Raanjhanaa (Beloved One in Hindi) is a 2013 Indian romantic drama film, directed by Anand L. Rai and written by Himanshu Sharma. The film is produced by Krishika Lulla under the banner Eros International. It stars Dhanush in his Bollywood debut, Sonam Kapoor and Abhay Deol in its lead roles.
The film was released on 21 June 2013 worldwide,
while the dubbed Tamil version titled
Ambikapathy was released a later.
The dialogues for the Tamil version was written by John Mahendran.
The background score and soundtrack was composed by A. R. Rahman. The Hindi lyrics of the tracks were penned by Irshad Kamil, whereas the Tamil lyrics were written by Vairamuthu.
Within a week of its release, its collections surpassed
34 crore (US$5.4 million). The film was declared Super Hit by Box Office India.
Post four week its run, the film grossed
80 crore (US$13 million) worldwide.
Cast
- Dhanush as Kundan Shankar
- Sonam Kapoor as Zoya Haider
- Abhay Deol as Jasjeet Singh Shergill/Akram Zaidi
- Swara Bhaskar as Bindiya
- Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub as Murari
- Shilpi Marwaha as Rashmi
- Suraj Singh as Anand
- Kumud Mishra as Zoya's Father/Guruji
- Arvind Gaur as Guptaji (cameo)
- Sujata Kumar as Chief Minister
- Vipin Sharma as Kundan's father (cameo)
- Ishwak Singh (Doctor from Lucknow)
- Tejpal Singh (Father of Abhay Deol)
- Late Ginny Singh (JNU activist)
Plot
Kundan Shankar (Dhanush)
is the son of an Hindu Tamil priest. Since his childhood days, Kundan
has had a strong and obsessive one-sided love for Zoya Haider (played by
Sonam Kapoor),
a Muslim girl residing in Varanasi whose father is a professor. Though
he sees her first as a child, Kundan is steadfast in his love for Zoya.
He always attempts to be around her and hold her hand but gets slapped
several times in the process. Zoya finally changes her mind because of
Kundan's constancy of affection and attraction. Zoya's family is
orthodox, preventing the lovers from being together. After Zoya moves to
Aligarh for further studies, Kundan harmonizes with Zoya's family,
assisting them with various chores. Zoya gets into Jawaharlal Nehru
University and discovers a long-lost strength as she confronts and then
falls for student leader Akram Zaidi (Abhay Deol).
After a period of eight years, Zoya returns to Varanasi. She barely
recognizes Kundan when she meets him again. Kundan again attempts to ask
Zoya for her love but she is reluctant, revealing that she is in love
with Akram. Zoya then urges Kundan to convince her family about her
marriage with Akram. Initially refusing because he still loves her,
Kundan eventually agrees to it and sets about trying to convince Zoya's
father of the match. Kundan gets the wedding of Zoya and Akram arranged.
Kundan promises Zoya that he will also tie the knot with another girl
and will forget her. Kundan proposes to his childhood friend Bindiya (Swara Bhaskar), who has had a crush on him since childhood.
On the day of their marriage, Kundan finds out that Akram is a Sikh,
whose actual name is Jasjeet Singh Shergill. This enrages Kundan as Zoya
had used their religious differences to convince him that their match
was not possible. Kundan reveals everything to Zoya's parents thereby
interrupting their marriage ceremony. Later, Kundan is informed by his
friend that Zoya tried to commit suicide and is in a critical condition.
He rushes to the hospital where he is also informed that Jasjeet was
mercilessly beaten by Zoya's relatives. Kundan rushes to find him, along
with his friend and Jasjeet's sister. At the hospital, Jasjeet talks to
Kundan and says that despite Jasjeet's misgivings about the plan, Zoya
convinced him to portray himself as Muslim to marry her, a plan he
should not have agreed to as it was a lie. Kundan also forgets about his
own marriage with Bindiya. For this reason, Kundan's family disowns
him. Later, Jasjeet's parents take him back to his village. Kundan tries
to redeem himself by taking Zoya to Jasjeet's village. However, he is
devastated to find that Jasjeet has succumbed to his injuries, finally
making Kundan understand that his one-sided love has resulted in an
innocent man's death.
Kundan then becomes homeless and begins visiting various religious
places and volunteering in their activities so that he can atone for his
sins. During one such visit to the banks of Ganga, a man advises him to
do the right thing rather than running away from his sins.
Motivated, Kundan locates Zoya to Jawahar Lal Nehru University, where
she is spearheading the activities of the political party "All India
Citizen Party" (AICP), created by Jasjeet. Kundan joins the nearby
canteen and serves the people of the party, working at a tea-stall, all
the while trying to get Zoya's attention. Over time, Kundan becomes
popular among the party due to his simple nature. The party workers are
impressed as Kundan also helps the party in negotiating some tough
situations by using his simple yet witty tricks. Slowly, he emerges as a
popular face of the party, disturbing Zoya. She holds a grudge that the
person who is responsible for Jasjeet's death is now taking his place.
She also tries to instigate party members against Kundan but Jasjeet's
sister Rashmi (Shilpi Marwaha), who is also Zoya's best friend, tells Kundan to continue, as he is the best choice for fulfilling Jasjeet's vision.
Kundan, however, only wants Zoya to forgive him. His motive in being
there, working for the party is to redeem himself in her eyes. The Chief
Minister (Sujata Kumar) tells Zoya privately she must seek revenge on
Kundan so as to take the place Jasjeet held for the AICP. To get back
the position, she tells her to let Kundan get injured as he delivers his
campaign speech for the party. Zoya apparently seems to gets
brainwashed by this plan and as the Chief Minister desired, Kundan is
hurt badly and sent to ICU, thus fulfilling Zoya's revenge.
At a press meet following Kundan's injury, the chief minister denies
having any hand in the blast that hurt Kundan. She says this can be
confirmed by the fact that Zoya would now be joining their party.
However, when Zoya steps forward, she reveals that the plan was plotted
by her and the Chief Minister and that she is prepared to go to prison
for this. Zoya leaves the press meet and finds out through a policeman
that Kundan was aware of the plot and still let himself be injured.
Shocked by this fact, she rushes to the hospital to be with Kundan.
In a final voice over, a dying Kundan wonders about letting go. He
says he might have the desire to live again, if Zoya called out to him,
but then again everything had become so tiring and he would rather let
go and rest (euphemism for dying). He speaks of the nature of love that
continues, by saying that he can be born again and again in the same
Benaras with the same surroundings, fall in love with a girl like Zoya
again, and become a Raanjhaana with her love.
Characters
Actor Dhanush plays the character Kundan who has a passion for his city Banaras and Zoya (played by Sonam Kapoor).
It depicts him a young boy and a teen who turns into a sensitive adult.
Sonam Kapoor quoted her character as, "'Zoya' is child-like and
unpredictable. She can be cold and at the same time, objective. She has
every quality that makes her desirable to a man." In an interview,
Kapoor revealed that for playing the role of a school girl in the film,
she drew inspiration from the character Jaya Bachchan played in the 1971 film
Guddi.
Actor Abhay Deol as Akram plays a secure yet confident university student, socialist and a budding politician.
Critical reception
- India
Raanjhanaa opened to positive critical reception.
Critic Komal Nahta
responded positively and said, "On the whole, Raanjhanaa is an
interesting, entertaining and a fairly different love story. It is like
heady wine and its effect will only grow."
Rajeev Masand of
CNN-IBN
wrote, "For its immensely entertaining first half, a winning score by
AR Rahman, but most of all for Dhanush, this is a film that's worth your
time. I'm going with three out of five for Raanjhanaa. It's not
perfect, but it'll do."
Resham Sengar of
Zee News gave the film 4 out of 5 stars and summarized "
Raanjhanaa is a love story that does not fall within the confines of a clichéd Bollywood romance."
Taran Adarsh of
Bollywood Hungama gave the film 3.5 out of 5 and stated, "On the whole,
Raanjhanaa
encompasses romance and myriad emotions most wonderfully, besides
bravura performances and a popular musical score from the maestro."
Adarsh also called it "a film that touches the core of your heart" and
said it was "definitely worthy of a watch".
At
NDTV,
Saibal Chatterjee gave it 3.5/5 and opined in the review, "The film
defies the expectations of the audience at several crucial junctures and
holds out absolutely no apologies for springing abrupt surprises. A
love story with a huge difference that benefits no end from a clutch of
exceptional performances."
Sukanya Verma of
Rediff Movies
gave 3 out of 5 stars and claimed, "Raanjhanaa isn't easy viewing.
Kundan and Zoya aren't easily likeable. They have flaws. They make
mistakes. Blunders, really but Rai shows them for what they are; he
never paints a pretty picture. And this brutal honesty coupled with a
commanding Dhanush is what works."
Meena Iyer of
The Times of India
claimed, "Raanjhanaa is a love story that has a Shakespearean touch and
is mounted on a lavish scale". She noted, "You may not like this film
if you cannot digest brooding love stories", and gave it 3.5 out of 5.
Kaushik Rmesh of
Planet Bollywood
gave the film a 8 on 10 and summarized, "A realistic romance that brims
with impressive elements (including and especially the enchanting
music), Raanjhanaa is surely a winner at the end and must be watched for
its unconventional handling and freshness".
Nabanita of One India
gave the film 3.5 out of 5 and wrote, "Raanjhanaa works, and yes, the
movie has maximum possibilities to strike the right chords amongst the
audience, only and only because of Dhanush and his heart-touching
performance."
Rachit Gupta of
Filmfare
called the film a "great love story" and concluded, "Grab a ticket,
clutch the hand of your loved one and go fall in love. This time with
great cinema".
Critics at Indicine gave a score of 65 out of 100 and summarized, "The
intentions of Aanand L Rai seem genuine. He wants to show us the world
where he grew up in, wants to romanticize the feeling of nostalgia and
unrequited love."
Tushar Joshi writes for
DNA India,
"Raanjhanaa works because of Dhanush's ability to make you believe in
his love for Zoya. You might not agree with his approach, but deep down
you cheer and root for him each time Zoya plants a slap on his face."
At
Deccan Chronicle, Khalid Mohamed mentioned, "Raanjhanaa: Playing ping pong with love", and gave it three stars out of five.
India Today
rated the film 3/5 and judged, "Raanjhanaa harks back to the way
Bollywood used to make love stories once upon a time. With some
imagination, the effect would have been nostalgic, too."
Shubha Shetty Saha of
Mid-Day assigned 3.5/5 to the film and praised actor Dhanush
and stated, "And then the second half is when the pace dips, the
sincerity of the storyline gets somewhat hazy and the film gets wee bit
disappointing. An absolutely believable one-sided romance takes a
slightly deceptive political drama twist and I am not sure if that is
what you wanted it to be. It is unpredictable, yes, but not in a great,
believable way."
At
Mumbai Mirror,
Karan Anshuman pointed, "Raanjhanaa flows like good poetry. It is
arguably the best love story of the year so far, the kind of film others
in the genre should aspire.".
On the contrary to above, critic Mayank Shekhar wrote, "His (Dhanush) character is supposed to be gifted with great inter-personal skills. It doesn't quite show."
Shubhra Gupta of
The Indian Express
gave it 2.5 out of 5 and mentioned, "Raanjhanaa is a film which is all
of a piece in its engaging first half, and a good Bollywood launchpad
for Dhanush. Makes me want to see what he will do in his second pass."
At
Emirates 24/7,
Sneha May Francis said, "While music maestro AR Rahman tunes the track,
and leaves us occasionally cheerful, the moments are far too few to
erase the horrid after effects of this movie."
Critic Manohar Basu at Koimoi stated, "However a sluggish screenplay and lurching script makes Raanjhanaa a half baked effort and hence gets a 3/5 from me."
Sudhish Kamath of
The Hindu concluded, "A dream debut for Dhanush even if the film gets stuck in its messy political subtext that kills the romance."
- Overseas
At
The Hollywood Reporter,
Lisa Tsering left the film unrated and asserted, "The fact that the
film marks the Hindi-language debut of South Indian star and YouTube
superstar Dhanush is bound to draw interest at the box office, though
Rai's firm refusal to play by the rules of the typical Bollywood love
story may make it hard to sustain momentum."
Controversy
The Central Board of Film Censors (CFBC) banned the film before its scheduled release in Pakistan. Chief Executive Officer of IMGC Global Entertainment Amjad Rasheed, the importer of
Raanjhanaa,
revealed that he received a letter from the CBFC with directives to
shelve the film's release which stated that the film portrays an inapt
image of a Muslim girl (played by Sonam Kapoor) falling in love with a Hindu man and having an affair with him.
Click here for movie trailer(Official): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ER9vmhxFucg
Watch full movie at here for free: Raanjhanaa (2013)- Full Movie In HD