Cast: Abhay Deol, Kalki, Mahi Gill, Dibyendu Bhattacharya
Directed by: Anurag Kashyap
Anurag Kashyap's romantic drama, Dev D, is a modern day take on Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay's 1917 classic novel, Devdas.
Young Devdas is the son of a taxman. Paro and Devdas have been childhood sweethearts, but differences in status and caste have acted as barriers to their relationship.
Devdas is sent off to Calcutta by his strict father, while Paro is married off to a rich but aged widower in Chandigarh.
In Calcutta, Devdas meets 16-year-old prostitute Chandramukhi, and a friendship is soon forged between these two characters. But remorse drives Devdas to unrestrained behaviour, as he takes to drugs in order to forget his first love.
Dev D breaks the typecasts of the original novel, including its principal characters. Abhay Deol plays Devdas, while debutants Mahi Gill and Kalki are Paro and Chandramukhi respectively.
Chandramukhi is known as Chanda in this modern remake, a young girl educated in London but now based in India.
Unlike director Sanjay Leela Bhansali's classic remake of Devdas, Dev D is based on a modern India where credit cards are more prominent than cash. There are also plenty of mobile phones and internet chatting, instead of telegrams.
Dev D has been scripted and directed by Anurag Kashyap, who is best known for his work in Bollywood classics Satya, Kaun, Shool, Yuva and Water.
The musical score for this film has been composed by Amit Trivedi, who was also involved with the small budget movie Aamir.
The majority of the filming for Dev D was done in Delhi and its surrounding villages, including Chandigarh and Manali. The story moves back and forth between the rustic and colourful Punjab, to the foggy and dingy lanes of Old Delhi. Some scenes were also shot in London.
Wednesday, December 24, 2008 17:43 IST