Calendar Girls Movie Review

Madhur Bhandarkar is known for making realistic movies which have hard hitting truths hidden in them. But it has become clear with his recent movies that all of his films have the basic storyline with the protagonist being set in a different field of work every time. This time he chooses to focus on calendar girls, and the promos have shown bikini clad women and cleavages in abundance. The makers are trying to sell the movie with the oomph factor. Does it work? Let’s find out.

Story: Calendar Girl is about 5 different models who shoot to fame because of their work as calendar girls in a rich guy’s calendar (bearing many similarities to a really famous businessman). But what happens after they become Calendar girls, is what Madhur Bhandarkar chooses to highlight. One of the girls ends up becoming a high class escort, one gets married to an uber rich guy, one gets caught up in the after-match IPL party scandal, one gets tempted to become a Bollywood actress. All of the 5 calendar girls fall into a rut and are unable to do any substantial work after being the much famed Calendar girl. Are they able to rescue themselves and their careers? This is what makes up the rest of the film.

Screenplay and Direction: Madhur Bhandakar makes one of the most disjointed, trivialized and offensive movies of all time in Calendar girls. His movie is sprouting with stereotypes and cliches of models being low in moral fiber and so on. It could still have been tolerated had the movie was entertaining. It doesn’t help at all that the movie’s pace is slower than that of a sloth. Calendar Girls follows the same pattern of any sample Madhur Bhandarkar and yet it reaches new low levels of filmmaking. How can a guy who made Chandni Bar make this drivel called Calendar Girls, is a question that will baffle us for a long time!

Technically there’s not a lot to write home about Calendar girls. The costume department was probably provided with a memo to keep the costumes of the 5 girls as minimal as possible. The art direction is low quality and the film has a dated feel towards it. The music is a non-starter.

Acting: Calendar Girls would have worked like Fashion or Page 3 had the lead actors been commendable actors like Priyanka Chopra or Konkona Sen Sharma. But here, none of the girls except for Kyra Dutt and Satarupa can act. They are all abysmal and makes you wonder how were they chosen to front this film. None of the actors come close to portraying the innocence, the grim nature of their fall and the eventual resurrection. Rohit Roy is satisfactory as the photographer and Madhur Bhandarkar himself makes a cameo which is laced with self-references

Conclusion: Calendar Girls is a dismal piece of filmmaking from a filmmaker who has long forgotten to make movies. His latest movie is disjointed, tonally inconsistent, stereotypical and has the same story from his earlier films. We can’t think of any scenario in which anyone would enjoy Calendar Girls. Stay far away from any theater showing the movie.

Pros:

• None

Cons:

• Bad disjointed script
• Bad acting
• Dated look to the film
• Story offers nothing new

Rating: