Banjo Full movie Rating, Review.

The profile of a rock star: unkempt, unclean, talented but drifting. Like the tragedienne, the romanticist, the romantic, the angry young man and the anti-hero, the musical stereotype is not a Tansen or a Shankara Sastry. He is the Udta Rock star. He is a cross between the images so strongly created by Ranbir and Shahid. If the hero could garner space in our cinema as the anti-hero, the star is now stretching to be the anti- star or the Rock star.

So, some of the lessons you learn at this torrential rain defying outing: That Rock stars have long hair yearning for a shampoo and a good body scrub; they use expletives with the ease of chewing gum, they may live in squalor and even prefer it but never hesitate to romance with the socially upward mobile; not only their roti, kapda aur makan but also their daaru is taken care of; they may be part of the underworld but not till the police station set is ready, do they run into the hands of law; a great singer is not just at that but a wonderful dancer and an amazing fighter too.

‘Banjo’ is about a group that has great talent but no fire in the belly. Grease (Dharmesh Yelandi – a neat performance), Paper (Aditya Kumar– just the sidekick), Vaaja ( Ram Menon, welcome to the comedy gang) join Tarrat (Riteish Deshmukh) to form a small local music band which is satisfied playing at the Ganapati pandals and Navrathri events. Here too they have competition from the non-sporting rival who would rather beat up the rival team members than concentrate on his music. In search of this great team and its hidden talent is Christine (Nargis Fakhri) who travels from USA with her hot pants and hope in place. She walks along the roads of Mumbai in search of the troupe that can make her album and has many abortive tests and auditions in vague settings. Abetting her search is evil businessman who is willing to sponsor her provided she is willing to capture evidence of the squalor in the region to enable him to get the demolition squad in and have the area for his business and his client. We have the formula steadily falling in place along with the ambitious businessman, the high-handed policeman, the local leader with his goons and the lecherous onlookers. Soon Christine runs into Taraat and his group and the musical genius that she is, fails to see the amazing talent in them and that this is the pot of gold she is in search of. Having wasted enough raw stock and film time, she discovers their talent and that this is the one stop shop. However, she still has to deal with their mood swings, indiscipline and lack of hunger for success.

Even as she works and things are getting tune perfect, things go amiss. There is attempt on the life of the local leader falling to the gun shots of a conspiracy. There is the Midas music company head who would throw expectations for sexual favours from Christine as if he were just asking her out for tea. The mess ends when the group defy the curfew to participate at a fest and has the audience up on their feet. You would expect a couple of things from a film of this kind: a good script, some good music (remember names like SJ, the Burmans!) and some strong performances. You will have nothing of them though. Except Riteish, this ‘Banjo’ is off colour and off tune.

Cast : Riteish Deshmukh, Nargis Fakhri and Dharmesh Yelandi
Direction : Ravi Jadhav
Genre : Musical-action
Thumbs Up: Riteish
Thumbs Down: Screenplay, script and direction