Update of Bengali Movies in the Third Quarter of 2016

The third quarter of 2016 was quite good in terms of business as well as good movies, specially the month of August which had two big hits.
Let's look back at this quarter and have month wise recap.

July

July is the month of Eid and since last few years Tollywood producers are eyeing at it to release their movies. This year on Eid it was the biggest clash of this year; Eskay Movies vs Shree Venkatesh Films, Jeet vs Dev, Action vs Comedy, #BadshahTheDon vs #KelorKirti.

#BadshahTheDon

It was Jeet starer action drama, a south Indian remake directed by Baba Yadav and Abdul Aziz. It was a joint production of India’s Eskay movies and Bangladesh’s Jazz Multimedia.It had actors from both side of Bengal. The leading lady was Bangladeshi actress Nusrat Faria, also there was Indian actress Shraddha Das. Also it featured Mahesh Manjerekar from Mumbai as the lead villain. The movie was just an average masala entertainer with dramatic punch lines, stylish action sequences and massy music. These types of commercial films are not doing that well now a days and this movie too was not an exception. Still it managed to be a crowd puller in small centres and it get good response in Bangladesh too because of the presence of local actors. The songs like “Piya Tore Bina” and “Dhat Tereki” were very popular among its target audience.

#KelorKirti It was a scene by scene remake of Bollywood adult comedy #NoEntry and that was the

biggest weak point of this film as the original one is already over exposed on TV. This one was a multi starer and the main highlight was Jisshu Sengupta's comeback to mainstream commercial cinema after a long time. Another added attraction was Dev in an extended cameo as a Casanova. Jisshu did a good job with fine comic timing and he was ably supported by Mimi Chakraborty who was playing his on screen wife. There was Nushrat too in a sexy avatar grooving her body to the tunes of “Item Bomb”. But all these could not help this to be a good entertainer. There were several reasons like it was a remake of a hugely popular Hindi movie so there was nothing new for the audiences. Also comedy movies hardly have any market in Bengali commercial cinema, it was too massy for urban audience and for small centres it was less spicy as there were no heavy dialogue or action scenes. Overall this movie became flop in final run.

Apart from this big clash there was one another significant release in this month and it was #Khwato

#Khwato It was an erotic thriller directed by Kamaleshwar Mujherjee and produced by Venkatesh

Films. It was about a passionate poet and his muse played by Prasenjit Chatterjee and Paoli Dam respectively. The movie was one of rare bold films of Bengali cinema not just because of the bold sex scenes rather because of the bold lead characters who are too open to admit their sexual needs. This movie showcased some wonderful performance by Prasenjit Chatterjee, Paoli Dam, Rahul Banerjee. Special credit should be given for Prasenjit for taking this challenging character with grey shades. It was a different concept but was somewhere lost in execution. The movie had potential to leave its mark but sadly finally it remained just a movie about extra marital affair nothing more. As expected at ticket windows its performance was very poor.

August

It's very rare that three big Bengali releases coming in one month that too without any festive season, but that rare scenario had happened in August.
There were three back to back big releases and surprisingly all three were thrillers. Among these three, two were big hits.

#Hemanta This was one long cherished dream of Anjan Dutta to adapt Shakespeare's revenge drama Hamlet. Anjan Dutta had adapted his story in a contemporary setup in today's Kolkata. It

had a wonderful ensemble cast featuring talented actors like Parambrata Chatterjee, Jisshu Sengupta, Shaswata Chatterjee, Gargee Roychoudhury, Payel Sarkar in the lead roles. All of them had done wonderful acting. It had an interesting premise, the characters had been transformed from play to movie keeping their basic emotions intact but somewhere the screenplay failed to transform the play into a movie script. Also towards the end the story was too hurried to finish. All these shortcomings affected the film's performance people rejected it and it failed badly.

#GoyendaShaborEaglerChokh Last year director Arindam Sil had surprised everyone with his slick stylish thriller

#EbarShabor, this time he was back with the second instalment of Shabor Series. Once again it was based on a Shirshendu Mukhopadhyay story, a murder mystery set in today's Kolkata. It was a story revolving around a young guy who is going through a mental trauma after a childhood tragic incident and many female characters around him among them many were sexually attracted to the guy. Shaswata Chatterjee once again did an excellent job as detective Shabor Dashgupta. Among the others it was theatre actor Anirban Bhattacharya in the central character who did a superb job and grabbed everyone's attention. Among the girls Jaya Ahsaan and debutante Riya Bank gave a remarkable performance. The first part of Shabor Series was a big hit and the second one continued that trend. It got a big opening and kept doing excellent business for many weeks. Even after six weeks it's still going strong at theatres. So far it is the second big hit of this year after #Praktan.

#SahebBibiGolaamIt was critic turned director Pratim D Gupta's second directorial venture. Since the first teaser had been released there was enough curiosity for the film. The bold and edgy thriller

had grabbed eyeballs not only in Bengal rather it had got positive feedback from many celebrities from Bollywood too. As a director Pratim D Gupta’s directorial debut was almost unnoticed but this time he was back with full energy and a wonderful cast which consists names like Anjan Dutta, Swastika Mujherjee, Ritwick Chakraborty, Parno Mitra. It was an interesting story about a contact killer , a bore housewife and a taxi driver whose lives gets interconnected with each other in a surprising twist. It was an interesting as well as refreshing story. Another good point about the film was it had raised string voice against social injustice and crime against women and this point helped it more to get connected with the audiences.The music by Anupam Roy was very melodious, the songs like “Mon Bhalo Nei” and “Tomar Ki Naam” were very popular. This movie had to struggle a lot with censor board for its bold contents which had delayed its release date, but the audience were mature enough to accept the bold contents. It got a bumper opening which was not expected at all and continued to run well at theatres for next few weeks.

September

The month of September had not much big releases. The only significant release was Shree Venkatesh Films production #LoveExpress.

#LoveExpress

This was a romantic comedy featuring Dev and Nusrat as the lead pair alongside few regular character actors of commercial Bengali movies. This movie was Dev's first solo release of this year so his fans were very excited. But the excitement does not made a huge impact on its box office performance. It did only average business at the box office. The music of this film was very popular; it marked the comeback for very popular music composer Jeet Ganguly who is not that regular in Bengali movies these days. The songs like "Mon Bolchhe Amar”, "Dhitang Dhitang" and "Majhe Majhe" were very popular among the mass. 

Apart from that there was #KiritiOKalobhramor featuring Indraneil Sengupta as detective Kiriti. It was the on screen debut of famous Seluth character Kiriti. This movie was a average one, both Indraneil and Kaushik Sen in a negative character were effective. But sadly Kiriti did not get positive feedback from viewers unlike the other Seluths like Byomkesh, Feluda or Kakababu.

The third quarter was not that bad but the now we are hopeful with the last quarter of the year. This one has the biggest releases on this Puja and then in Christmas. Hope it will be the best part of the year.

Best Film of Quarter 3 2016

• Eagler Chokh
• Saheb Bibi Golaam

Best Directors of Quarter 3 2016

• Arindam Sil - Eagler Chokh
• Pratim D Gupta - Saheb Bibi Golaam

 Best Actors of Quarter 3 2016

• Prasenjit Chatterjee - Khwato
• Shashwata Chatterjee - Eagler Chokh/Hemanta
• Parambrata Chatterjee - Hemanta
• Rahul Banerjee - Khwato
• Anirban Bhattacharya - Eagler Chokh
• Jishu Sengupta - Hemanta/Kelor Kirti
• Sagnik Chattrerjee- Hemanta
• Shubhra Saurav Das - Hemanta
• Vikram Chatterjee - Saheb Bibi Golaam
• Ritwick Chakraborty - Saheb Bibi Golaam
• Anjan Dutta - Saheb Bibi Golaam

Best Actresses of Quarter 3 2016

• Paoli Dam - Khwato
• Jaya Ahsan - Eagler Chokh
• Mimi Chakraborty - Kelor Kirti
• Gargee Roychowdhury - Hemanta
• Swastika Mukherjee - Saheb Bibi Golaam
• Raima Sen - Khwato
• Payel Sarkar - Eagler Chokh/Hemanta
• Riya Banik - Eagler Chokh
• Parno Mitra - Saheb Bibi Golaam