Message to reduce the wastage of water is understood, but what is 'killing beauty' of the title?
Neither immense publicity nor the casting of the foreign popular actor has proven enough to prevent Voyangkor Sundor a.k.a Killing Beauty from being a box office failure. The most responsible element for this disaster is its story.
It is an adaptation of Joler Ghurni O Bokbok Shobdo (The whirlpool and the sound of it) by Moti Nondi, a veteran writer of Kolkata. But a catastrophe happened while adapting the story for the screenplay. Some extra elements and events have been added to the main story, which is not well executed or not even well planned. Such as, after committing a murder, there was neither any reaction of killing nor any of the killer. The hero has no regrets or any other difficulties like police inquiries or other social problems and lived a very usual life without any kind of trauma or other sufferings.
On the other hand, after the declassification of the heroine from a highly superior family to very low-standard one, the reaction of her family is too easy to believe. The only struggle by the heroine was standing against her family just for once grabbing a sharp household utensil as an arm. And due to that sole reaction, they allowed her to live in a slum, with a boy who is from a different religion, who doesn't have any birth-identity and doesn't even have a minimum reputed job. When these elements had been added to the main story, these should have been added with some more details and explanations.
Ending of the main story has been changed too. And the changed one is also very mysterious. Why hero-heroine smiled with satisfaction when neighbors were looting their huge collected water? A probable answer is that they were satisfied as the water was being distributed among the neighbors with the lessons of the importance of water. If so, what is the point of the neighbors' revolution? Just to make a platform for those satirical speeches, or to bring a feeling of thriller? If so, that is also not acceptable as that makes a minor element way more important than the main climax.
Another reason could be the 'second warning' shown prior to the title- 'stop wasting water', because 'life is another name for water' (a very much publicized phrase in Bangladesh to ensure reducing wastage of water). The ending of the main story is on contrary to that as it is finished by spilling all the collected water in drain thus wasting all of it. So it has to be changed and the collected water should have been distributed to ensure its using. Probably that's why the story ended with the revolt of the neighbors resulted in a chaotic plundering of water. By doing so, the message is clearly delivered and the water is successfully distributed. Most likely this success of distribution of water is the reason behind hero-heroines satisfactory laughter.
Although it was a disaster, the story had a huge opportunity to be placed in Dhaka, as during every summer water crisis is a rude reality in various places here. This possibility was boosted as the story was set in Sadarghat-Old Dhaka region, where water crisis occurs very often. But the representation wasn't good enough; also the presentation of Old Dhaka was even poorer.
Execution of songs wasn't successful either. At the beginning, there were so many songs pouring right and left that even made the audience impatient, though almost every song had a purpose, to transmit some specific feelings, and the lyrics and compositions were also fine. Although the combination of lyric-tune-composition-choreography was absent. Also, there were some major flaws in costume designing of songs.
There was absolutely no space for acting in the script except for the hero-heroine, as no other character not even developed, yet to be established. On the other hand, the main problem of Parambrata-Bhabna pair was the distance of their acting.
But the most complicated and mysterious subject of this film is its naming. What is the 'killing beauty', which resulted in the title of the film? Is it the beauty of heroine 'Nayantara' (Bhabna), which insisted pitiful 'Moku' (Parambrata) commit a murder? But in that case, the naming keeps no liaison to the climax, not even to the main portion of the story. Or it is water, which is the subject of English poems and stanzas once recited by the obsessed heroine, even included the exact phrase?
Although both of these possibilities are far-fetched, perhaps it is safe to vote for water, because in that case, at least there is a strong connection between the title and the climax of Killing Beauty.
Neither immense publicity nor the casting of the foreign popular actor has proven enough to prevent Voyangkor Sundor a.k.a Killing Beauty from being a box office failure. The most responsible element for this disaster is its story.
It is an adaptation of Joler Ghurni O Bokbok Shobdo (The whirlpool and the sound of it) by Moti Nondi, a veteran writer of Kolkata. But a catastrophe happened while adapting the story for the screenplay. Some extra elements and events have been added to the main story, which is not well executed or not even well planned. Such as, after committing a murder, there was neither any reaction of killing nor any of the killer. The hero has no regrets or any other difficulties like police inquiries or other social problems and lived a very usual life without any kind of trauma or other sufferings.
On the other hand, after the declassification of the heroine from a highly superior family to very low-standard one, the reaction of her family is too easy to believe. The only struggle by the heroine was standing against her family just for once grabbing a sharp household utensil as an arm. And due to that sole reaction, they allowed her to live in a slum, with a boy who is from a different religion, who doesn't have any birth-identity and doesn't even have a minimum reputed job. When these elements had been added to the main story, these should have been added with some more details and explanations.
Ending of the main story has been changed too. And the changed one is also very mysterious. Why hero-heroine smiled with satisfaction when neighbors were looting their huge collected water? A probable answer is that they were satisfied as the water was being distributed among the neighbors with the lessons of the importance of water. If so, what is the point of the neighbors' revolution? Just to make a platform for those satirical speeches, or to bring a feeling of thriller? If so, that is also not acceptable as that makes a minor element way more important than the main climax.
Another reason could be the 'second warning' shown prior to the title- 'stop wasting water', because 'life is another name for water' (a very much publicized phrase in Bangladesh to ensure reducing wastage of water). The ending of the main story is on contrary to that as it is finished by spilling all the collected water in drain thus wasting all of it. So it has to be changed and the collected water should have been distributed to ensure its using. Probably that's why the story ended with the revolt of the neighbors resulted in a chaotic plundering of water. By doing so, the message is clearly delivered and the water is successfully distributed. Most likely this success of distribution of water is the reason behind hero-heroines satisfactory laughter.
Although it was a disaster, the story had a huge opportunity to be placed in Dhaka, as during every summer water crisis is a rude reality in various places here. This possibility was boosted as the story was set in Sadarghat-Old Dhaka region, where water crisis occurs very often. But the representation wasn't good enough; also the presentation of Old Dhaka was even poorer.
Execution of songs wasn't successful either. At the beginning, there were so many songs pouring right and left that even made the audience impatient, though almost every song had a purpose, to transmit some specific feelings, and the lyrics and compositions were also fine. Although the combination of lyric-tune-composition-choreography was absent. Also, there were some major flaws in costume designing of songs.
There was absolutely no space for acting in the script except for the hero-heroine, as no other character not even developed, yet to be established. On the other hand, the main problem of Parambrata-Bhabna pair was the distance of their acting.
But the most complicated and mysterious subject of this film is its naming. What is the 'killing beauty', which resulted in the title of the film? Is it the beauty of heroine 'Nayantara' (Bhabna), which insisted pitiful 'Moku' (Parambrata) commit a murder? But in that case, the naming keeps no liaison to the climax, not even to the main portion of the story. Or it is water, which is the subject of English poems and stanzas once recited by the obsessed heroine, even included the exact phrase?
Although both of these possibilities are far-fetched, perhaps it is safe to vote for water, because in that case, at least there is a strong connection between the title and the climax of Killing Beauty.
