Lagaan was no great . But somehow it was taut in treatment. It had a flow which kept even the foreign viewers on their seats and the final half an hour of a cricket match, like any one dayer had a cathartic effect on the viewers. So the trick was in keeping the jury on their seats to watch the movie till they got too involved with the cricket match. Anyways kudos to the strategy although I doubt it was ever done consciously.
Devdas is a disaster by any standards. As a bengali I feel it is a rape of Sharat Chandra's basic idea. Of course for a bengali it is a double pain having to stand the highly distorted bangla pronunciation of phrases like 'bondhu', 'shotti' and 'mishti'. Wonder why a dubbing expert could not be accomodated in the huge budget of the film. But that actually shows the true attitude of the director; lack of minute attention, as if spending on lavish sets guarantees a movie's success. Successful he was in monetary terms and he seems to be happy with it too. Never mind about that but to me the movie was like a Chitrahar interspersed with an unconnected story.
The whole USP of Devdas lies in its story and the director has done best albeit unsuccessfully, to dilute the pain of the tragedy which has endured it as a classic through all these years. Even the last successful movie of Bhansali, Hum Dil De chuke sanam was successful because of the tragedy factor. So I think he should not get too anxious about entertaining the masses; if a film touches a human chord even the rickshawallah would pay to watch it.
