• Bindu Cherungath
    Bindu Cherungath
    126 reviews
    Top Reviewer
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    Noor is a film by Sunhil Sippy. This film is based on the book “Karachi – You are Killing Me” by Saba Imtiaz. The film’s plot had tremendous potential but the movie does get lost in the midway. It starts as if it is focused on Noor’s journey, but later, it shifts to focus on many issues viz. the shallowness attached with today’ journalism, organ trafficking, how ethics and humanity are dying in the world, environmental issues, how unsafe the cities have become etc. This is where the film also becomes shallow, lacks depth. In spite of Sonakshi portraying the titular character very well, the film is unable to adopt a focused approach to storytelling. But certainly, it is a feel-good film.

    The eponymous character Noor is played by Sonakshi. As her name implies (Noor means ‘Light’) she is seeking light/brightness in her professional as well as personal life. She starts her day with the statement ‘I hate my Life’. She keeps whining about everything in her life: a faulty geyser, her domestic help Malti’s (Smita Tambe) frequent leave, priority given to her cat Dimpy by her father, her weight gain, her twitter followers less in number than her weight, not excited in doing regular stuff, irritation on being asked to interview celebrities like Sunny Leone etc. She is a topper in Journalism and interested in doing issue-based Journalism, but her boss Shekhar (Manish Chaudhary) keeps drifting her attention to the topics which attract TRPs. Noor is not too happy with her personal life too. She does miss love in her life. Her friends Zaara (Shibani Dandekar) and Saad (Kanan Gill) do pep up her life. She has support system at home in her father (played my MK Raina) and her housemaid Malti. Noor meets Ayan Banerjee (Purab Kohli), a journalist cum photographer and falls in love with him.

    Situations so happen that Noor gets ‘the story’ which she was looking for. She does cover the story, but that changes her life forever. It becomes a learning point for her that as a journalist, she just can’t get carried away but she needs to be responsible too.

    What happens thereafter? What story does Noor get to handle? What events transpire after that? How does Malti become an important thread of the story? What shape does Noor’s relationship with Ayan take? How Zaara, Saad and Noor’s father support her during a crisis? Does Shekhar ever agree with Noor’s desire of doing issue-based journalism and what support he extends?

    Sonakshi enacts Noor very well and she is very much likeable in the film. Her style statement is also appropriate as per the character. Kanan Gill who makes his film debut with Noor is natural and spontaneous. MK Raina does play his role of an empathetic, supportive father very well. Shibani Dandekar as Zaara has small role, but she is also good. Smita Tambe is very much noticeable and good as Malti.

    The film Noor begins as her transformational journey of how she changes her statement from ‘I hate my life’ to ‘I love my life’. But the screenplay which later gets deviated by focusing on multiple issues, lacks the initial quirkiness, becomes shallow, lacks depth. A one-time watch.

    April 24, 17