12th Fail movie review: Vidhu Vinod Chopra film is the elixir our cynical times need

It is primarily down to Vikrant Massey’s absolutely convincing playing of Manoj Kumar Sharma, who comes from a tiny hamlet in the infamous once-ridden-by-dacoit area in Madhya Pradesh and stays the tough cyclic course of failure-and-success, so familiar to those who have gone through the ‘civils’ grind. It is also the faces the film surrounds him with — Medha Shankar as his supportive girlfriend, Anantvijay Joshi as his helpful friend, Anshumaan Pushkar as the experienced exam giver, UPSC aspirants and all, and Priyanshu Chatterjee as the straight arrow cop who becomes his idol– who make you believe. And above all, it is the carefully-calibrated writing, which stays relatable, even when the film dips into the realm of how-can-this-be-true: have you ever heard of a hopeful staying in a room with a super-noisy ‘atta-chakki’, working through the day, and studying through the night, and managing to get through the prelims? This is what the real-life Mohan did, and this is what the reel-life Manoj does.

Watch 12th Fail movie trailer here:

Producer-director Chopra is celebrating his 45th year in cinema with this film. What makes it stand out from the rest of Chopra’s filmography, which includes some of the biggest blockbusters in Bollywood, is its sweetness of spirit coupled with a strong streak of realism. This, even as you are aware that some of the locations are sets, and that some of the characters are underlined, and situations are heightened somewhat, just so that the film is not dubbed a ‘documentary’, that dreaded term that’s a mood-killer for most lovers of standard Bollywood melodramas.

Despite the background music, and the occasional mood spikes, ‘12th Fail’ stays, for the most part, a film that cleaves close to ground reality, with characters that makes you feel that they’ve wandered off the street, and come to hang out with us, dishing out life-lessons laced with dollops of inspiration. It’s not just the main cast, but the numbers of the young who gather in the hot-spots rife with coaching centres, such as North Delhi’s Mukerjee Nagar: all these multitudes, crowding into tiny rooms, far away from their homes, cramming day and night to get through the exams in the hope of becoming something more than who they are, is such an India story.

A few portions sag, and I had to work at wrapping my head around the fact that the very bright Shraddha believes for so long that Manoj is more educated than he actually is: it would have been apparent the moment he opens his mouth. There’s also the all-knowing voiceover, truly such a tired device: why underline things we can see with our own eyes? But the inspiring story of Manoj Kumar Sharma, whose success is not just his own, but of each person who helps him reach his destination, and who clings to his hard-won belief that honesty is the best policy, and that corruption is not always the default option, is the balm that our cynical times need. Naive? Maybe. But sometimes naivete which leads to a hope-against-hope is the elixir we need in these troubled times. One can be honest too, and go straight to the top, and hopefully, stay there. And what do you do if you fail, and fall ? Why, dust yourself off, and restart.

12th Fail movie cast: Vikrant Massey, Medha Shankar, Anantvijay Joshi, Anshumaan Pushkar, Priyanshu Chatterjee, Geeta Agarwal Sharma, Harish Khanna, Vikas Divyakirti
12th Fail movie director: Vidhu Vinod Chopra
12th Fail movie rating: 3 stars