Why Milan Luthria fails in ‘Dirty Picture’

National award for Vidya Balan

Everyone is heaping praises on Vidya Balan and even termed her as the only female hero of the industry. After watching Dirty Picture I quite agree with this statement but don’t hold the director of this movie in the same league. I can also write a good review and talk about Naseer sahab’s brilliant work , Emraan Hashmi’s incensed performance and Vidya’s antics but one person who has not done justice to this movie is the Director. It pains to see so many good performances weaved into an incoherent and ineffective story line. Here are my facts to substantiate my claims.

It has been projected that this movie is inspired by Silk Smitha’s  life but nowhere it touches Silk Smitha’s  reality in true sense. Her rise was meteoric and she went on to star in Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada and a few Hindi films. Her career spanned across 17 years where she starred in over 450 movies and acted in iconic movies like ‘Sadma’ and ‘Reshma ki Jawaani’. Vidya was only depicted as a moll to Naseer and it seemed as if he was the Godfather and her career was solely dependent on him. Excuse me Mr Luthra, a career spanning over 450 films and 17 years can’t be depicted dancing and singing with one old haggard. 

Moreover you forgot to capture the rise and the fall the way it should have been. Neither could you bring out any intensity in Vidya’s love for her Demi god, justify Emraan’s anger nor could you even portray Tusshar Kapoor’s infatuation properly. The animosity that you wanted to show through Emraan was baseless and did not convey why it was there in the first place. You could not capture the loneliness of a star when crowned by the public nor could you really show her happiness at the prime of her career. The depiction of her financial woes in the end is flimsy and I could not understand the last part where you showed Vidya’s movie completely washed out by Emraan’s. There is no compelling reason for your portrayal and you have taken events for granted. Aspects like stardom, rise, fall, competition, insecurities, addiction, failures need a deeper understanding of human joys and sorrows and a sensitive eye for showcasing it. You fail here entirely and leave so many things to imagination for a confused audience. 

Mr Luthria ! I was saddened by the entire effort that you have put in. The story line is utterly flawed, loosely stitched and calls for good sense to capture a biopic like this. The only place where I quite agree is  you have really created a ‘Dirty Picture’.

Posted in: Article, Dirty Picture, Vidya Balan