The New York Times
Dostoyevsky With Bollywood Style
By A. O. SCOTT Published: November 9, 2007
"Saawariya" announces itself as an adaptation of Dostoyevsky's "White Nights," but whatever Russian soul may dwell deep within it is pretty well drowned in Bollywood style. Eye and ear candy for fans of Indian musical cinema, it is 2 hours 11 minutes — bracingly compact by Bollywood standards — of wide-screen close-ups, fanciful sets, colorful costumes, bellybuttons, almost-kisses and 10 pumped-up, achingly sweet songs.
The story is narrated, at least at first, by Gulab (the divine Rani Mukherjee), a cheerful toiler in the red-light district of a city meant to suggest some combination of Chicago, St. Petersburg, Mumbai and Venice. One night an itinerant musician named Raj (Ranbir Kapoor) arrives in town, and while Gulab is instantly smitten, the object of her affection just wants to be friends. And friendly he is, in the wide-eyed, puppy-dog manner of certain Indian movie heartthrobs. (The more brooding, strong-and-silent kind will show up a bit later in the person of Salman Kahn.)
Raj falls in love with Sakina (Sonam Kapoor), whose heart belongs to Imaan (Mr. Kahn), whose return she awaits every night on a lonely bridge. She is either drawn to Raj or else she's toying with him, but in any case psychological realism has far less to do with their relationship than the necessity for duets, pursuits down rainy, half-lighted streets and sudden changes of mood and costume. The experience is visually enchanting, cloyingly sweet, at once utterly chaste and insanely erotic, and finally exhausting. Aficionados will not settle for less.
"Saawariya" is rated PG (Parental guidance suggested). It has exposed bellybuttons and mild sexual innuendo.
SAAWARIYA
Opens today nationwide.
Produced, directed and edited by Sanjay Leela Bhansali; written (in Hindi, with English subtitles) by Prakash Kapadia and Mr. Bhansali, based on the short story "White Nights" by Fyodor Dostoyevsky; director of photography, Ravi K. Chandaran; music by Monty, lyrics by Sameer; art directors, Omung Kumar Bhandula and Vanita Omung Kumar; released by Sony Pictures International. Running time: 166 minutes.
WITH: Salman Khan (Imaan), Rani Mukherjee (Gulab), Ranbir Kapoor (Raj), Sonam Kapoor (Sakina), Zohra Sehgal (Lilian Ji) and Begum Para (Badi Ammi).
-- My humanity is in feeling we are all voices of the same poverty. - Jorge Louis Borges