Sonata: Slow & unsteady

Cast : Aparna Sen, Shabana Azmi, Lillete Dubey

Rated: 4/10

Shabana is great, Aparna Sen muted and Lillete much too bubbly under the circumstances. And, there is a Palatial house in Mumbai resounding with monologues from the three aged friends, two being housemates.

That’sSonata for you, helmed by veterans you have long looked up to. So it is a let down that the three are unable to knit the magic they are so capable  of. Not because they have erred but because Sonata is much too theatrical for a movie screen.

The three lovely ladies deliver their thoughts as if they are on stage and not in a film, and the fact that the film is actually an adaptation of a play does not help matters either. The issues at hand and on the table — basically black thoughts around a seemingly safe and even life — are much too familiar even though the aged ladies have settled in comfortably as singletons. They are modern women with modern mores. One an HOD with a big company who lives her wine and moments; the other a respected professor who hates the touchy-feely, expressive kinds, and third, a hardcore journalist who does not mind a splash of domestic violence on the side of a romance.

But they are college friends who have a lot to talk about over red wine and more importantly the soulful Rabindra sangeet renditions by Shabana Azmi. Her singing is a revelation and seems so professional that it startles you.

Sonata, however, will not do well because none has the time for such introspective monologues, especially of unmarried women in the grind of life. Not even a niche audience.

Source: Sunday Pioneer, 23 April, 2017