A short review on MAQBOOL..

An interpretation on shakespeare’s ‘MACBETH’, ‘MAQBOOL’ is one of the best movie i have seen till date. Vishal bharadwaj is a brilliant storyteller and this was his career’s best IMO. He was successful in extracting the best from his talented cast. The screenplay and dialouges were excellent. The story is engaging and at the same time close to reality. The songs in between are bit disturbing but are well gelled up with the story. Maqbool (irrfan khan) was influenced by his lady love Nimmi(Tabu) to kill Abbaji(Pankaj kapoor) the godfather of Mumbai and capture his throne. Latter Maqbool goes on to kill his childhood friend ‘Kaka’ and declare himself as the successor of Abbaji. But the guilt of killing Abbaji affect Nimmi and Maqbool’s life harshly.
The high class performances takes the movie to another level and i dont think any other artist from the present lot would have been able to match the act. Nasserudin Shah and Om Puri gives expert portrayals as the corrupt policemen. Tabu was brilliant as Nimmi. Irrfan khan was more than excellent and deserves all the acclaims. But for me pankaj kapoor with his classy act was the showstealler. He played the character as if he was born to play it. The versatality which he shows in his movies are class apart, but sadly he is yet to receive his due in Bollywood. In some parts i found him better than Al pacino in ‘The Godfather’ and in others he was at par with him.
In short MAQBOOL is a masterpiece and an underrated GEM which shows the hidden potential of Bollywood. WATCH IT NOW!!
PS- Can i say that Maqbool is better than The Godfather and Pankaj kapoor’s performance in Maqbool is better than that of Al pacino’s in Godfather??

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3 Comments
  1. Baba Ji 12 years ago

    Not seen maqbool reddemon. but I liked Marlon Brando more in Godfather. Al Pacino was also good though.

  2. sputnik 12 years ago

    I did not like Maqbool that much.

    In Shakespeare’s Macbeth, he does not have an affair with the King’s wife. While coming from some battle three witches meet Macbeth and call him a future King. When he tells it to his wife she plans the murder to secure the throne for her husband. The affair did not fit in according to the context IMO.

    By setting it in underworld Irfan is already a criminal why would he suddenly feel guilty about killing his boss. There Macbeth was a honest general.

    The witches are replaced by Naseer and Om Puri as cops. I did not like their parts at all.

  3. Author
    Reddemon 12 years ago

    @Baba- watch it. If you like Godfather you Will definetly like Maqbool.
    @sputnik- Its not possible to have line by line interpretation.
    And i dont see any fault in Tabu’s character as she was used as a sex object by Abbaji and she was not happy with her so he fell in love with Maqbool and latter to free herself she planned to kill Abbaji. So this scence has some logic rather than the one mentioned in Macbeth imo. Coz i was not able to connect with the one mentioned in Macbeth.
    Although irfaan was in underworld but he was brought up by Abbaji and he killed him for his own greed which led to the guilt
    Imo naseer and om puri were v good

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