BEing CYRUS English Movie
Leo Tolstoy once said, ''All happy families resemble one another, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way''. This is one of Saif's lines in the movie. I would rephrase it in the context of the same movie as ''All Saif Ali Khan movies resemble one another (at some level, in some way), Being Cyrus is different in it's own way''.
Being Cyrus isn't an avant-garde path-breaking cinema but then it uses a different set of formula to solve the problems of its lead characters. It has its moments of humor, eccentricity, mystery, muddles, treachery, double-cross, wit and philosophy. To put it in brief, Being Cyrus entertains.
The film has an interesting story to narrate and adopts a novel approach too. But the best aspect of Being Cyrus is it's strong characterizations. The writing is highly character-driven. And no, the film is not about Parsees. Though all the six characters in the movie are Parsees, the story is not based on the Parsee society like in Naseruddin Shah's earlier film Pastonjee. However all the Parsee characters are well defined not just in terms of their language and mannerisms but also about their respective motives in the film.
Whether it's Naseruddin Shah as the maverick sculptor, Dimple Kapadia as his thwarted wife, Boman Irani as a conniving brother and insensitive son, Simone Singh as the naïve and suppressed wife, Honey Chaya as the pitiable father who gains your complete sympathy or Saif Ali Khan as the mysterious guest on a mission, each character is so well-etched and believable that you can identify with each one of them.
Cyrus Mistry (Saif Ali Khan) reaches Panchgani to learn pottery from Dinshaw Sethna (Naseeruddin Shah). Dinshaw's wife, Cathy (Dimple Kapadia) gets close to Cyrus and subsequently uses her as a messenger to communicate with her ailing father-in-law, Fardoonjee Sethna (Honey Chhaya) in Mumbai. But Dinshaw's brother, Farokh Sethna (Boman Irani) cannot see eye-to-eye with Dinshaw and his wife and also appears to be ill-treating his father. He also dominates his wife Tina (Simone Singh) suppressing her existence.
Each character makes you more inquisitive about what's happening in the movie. But nothing actually happens until Fardoonjee is murdered. Each character in the film has it's own motive behind the old man's murder. From here on the mystery mounts and subsequently the suspense unravels. However this isn't your typical who-dun-it thriller. That's because you already know who has done the crime. Being Cyrus is about why-dun-it'
Debutante director Homi Adajania chooses a Parsee setting for the film and being a Parsee himself, he perfectly manages to create the right ambience for the film. The costumes and the artwork just add to the conviction of the characters. Editors Anand Subaya and Jon Harris adopt a rather ambiguous and non-chronological editing pattern and that's intentional to add to the confusion and commotion of the thriller. Homi prefers to keep the film short and crisp with a runtime of just 87 minutes. The background score by Salim-Sulaiman fluctuates from the light strings for the funny scenes to heavy percussions for the grave ones.
One however wishes that when the entire suspense is uncovered in the end, the detailing behind the conspiracy could have been a little more explicit. Also an abstract dream sequence where Saif encounters weird experiences could have been avoided.
The humor in the film comes out from the situations and in not forced on your face. None of the actors attempt to make you laugh in the film but you can't stop rolling out of your seats when they end up in hilarious state of affairs.
Every actor comes with a fine performance and in this small duration film, each one can boast of at least one scene where they steal the limelight. Boman is side-splittingly funny in the scene where a d
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