Tehzeeb

The film is a pathetic attempt to remake Ingmar Bergman's "Autumn Sonata"(1978) starring Ingrid Bergman,Liv Ullman and Erland Josephson.It did not take me more than 5 minutes to figure that out.

It is time Film journalists like Khalid Mohammad took out time to do some creative thinking. It makes me sad when potentially good film-makers waste their talents by making substandard remakes of Hollywood and European films.

You've got to give the film-maker something though. The film he picked for copying is one of Bergman's classics, and easily one of the finest instances of the portrayal of a strained human relationship in European cinema.

The Bollywood fare is burning brighter with each film. When an actor the like Arjun Rampal(Salim) is thrown with the likes of Shabana Azmi(Rukshana Anwar)and Urmila Matondkar, some of the talent has to rub off on him and it does in this marvelous movie called "Tehzeeb"(Etiquette). Even though it is difficult to accept them in the role of a mother and daughter the acting prowess of Shabana Azmi takes a notch over Urmila and both come out as top notch talent at the end, where as the other two characters have a long road ahead. Except the song that Shabana sings for her daughter, the music of AR Rahman is a flop to think he may be an overworked composer. The standout is ace direction, Screenplay and Cinematography.There is not much dowdt that Urmilla Matondkar has immense talent that very few of her contemporaries can match. Suffice to say this a a beautifully enacted film that lingers long after the movie including the very short and impressive perf. by Rishi Kapoor.

Tehzeeb, starring Urmila Matondkar, Arjun Rampal, Diya Mirza, Shabhana Azmi and Rishi Kapoor, is a well acted and produced film. The strongest charcters in the film were definitley Urmila and Shabhana Azmi, who play mother and daughter in the film.

The story revolves around Tehzeeb (Urmila) and her struggle to overcome her troubled past and to look after her husband and mentally disabled sister. Her mother is her serious grudge which is what the film is based on. The conflicts they have are the best part of the film.

It is a good film and worth watching.

7/10

Tehzeeb is the story of Rukhsana Jamal (Azmi), a singer drunk in the fame she has attained. She doesn't care for her husband (Rishi Kapoor) and two young daughters (Tehzeeb played by Matondkar and Nazneen essayed by Mirza). Her failed businessman husband suspects her of an illicit relationship (shown only through a flip-second image) and creates a scene, which ends in his death.

Their elder daughter Tehzeeb watches it and 'sees' her mother with a revolver. She grows up suspecting her mother of her father's murder. Nazneen grows into a child-woman whom Rukhsana puts in a hospital, to be rescued later by Tehzeeb and her husband Salim (Rampal).

Ruksana's colorful character builds up with such negative shades in the first half that you almost begin to wonder ? what kind of a mother is she? Feminists might feel that a career woman is being assassinated just because she is successful in her career.

However, that is not to be as you discover later. The mother visits Tehzeeb and then the tension between the two unfolds in bits and pieces, through caustic comments, stifled praises and formal acknowledgment of love, till Tehzeeb can't take it anymore and bursts. The burst carries into the second half and then loses its bite. And so does the film.

Mohamed has proved himself as a storyteller with Sardari Begum, Mammo and Zubeida but sadly, he has punctured Tehzeeb with unnecessary baggage like Diana Hayden, Namrata Shirodkar and endless love scenes between Matondkar and Rampal after interval.

As expected, the movie belongs to Azmi and she is charming as a successful woman. Rampal too has done a good job as a rich author, and a doting husband and brother-in-law.

Tehzeeb is a good step over Fiza for Mohammed, and hopefully, whatever he does next, will deliver more.

Urmaila is a great actress. It was nice to see Shabana Azmi in this film because I like her old films such as Amar,Akbar,Anthony. Arjun Rampal was good in this film and Dia Mirza was good at playing a dramatic character in this film who shoots herself but hopefully does not die because her sister Urmila,brother in law Arjun Rampal pray.I liked the way that most of the main characters were Muslims.The songs were O.K. and I give the storyline on it's own a 9/10 and I give the acting a 9/10 as well.The songs get an 7/10.This film is interesting so thats why I gave the film a 9/10 overall.I found the ending sad because Shabana Azmi dies.