Two for Tamasha

Part 1

As I rode my bike to the mall, it took me several minutes to digest the fact that I was going to the theatre alone! Actually, this was the only thing in my mind until I reached the Meenakshi Mall, on Bannerghatta road. I ran to the ticket counter, which was thankfully empty.

“Two tickets for Tamasha please?” I said. The person at the ticket counter looked at me with pity and said, “Its houseful, ma’am. But there are a few seats in the first row.” Gasping for breath, I said yes. Only after buying the tickets did I realise that I bought two tickets. I was too exhausted to think about it. I ran to Screen 5 which had to be at the end of the hall. Already ten minutes into the movie, I found my seat in the dark without help and settled down. For me, watching a film in the theatre is like going to a picnic spot. The more the merrier.

There was a little boy on the screen, listening to a story being narrated by an old man. There was a play being staged in between the narration of the story. It was painful to have missed the first ten minutes of the movie, but equating the pros and cons, I was happy that the tickets were only Rs. 80. My thoughts were interrupted by Deepika Padukone. She wore a pretty blue dress with a see-through shirt. As always, I was very excited to see her with Ranbir Kapoor.

People kept entering the hall for another twenty minutes or so. I wondered how they were fine with missing half an hour of the movie, when I was whining about missing the first ten minutes. Everything was going fine and this haunted me. The last two people who entered came towards me to tell me that I was sitting in the wrong seat. I panicked as if someone had come to steal my property. After apologizing, I tried hard to find the right seat number. After a minute, I successfully found my seat which was at the other end of the row and settled down again.

By now, Deepika and Ranbir were making out. Deepika leaves the hotel with great despair. Technically, I had not paid attention to quarter of the movie. This killed me inside. Instead of concentrating on the movie, I started to think about how to get away from my seat to buy popcorn in the interval. Just for a second, it felt like I was daydreaming in a boring class. On realizing that Ranbir is nothing but a machine, Deepika rejects his proposal. Interval. I saw people getting up from their seats to buy food from the counter, crowding the door. I reluctantly took my bag and the tickets – both of them – and made my way to the door. I stopped, and looked back to confirm my seat number, so that I wouldn’t be lost in the dark later.

tamasha-feature

Part 2

As expected, I entered the dark room with the movie playing on the screen. This time I made sure I sat in the right seat. Ranbir was in his office, and he seemed happy. His face in this particular scene reminded me two of his other movies – Roy and Rockstar. These two movies had managed to annoy me as I did not understand them, and the stories were boring.

I had just begun to like Ranbir Kapoor when Rockstar was released, and the hype it had created with songs and trailer made me want to watch it. Although I got hold of the story, I did not understand why it received so many awards and was being appreciated by almost everyone I knew. Watching Roy was mainly for Arjun Rampal and the songs; but then, this is one of those movies which left me unsettled. At the end of the movie I was trying to confront the requirement of Ranbir’s existence in the movie. Deepika’s character lays the foundation for the male lead, and he became the focal point.

Tamasha so far was not that bad. As Ranbir was acting crazy all of a sudden, I could hear two people sitting behind me talking about their future. It was more like an argument. This went on for three minutes or so. I wanted to shout back at them, but was too scared to do that. Another five minutes went by and they had stopped. Admiring the acting, I tried to make notes about the movie on my phone.

I noticed that there were no hints about the place or even the period the actors were in, other than the small indications in text about place and year, in the corner of the screen. As the actors travelled to about five cities, the landmark of the city was not shown, which made it different from other movies.

I felt the movie was a series of coincidences created by the director. He has managed to place all of the incidents in a loop. So, they end where they had begun. I felt a less intense version of the same feeling I had when I watched Roy and Rockstar. I was happy that the movie was finally over. Surprisingly, it was not only the story that had been bad, but the whole experience of visiting the theatre alone. It felt like I was walking out of some adventure land, not sure if I wanted to go back in the future.