It's been five years since we saw Aishwarya Rai Bachchan in a Hindi film. Her hotly-anticipated comeback film, Jazbaa, releases on October 9 and a trailer was released online on Tuesday.
Directed by Sanjay Gupta (Kaante, Zinda), the film is reportedly an official remake of the 2007 South Korean blockbuster Seven Days. Bachchan plays Anuradha Verma, a hot-shot lawyer who is blackmailed into defending convicted murderer and rapist Niyaz Shaikh (Chandan Roy Sanyal). Helping her is Inspector Yohan (Irrfan), a renegade cop who is told that his Amitabh Bachchan act won't help him get ahead in the case.
Gupta is an experienced 'film-remaker', having earlier helmed Kaante (2000) and Zinda (2006), which were remakes of Hollywood cult classic Reservoir Dogs (1992) and acclaimed Korean thriller Oldboy (2003) respectively. Hallmarks of his style — quick cuts, fluid camera movements, Dutch angles — are visible in this trailer, which also makes use of a thunderously loud soundtrack to tell us that this is a dramatic film.
Mysteriously, the entire film seems to sport a green wash that, in many places, looks like the flash of green light that accompanies the killing curse 'Avada Kedavra' in the Harry Potter series. As green usually signifies emotions such as jealousy, envy, and/or greed, perhaps this is in-your-face symbolism. Then again, green is also the colour of fertility, which could allude to Bachchan's maternal status (both in the film as well as real life).
Or maybe, Gupta just thought it looked cool.
Packed with crowd-pleasing one-liners, slow-motion shots of Bachchan running and screaming, and plenty of drama, Jazbaa looks like an out-and-out commercial potboiler.
The film also stars Jackie Shroff and Shabana Azmi. Watch the trailer above.
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