simrangillevans

Miss Lovely (2012)

Miss Lovely doesn't offer anything like a straight plot, and it has no real stars - save for the "discovery" of Nawaz Siddiqui

Miss Lovely is not an easy movie. It's not a movie that will ever play at a hundred mutiplexes and draw large popcorn eating crowds. But it's a fantastic movie, a sweaty, fever-dream of a movie, and it's wonderful that people are engaging with it. There is simply nothing like it in Hindi cinema - and like it or not, that is one thing I'm sure no one can argue with.

Miss Lovely doesn't offer anything like a straight plot, and it has no real stars - save for the "discovery" of Nawaz Siddiqui (this film was his first lead role). He's great in it, as is another "discovery" Anil George (who plays the demanding elder brother with an intensity unseen before in Hindi cinema). For me however, the film belongs to Niharika Singh, who plays the mysterious 'Pinky'. On one level, she is a femme fatale of yore (like in a 1950's Noir film), on another she's a complete cipher, a blank slate. You can project anything you want on her and she absorbs it. This could be seen as insignificant characterization, but I saw it simply as a struggling character who exists in the shadows of the film industry, someone you know almost nothing about but around which most of the plot revolves - like an empty center. Her mix of coyness, intensity, disinterest, coldness & warmth is terrific and incredible subtle.

That said, this is one of my favorite films of the year so far, and I'm glad to see this kind of edgy, fearless filmmaking coming from India.