PK: Solid Satire

Aamir Khan does one movie a year, and that movie will be a doozy. PK is no exception. The marketing for this movie was spectacular - the filmmakers didn't give away one iota of plot, which is crucial for your enjoyment. I went in knowing absolutely nothing and everything that unfolded on screen was a sheer revelation. I can't discuss my opinion of the film without giving away the entire plot and theme so please stop reading right now if you plan on watching PK: you need to watch it first and then come back to read this review.

The opening scenes establish the weirdest part of the film, i.e. that the title character, PK (Aamir Khan), is actually an alien who arrives on Earth to do some reconnaissance on its inhabitants. However, he ends up stranded in our world when he is robbed of the device that can summon his spaceship to take him back home. He stumbles around Rajasthan and Delhi, asking people to help him, and in fatalistic Indian fashion, everyone he meets shakes their head and says, "What can I do? Only God can help you." Being a literal-minded alien, PK therefore sets off on a quest to find this mysterious God who is going to help him get back home.

Written by Abhijat Joshi and director Rajkumar Hirani, PK is wonderfully well-scripted and witty, insightful and edgy. At the beginning it pokes fun at humanity as a whole and the strange customs and rituals we observe that would bewilder any alien who lives by logic and reason. However, it quickly turns into a very specific satire on religion and its purveyors. PK teams up with a TV reporter, Jaggu (Anushka Sharma), and the two of them decide to take down Tapasvi Maharaj (Saurabh Shukla), a religious guru who claims to have a direct line to God and proffers useless advice to his millions of followers. PK doesn't understand the concept of deception (no one is capable of lying on his planet) so he thinks Tapasvi has just gotten his lines crossed and is "dialing a wrong number" to get to God. Jaggu is fully aware that Tapasvi is a fraud, but she simply lets PK argue with his alien logic and creates a massive expose that attacks not just Tapasvi but the general irrationality and strife caused by religious fervor.

This is a fairly explosive topic to broach in India, which is why Rajkumar Hirani is the only director who could do it without getting a fatwa issued on his head. The movie is so funny that most audience members will probably think it's a hilarious comedy and basically ignore the serious truth at the movie's core. The more activist members of the audience will immediately begin a "Wrong Number" campaign as portrayed in the movie, and all of India will be buzzing with that for a few months until Shahrukh Khan comes out with a new movie and everyone forgets about PK. Already, some people are protesting about the movie and claiming it portrays some religions in a more negative light, which shows how they've completely missed the point anyway. In fact, my biggest problem with PK is that it still insists on a God - it says religion is a man-made construct with silly rules, but it doesn't doubt that God exists. Hirani is a wildly clever director, and the reason for his success largely derives from his populism. He knows that attacking religion is a dicey proposition already; acknowledging atheism would just be one step too far. India is a country that is still largely incapable of viewing morality and religion as mutually exclusive constructs, so for now, we shall have to be satisfied with the stand taken by PK.

Just a few words about the technical aspects of the movie. The songs are lively and colorful - nothing extraordinary but certainly enough to keep the momentum going. The cinematography by C. K. Muraleedharan is vivid and wonderful. The acting is excellent: Aamir Khan is a sheer delight (as always) and manages to be funny and heartbreaking all at once. Anushka Sharma is a perfect counterpart and brings the necessary worldliness and intelligence to counter PK's naivete. Boman Irani has a reliably fun and engaging turn as Jaggu's boss at the TV station, while Sanjay Dutt is equally delightful as a Rajasthani man that PK runs into during his travels. All told, PK is a technically impeccable film.

Bollywood has trouble crafting comedies and PK does go slightly over the top towards the end in its desire to hammer the message home on the unsuspecting masses. Just in case you weren't aware, religion inspires terrorism and other awful things - big surprise. There's also an unnecessary romantic angle, and a very predictable romantic subplot with Jaggu and a man she met in Bruges that is charming but ultimately pointless. However, barring my quibbles with the script, which starts to mix too many genres and simply does not go far enough for my liking in terms of the religious commentary, PK is a perfect movie. After all, it wasn't made for me, it was made for the wider Indian populace, and judging by their reception of it, it's at least provoking some kind of meaningful dialogue. That is, until the next big blockbuster is released.