Audiences have just recently been witness to the glorious Seventies in Farah Khan's Om Shanti Om and close on heels follows director Sudhir Mishra's take on the Fifties, often referred to as the Golden era of Hindi films. Mishra captures that liberal era, which saw giants like Raj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar, Guru Dutt, Meena Kumari, Nargis, Madhubala and their ilk, strut their stuff on the screen and off it as well. It was an era of great passion and Mishra manages to capture most of that superbly through the story of star-crossed lovers Nikhat and Zafar.
He gets his era right. The times are superbly captured by him, the costumes, the music, the look, everything is befitting the era that Nikhat and Zafar inhabit. But what fails to ignite this film is the overpowering, all inspiring passion between his protagonists. Somehow Mishra's Nikhat and Zafar fail to live up to the mythic proportions of life & love lived in those times: think of Guru Dutt, Waheeda Rehman, or Madhubala and Dilip Kumar or even Raj Kapoor and Nargis.
This is not to say that he errs anyway. It's probably not something that he didn't do. It's probably got more to do with his choice of actors to enact the roles of Nikhat and Zafar. While Soha Ali Khan, probably has the role of a lifetime as Nikhat, one feels that it has come too early in her career for her to do full justice to the complexities of Nikhat's character. Her sincerity is not in doubt, but a more mature performer would have definitely raised the tempo of this passion-ridden drama by a couple of notches at least. Shiney Ahuja as the angst-ridden, writer-turned director is good but not compelling enough. While it is downright unfair to compare this film to another, one fails to find that emotional core which lifted Mishra's previous film, Haazaron Khwaishein Aisi. That one left you shaken to the core, and it had as much to do with manner in which the story was narrated as well as the acting of its protagonists, Shiney in particular.
Khoya Khoya Chand still has enough to have you rivetted to the screen for at least the first half and a majority of the second half. The film begins well enough with the story of a struggler, Nikhat, trying to break into the big league. She catches the attention of the then reigning superstar Prem Kumar (Rajat Kapoor) and he decides to take her under his wing. He also takes under his wing, a young writer, Zafar, a man of literature, who comes to Bombay to find himself and his dreams. The inevitable happens as the two troubled, and self-destructive souls come together. What follows is a cancelled nikaah as the golden goose Nikhat cannot shirk off the responsibility of her mother, mother's drunk lover and siblings. The writer turns director with his own biopic, starring Nikhat's arch-rival, Ratanbala (Sonya Jehan). It is a film before its time and bombs at the box office. A disillusioned Zafar, reeling from what he perceives to be Nikhat's betrayal and the failure of his film, flees to London. He leaves behind an embittered and heartbroken Nikhat, who inevitably takes to the bottle and slips from A-grade to B-grade movies. The Sixties arrive and so does technicolour. Zafar comes back from his self-imposed exile and proceeds to make another biopic, this time on the triangular relationship between him, Nikhat and Prem Kumar. This time Nikhat is determined to star in this venture, to make up for the old times. Despite her delicate condition --- she has a hole in her heart – she completes Zafar's film before she dies. Zafar goes on to make many more films but Khoya Khoya Chand remains Nikhat's last and most enduring performances on screen ever.
The story is moving enough despite certain obvious clichés. The director manages to bring together a delightful ensemble cast of actors like Rajat Kapoor, Sonya Jehan, Vinay Pathak, Sushmita Mukherjee and Saurabh Shukla, who along with Soha and Shiney who people the era of the fifties to perfection. The character of Prem Kumar, has been superbly enacted by Rajat Kapoor. He carries off the role of the philandering superstar very well indeed. This is not a character without intelligence or self-reflection. He does ask once during the course of the film, if he is the only one who is carrying on with so many women, or is it just that he is the only one who is in a position to do so. Even the character of the punter producer, Khosa, played by Saurabh Shukla is very well etched. Sonya Jehan as the fading star, puts in quite a nuanced performance as Ratanbala. Shiney has been cast well and he manages to bring out the angst of Zafar well enough. Shantanu Moitra's musical score is authentic and yet manages to stand out for its individual brilliance.
Having said all of the above, we come back again to the missing X-factor in Khoya Khoya Chand. And to the relationship between Nikhat and Zafar, which lies at the core of the film. Besides a few heart-breaking moments, their madness does not transcend the film and infect your being. Sudhir Mishra is to be credited for his brilliant attempt at recreating a glorious era of Hindi cinema. But it is his story which kind of lets him down at the end. It's not strong or compelling enough.
