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Liar's Dice

This is a simple story of a woman from a village in Himachal Pradesh, who defies the elders of her village and goes looking for her husband who had left home to earn a living in the city, and hasn't been heard from in a while. Any other woman would have been fatalistic but not our fiesty protagonist.
She is accompanied by her daughter,(who is played by an adorable Manya Gupta, and made me want to just sit down and listen to her chatter.) and their pet lamb. Along the way they gain the company of an army deserter.
The protagonists of this movie are Geetanjali Thapa and Nawazuddin Siddiqui.


I stumbled upon this movie quite by chance when I was greedily looking for details about Geetu Mohandas and her work. I have been obsessed with her ever since I had the privilege of watching - Moothon, which deserves a review of its own.
The credentials of this movie are tremendous. It was given the National award for its cinematography and also the best actress award for 2013. It also has in its kitty several other awards and was the official entry to the Oscars for that year.


To paraphrase Geet at this juncture, "Aap convince ho gaye ya mai aur bolun" 😂😂😂😂


The cinematography by Rajeev Rai is amazing to say the least. He is the director's husband, not that it has any significance, but this spousal duo create magic together. The beauty of the mountains is sublimely captured, as are the murky depths of Delhi. This is helped by the sound of rushing water, which is used in lieu of a background score all through the mountains. This gets replaced with street noises in the city, but never with intrusive music. That in fact, is a key feature of how Geetu Mohandas, uses the city and its persona to create a mood of hope or futility.


I must confess that I have never seen Nawazuddin looking so rugged and personable. He  carries it very well. And Geetanjali Thaapa was such a revelation! Why isn't she in more movies? Just why? It's a question that needs to be addressed. If not the overhyped Hindi film industry, then why not malyalam movies? Why isn't she in anything great other than a two-bit role in Sacred Games? I don't want to rant beyond this, but I do declare this to be a travesty!

P.S: this movie isn't for you, if you want a plot with elaborate backstories and cut and dried breadsticks. So, no backsies please if you don't like it.



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