Discovering Fanny is one such film. It's a basic film with a beat up plot line – a gathering of loners travel together looking for lost love. Yet on account of some superlative acting, you overlook how thin the plot is and drench yourself in the lives of the characters.
Naseeruddin Shah plays Ferdie, a tyke like postmaster of an interesting languid backwater of Goa called Pocolim. He gets back a letter he had presented 46 years on the love of his life Stefanie "Fanny" Fernandes (Anjali Patil). His closest companion Angie (Deepika Padukone), a 26 year old widow, who lives with her widowed mother by marriage Rosalina "Rosie" Eucharistica (Dimple Kapadia), encourages him to search out his missing love. A painter looking for a muse, Don Pedro Cleto Colaco (Pankaj Kapur) and Angie's youth love Savio Da Gama (Arjun Kapur) join this diverse temporary fad. What takes after is a road trip that makes the characters relearn some cruel truths furthermore familiarizes them with changing motion of their relationships with one another in the meantime.
Naseer and Pankaj are prepared veterans and expectedly sustain off one another. One of best lines in the movies is when Don Pedro flourishingly portrays Freddie as the Casanova Of Konkan. While Naseer brings out all the idiosyncrasies of a bashful, self observer lover, Pankaj is a hoot as the over-the-top painter. His rejection of his "muse" Dimple after he completes her composition is piercing and slyly shows the heart of a painter in the meantime. Dimple shows what a fine on-screen character she is – her boasting Goan close relative act, where her intense outside shrouds a shaky persona is one of her best screen versions as such. The young people, Arjun and Deepika are the genuine astonishment. Arjun plays Savio, the driver, repairman and vigorous love with the rant his character merits and is at times out of pace with the veterans. Deepika overflows confidence in every edge. She stands her ground against everybody and demonstrates how great an on-screen character she could be in the hands of a proficient director. It's her film more than anybody else's.
In the wake of Being Cyrus and Cocktail, director Homi Adajania has apparently hit his stride. The cinematography by Anil Mehta is world-class thus is the music by Mathias Duplessy and Sachin-Jigar. Go watch the film for its abundance of eccentric characters managing ordinary emergency and rising wealthier simultaneously. It will most likely put a grin to your face, if nothing else.
Cast: Deepika Padukone, Dimple Kapadia, Arjun Kapoor, Pankaj Kapur, Naseeruddin Shah
Direction: Homi Adajania
Genre: Drama
Duration: 1 hour 45 minutes
IMDB Rating: 3.5/5 , DP2Web Rating: 3/5