DUS TO DUST

Ten different stories, using six different directors. Dus Kahaaniyan chose to take the road less travelled by, prompting me to catch the series of short films on day two of release.

We were welcomed by a near-empty hall. And a group of kids who were eagerly awaiting the Sanjay Dutt episode left after a while, unable to take the long wait.

In the end, they didn't miss too much. While we ended up watching utter no-brainers like High on the Highway (Jimmy Shergill's junkie act), Sex on the Beach (a lot of flesh and a horrible horror flick) and Zahir (The almost-invisible Manoj Bajpai trying to radiate intensity). Strangers in the Night and Lovedale had interesting twists in the end, but both stories as well as the execution fell flat.

The finale, with Sanjay Dutt and Suniel Shetty as underworld dons, reeked of Sanjay Gupta. All style and no substance, the only thing which stood out was the quick intercuts between Dutt and Shetty and the two kids with a supari to kill Dutt's character. Deja vu was written all over Dutt's don, which has seen Kaante, Vaastav, Khalnayak and countless other flicks. A shootout or two does not make a Quentin Tarantino.

Dus Kahaniyaan wasn't all downhill though.

'Gubbare' may have been a predictable story, but Nana Patekar got it right as the loving husband.

Shabana Azmi gave a riveting performance as the prejudiced Tamil Brahmin in Rice Plate. And so did Naseeruddin Shah who conveyed so much without actually saying much. The plot though, is suspiciously similar to the 1989 short film The Lunch Date

And the pick of the lot - Meghna Gulzar's directorial short Pooranmashi, showcasing Amrita Singh as a Punjabi mother, whose extra-marital fling ends in tragedy. Gulzar's daughter had rich material to work on, a short story by renowned Punjabi author Kartar Singh Duggal.

But all in all, just style quotient does not an experiment make. One prefers a smooth line to curves with too many deep troughs and too few crests to savour. A common theme would also have helped matters, giving the series a sense of purpose.

For redemption I will need to watch Paris J'et aime , Life in a Metro or Adoor Gopalakrishnan's latest Naalu Pennungal.