Mayar Jonjal: A neo-realist film among the unrealistic ones

Filmmaker Indranil Roychowdhury, who has previously helmed films like 'Phoring' and 'Bhalobashar Shohor', took up the challenge in his latest directorial, 'Mayar Jonjal', to bring back the authentic look of Kolkata on the big screen, with all its dirt, darkness and distress.

Kolkata-based directors now generally show this tendency of portraying a visually pleasing landscape of the city, which is too good to be true, and that has become normal before the eyes of the regular audience. 

In doing so, the real picture of Kolkata, known to be the city of joy, has more or less vanished from the realm of cinema. All we can see now in Kolkata films — be it a mainstream or an alternative movie — is hyperreality.

Walking against that crowd is what makes Mayar Jonjal a fascinating watch.

It is a film that depicts the shadows of reality that lie beneath the glamour of fiction, especially in times of severe economic crisis, but in a way that is quite minimalistic in its approach and never goes over the top.

Based on two short stories by Manik Bandopadhyay, titled 'Bishakto Prem' and 'Shubala', Mayar Jonjal has two separate tracks that play out in parallel.

On the one hand, it has a laid-off factory worker Chandan (Ritwick Chakraborty) who is desperate to stop his wife Soma (Aupee Karim) from working as a housemaid.

And on the other, there is a petty criminal Satya (Shohel Mondol) who loves a prostitute named Beauty (Chandreyee Ghosh) but also wants to run away with her money.

While there are novelties in both the stories blended together as one in the screenplay by Sugata Sinha and the director himself, they never try too hard to shove unnecessary melodrama down the audience's throat.

The director lets the story flow at its own pace, with all characters receiving enough room to mature and reach a conclusion. And thus, characterisation is another big plus of the movie.

However, its abrupt ending may not be satisfying enough for everyone, but certainly has some thought-provoking elements for the bona fide watcher to ponder on later on. 

And in all honesty, that is even more accurate and justifiable, given the fact that the source materials were two short stories, which are known for their open-endedness.

Two Bangladeshi artistes in the film,  Aupee and Shohel, stand out amidst the crowd of some equally brilliant actors from the other side of the border.

Aupee plays the role of an unhappy housewife-turned-housemaid in the movie. And she does a wonderful job delivering a sublime level of measured performance, exactly what one might expect from a seasoned actor of her calibre.

She particularly shines the brightest in the scenes where she is trying to suppress her dreams in the face of bleak reality. She might not have many dialogues to utter in that regard, but her expression of eyes — sometimes hollow yet sometimes dreamy — is quite to the point. 

Shohel, the Taqdeer-famed actor, is equally brilliant as the petty criminal who also nurtures a soft corner for the person he was about to rob. Such a duality is not very easy to depict, but he does so without stumbling for once. 

Moreover, the way Shohel pulls off the Kolkata accent also deserves praise. Not everyday do the Bangladeshi actors do this to perfection.

Among the actors from Kolkata, Chandreyee has the most character arc and she did full justice to it. She brings the courtesan character to life, before it starts marching towards the opposite direction. 

The veteran actor puts out her past in a way that not only explains her present, but also makes her look very humane.

Ritwick's performance, however, might leave one wanting for more. It is not because his acting lacks sincerity, but because we have already seen more than enough of him in similar roles. 

The way Ritwick walks, talks, swallows or simply throws blank looks are all too familiar to the audiences who have previously seen his work.

Meanwhile, cinematographer Indranil Mukherjee is on top of his game throughout the movie. Without his magic work, the narrow lanes and alleys of Kolkata would not really transgress the reflection of reality we have been discussing from the beginning.      

Overall, Mayar Jonjal is a movie that is a good addition to the procession of films trying to come out of the traditional cliche and offer the audiences something new and fresh.