Princess. Both died. End of story.” Well, isn’t this completely contrary to what we’ve been listening to, all this while?

Without any adieu, Mukesh Chhabra takes us right into the plot. Kizzie Basu (Sanjana Sanghi) is a patient. She is suffering from a type of thyroid cancer. Kizzie cannot live without her companion Pushpinder (Literally). She leads a lonely life. The first frame of the movie starts off with a funeral, where Kizzie is seen hugging random strangers.

Soon after Kizzie’s character is introduced, Immanuel Rajkumar Junior aka ‘Manny’ comes into her life. He is charming and has a killer personality. He is the come-what-may kind of person with a very positive aura. He gives out a chill vibe, wherever he goes. But that is not it. He has a dreadful past but doesn’t let that bother him. He is a fighter. ‘Manny’, played by Sushant Singh Rajput will be remembered for generations.

Manny and Kizzie are two ordinary people, with an extraordinary love story. Their romance is not the usual Bollywood romantic cliche that has been in the scene for years. It is something more. It is something unusual. Manny makes Kizzie love herself.

Manny is a big fan of Rajinikanth. He has posters and paintings of ‘Thalaiva’ all over his place. He and his friend JP shoot a film, where Manny plays the lead. He is seen mimicking the Superstar. This movie brings together Manny and Kizzie, for the usual on-screen romance with the good guy fighting bad guy sequences; hero dancing around with the heroine during the rain sequences and what not. Well, all is not good with Cancer. It hates happiness. The movie revolves around the bittersweet love story of Manny and Kizzie, with its highs and lows.

Sushant Singh Rajput - the stellar performer he is, he never lets you take your eyes off him, even for a second. If you are already a big fan of Sushant, you’ll love him even more. If you aren’t his fan, you will become one. Welcome to the club. Sushant’s small and cute Tamil references are also neatly presented, amidst the Jamshedpur setting.

Sanjana Sanghi has given a splendid performance throughout. She aces the romantic scenes and is even better in the emotional ones. Right from the start till the end, you can see yourself falling in love with Kizzie Basu.

Apart from being the emotionally heavy movie that ‘Dil Bechara’ is, the music and the visuals are a standout. AR Rahman has delivered one of the finest albums of this year. His music is so deep, that unknowingly, you can feel the tears rolling down your cheeks. The chartbuster songs enhances the visuals a notch high and the background score organically strengthens both the happy and emotional sequences.

The rest of the actors - Sahil Vaid, Swastika Mukherjee and Saswata Chatterjee - are very natural and resemble the actual people around us. Their characters are smoothly written and their performances are solid, right throughout.

‘Dil Bechara’ is an emotionally high movie. The absence of Sushant Singh Rajput makes it a hard watch. It makes you smile, laugh, scream and cry - all in the short run-time of 1 hour and 40 minutes. The movie starts with Sushant’s musing that reads, “Perhaps, the difference between what is miserable, and that, which is spectacular, lies in the leap of faith..” This is what ‘Dil Bechara’ does to you. It will make you take that leap of faith.

We miss you Sushant. We really do. Your legacy will live forever.

It's nice to welcome back AR Rahman to the scene of Bollywood music where he has ruled for more than a decade. The movie has been straightway sent to the public through the OTT platform and it’s the last time we will see Sushant Singh on screen in a new project. All that sadness aside, this album goes well beyond pacifying us and providing the necessary reasons to be happy and hopeful of a bright outlook towards life itself. The musical abilities of AR Rahman will never be in doubt and for doubters, 2020 has been a clear statement from the Chennai-based Genius. After a resounding success in “99 songs” boasting of 14 tracks this time its 9 tracks in Dil Bechara. But it is never about the quantity, and always about the quality. Let us individually look at what worked amazingly in these tracks.

Dil Bechara
Singer: AR Rahman
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya 

Funky is one word to describe this as the bass guitar casts a spell on you straight away as AR Rahman strikes you with one of the most unique voices in the industry and songs like these, he alone can deliver with style. You can hear the backing vocals of Poorvi Koutish in the background and just in his usual style he goes for digitally recreated vocal tones as his interlude music. Even without watching the video you know the track begs you to get up and hit the dance floor, in slow tempo though. In the first stanza you can start hearing the keys doing some magic. Hriday Gattani accompanies on the backing vocals as well. The fag end of the second stanza where the strings play in the second layer is what reminds us of the great man’s musical wizardry.

Taare Ginn
Singers: Shreya Ghoshal, Mohit Chauhan
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya

Quite clearly this is the best track of the album, and it is so nice to hear Mohit Chauhan’s voice after so long. He combines with the leading diva Shreya Ghoshal for this track and straight away you know you are up for something magical as the strings keep playing just about enough to get your attention. This track scores very high on instrumental arrangements all along and we are about discover why. IN the first interlude AR Rahman goes for a brilliant symphony of live instruments with the keys making the intro, and then over to a string orchestra accompanied by a delightful flute solo. Suddenly the three instruments climax into silence and Mohit Chauhan sings “Rokho Ise”, was this intentional? If yes, its brilliant in design! The end to the stanza is rich in quality with both Shreya’s humming and a violin playing to match her. The scale changes like we have seen in so many of AR Rahman’s prior works and he so smartly makes Shreya sing the opening lines like a loop in the background. The outro is a violin solo that takes away the cake and probably what we will remember the most about the song. Mohit is the heartbeat of the song but Shreya makes her contribution worthwhile too even if just mostly through background vocals.

Khulke Jeene Ka
Singers: Arijit Singh, Shashaa Tirupati
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya

This is another track straight down the alley of AR Rahman, a love duet with some great singing but this reminded me of Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na. The flute interlude is playful and catchy and it ends with a mild piano leading into the first stanza. Arijit sings backed by Shashaa’s humming, but the richness of the opening lines of the track and the stanza go missing in the ending part of the stanza. A second interlude (something of a rarity these days) is also flute-based and scores better than first one. What struck me when the song nears its end especially with Shashaa’s humming and the bass guitar, I was reminded of Thumbi vaa from the movie Olangal by Ilaiyaraaja back in 1982.

Main Tumhara  
Singers: Jonita Gandhi, Hriday Gattani
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya 

Hriday Gattani is an up and coming singer, songwriter and impressed one and all a couple of months back with a single Tu Zinda. He already sang the backing vocals in the Dil Bechara title track. He just excels at his vocal delivery, and the song takes us back to those precious compositions of yesteryears of AR Rahman. Somehow barring the first track the other 3 have all been a duet with male and female singing in harmony. It’s a short and sweet track

Mashkari 
Singers: Sunidhi Chauhan, Hriday Gattani
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya 

The track starts off in extremely stylish fashion with Hriday’s humming, and just like from being pop-sounding it seamlessly moved into the genre of Indian folk. Sunidhi Chauhan is an exponent and she needs no time to swoop into play with her energetic vocals. The folk strings play the interlude, and here too the singers share the stage in unison during the stanza. Somehow the tune and structure and arrangements remind me of Tamasha’s Matargasthi track.

Afreeda 
Singers: Sanaa Moussa, Raja Kumari
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya 

Sanaa Moussa is a globally renowned Palestinian singer and she has been roped in to deliver the middle-eastern influences with great efficacy while the Indian-American rapper Raja Kumari who is blowing extremely hot in the independent scene has been employed to perform the rap sections. The song is more of a congregation of global talents and who better than Rahman to inspire and broker such a deal. One cannot avoid the comparisons to Maiyya Maiyya from guru for obvious reasons. There is an abundance of percussion and too many things happening which overwhelm the Arabian element and richness in their music which is generally high. All said and done, hats off to Sanaa for what she can do with her vocals.

Mera Naam Kizie
Singers: Aditya Narayan, Poorvi Koutish
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya 

Aditya Narain is the son of Udit Narain and he has been quite popular in the independent music space singing for other composers as well. The song has something like a jazz feel with the wind instruments and strong influence of the piano. Poorvi Koutish who hit a home-run with Jwalamukhi from 99 songs a few months ago sings this with tease and glamour, and we all know what an Indian idol finalist is capable of. There is an elaborate outro to this song and for really hardcore AR Rahman fans this is straight out of the first interlude of May Madhams “Palakattu Machanukku” track.

Friendzone
Singer: AR Rahman
Lyrics: Amitabh Bhattacharya 

This is just a reprise version of Dil Bechara track title and it begins from the first stanza, with chorus elements and sounds like an EDM/party version of the original. Amidst all the exuberance of music and noise, the trumpets stood out!

The Horizone of Saudade

This is an instrumental track , and the beautiful guitar strings play jugalbandhi with the flute and a mild santoor as well. The piano then begins to take over and as it slowly fades in the background, the violin solo becomes the hero and its extremely beautiful and soulful and this is the same version that plays as the outro in Taare Ginn.