Dil Se… Mani Ratnam

An inspiration for many aspiring film makers and a source of creativity to growing film directors, Mani Ratnam is an epitome of quality Indian cinema. With directors like Satyajit Ray, Shekar Kapur making a league of their own, there’s one man from the south of India who’s created a league for himself. Mani Ratnam has captured the hearts of many. Be it an intense interaction between the antagonist and the protagonist or a romantic scene with the hero wooing the heroine, Mani Ratnam has handled his script in such a way that more than the hero receiving importance, his story does! Talking about emotions and directing them, remind yourself about ‘Roja’, a movie that deals with the plight of newly married when they’re separated by militants. The entire essence of that emotion was captured in one song composed by then debutant A R Rahman, ‘Roja Janemann’ in the ever magnificent voice of S.P Balasubramanyam, when the handsome Arvind Samy is kidnapped by militants and sings thinking of his beautiful wife. Mani, as he is fondly called, is one extraordinary director who believes in a strong story line and affirms it with his gripping screenplay. Dealing with both entertaining and socially relevant scripts, Mani has dealt his story lines with care. Consider a film called ‘Bombay, Mani dealt with inter-communal marriages and in particular the Hindu-Muslim embroilment. Such a hostile subject but dealt beautifully by the master. Not just that, Mani showed terrorism in a sensible way; he along with Ram Gopal Varma and Shekhar Kapur produced ‘Dil Se’ with Shahrukh Khan and Manisha Koirala. With music as one of the highlights, Mani brought the picture out with loads of romance between a radio station employee and a lady terrorist. Besides the marvellous director he is, Mani Ratnam is also a producer. Having produced many movies in Tamil and having dubbed them into other languages, he produced ‘Saathiya’ which was a remake of a Tamil hit directed by him. Though Saathiya was not directed by him, it had the screenplay of Mani Ratnam. A classic love story and after lives of people who elope to marry.Later coming out of the practical movies, Mani Ratnam came up with the story to deal with a powerful subject what most people would say as a biopic of Dhirubhai Ambani – ‘Guru’. With Abhishek Bachchan as the protagonist and Aishwarya doing the reel wife thing, Mani gave attention to detail from the body language to dialogue delivery, showing his class. With A R Rahman as his trump card, Mani offered the audience, movies with the best music. Their combination is note worthy and one of the best in the industry. It started from ‘Roja’, continued in socially associated movies like ‘Yuva’, ‘Guru’ till the most expected ‘Raavan’. With the Bachchan couple as lead and Mani’s direction, the movie has enough hype as it is. Abhishek, Aishwarya and Rahman, with their favourite director Mani Ratnam, the ‘Guru’ team is back. The teasers that are out create the quintessential expectation for any Mani Ratnam movie. With audio launched today, the music might divulge what the movie holds. Mani’s sensibilities dealing with an epic like Ramayan on celluloid with Rahman’s music and this is absolutely a movie to look out for this summer!