human development

The title lead of the movie is deaf and mute but not for a moment in the movie do you bemoan that Barfi can't speak. Ranbir Kapoor skillfully makes up for the deficiency with his animated expressions and endless energy. And while director Anurag Basu subtracts some significant senses from his protagonist, he adds much more than he takes away. Barfi is 'visually' stunning, 'smells' of freshness in every frame, 'touches' your heart every second and is so 'tastefully' treated that its excellence 'speaks' for itself.

Barfi has the potential to make the stonehearted go soggy-eyed with its sheer sensitivity and the capability to make even cynics open up to its warmth. Without a single line to mouth, Ranbir Kapoor expresses much more than any average actor could even dream of. The actor oozes of such continual charm that you can't help but fall in love with him.

Such is the uniqueness of the film that it starts with the protagonist on deathbed, goes in flashback mode and despite the imminent tragic tone, still ends on a happy note. The protagonist derives its name from the popular radio brand of 70s - Murphy, but ironically can't speak or hear.

Fondly called Barfi (Ranbir Kapoor), the film traces his journey as he grows up in the quaint hill-station of Darjeeling, falls in love with a tourist Shruti (Ileana DCruz), is left heartbroken and then forms another tender bond with his childhood friend, an autistic girl Jhilmil (Priyanka Chopra).

To start with, Barfi is not a film about the trials and tribulations of a deaf and mute human in this supposed normal world. The idea is never to seek sympathy towards the protagonist. Rather Barfi comes across as a perfectly normal guy and exudes more life than any all-right mortal. In fact his natural joie de vivre attitude, notwithstanding the deficit, imparts distinctiveness to his blithe biopic.

If you analyze the film technically, it doesn't rely on a very inventive storyline. However it's Anurag Basu's delicate handling of the narrative that takes the film to an altogether different level. The love story between Barfi and Shruti is confined within the age old rich-girl-poor-boy syndrome. But not for a moment does the track seem cliched.

Rather then resorting to melodrama, Basu shows restrain esp. in the scene where Shruti's mother (resourcefully played by Roopa Ganguly) puts across the dilemma to her daughter with her similar love story in the past.

The subsequent bonding between Barfi and the autistic Jhilmil faintly reminds of Kamal Haasan-Sridevi's masterpiece Sadma. What adds individuality to this episode is the fact that while Barfi is sane, he can't express wholly and while Jhilmil can express she is not completely stable.