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Hate Story (A)
Director: Vivek Agnihotri
Cast: Paoli Dam, Gulshan Devaiah, Nikhil Dwivedi, Mohan Kapur, Joy Sengupta
Running time: 130 minutes
Sleaze and thrill, the two most important components of any Vikram Bhatt film, are on offer yet again in his new release Hate Story. But Vivek Agnihotri’s skill has saved the film from being just a mundane tale of love, lust, betrayal and revenge. Vivek, who showed his brilliance in his earlier film Chocolate, comes up with yet another slick film, though made on a much more lower budget. And the box office may not elude him this time, going by the initial collections.
The storyline evolves from the age-old belief that hatred is perhaps the strongest emotion in a man or woman, even stronger than love. So strong that Kavya, played by Paoli Dam, sheds all her middle-class values and uses her body to seek revenge. Perhaps this must have prompted the producers to use the tag ‘erotic’. But the best scene of the film, Kavya having sex with vengeance in her eyes, contradicts the tagline. Paoli delivers brilliantly in the scene, expressing crude antipathy. The scene where she enters the gents’ toilet to manipulate a man speaks of the changing values in Bollywood.
Delhi’s underbelly provides the right backdrop for the film. Kavya strips off her clothes many times to strip the mask off politics. Gulshan Devaiah, noticed in Anurag Kashyap’s Shaitan, impresses. But his use of stammering in front of his father denoting his fear and lack of confidence, could have been done better. Interestingly, Joy Sengupta, the other Bengali actor in the film, is part of the most steamy scenes.
The background music by Amar Mohile not only keeps the pace of the narrative going but covers up quite a few flaws. Sunidhi Chauhan’s rendition of the title song is haunting. The use of Sufi songs has almost become mandatory in Hindi cinema now and Hate Story is no exception. The film has quite a few cliches but is watchable for the edit pattern. The cinematography (Attar Singh Saini) is brilliant in patches, particularly the chase scene of Nikhil Dwivedi.
Hate Story, often perilously close to sinking to an absolute disaster, was saved each time by Vivek’s sensibility and Paoli’s grace. As an actor, Paoli could have easily played safe, after earning praise for her performances in films like Kalbela, Moner Manush or Shob Charitra Kalponik. Instead she chose to risk everything. This undaunting spirit of an actor to explore new horizons comes through in Hate Story. That’s what really makes the film watchable. But Paoli must be extremely careful with her make-up. Her look in Hate Story is inconsistent at times.
Hate Story is not without the regular quota of moral dosages. It fails to cross the boundary and remains a normal Bollywood masala flick. But its business can raise many eyebrows.
Bappaditya has directed Paoli in Kagojer Bou and Elar Char Adhyay.
