Who payed the critics

Instant Favorite.

brilliant actors, brilliant editing

It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

I watched 'Paheli' two times and I still dislike the ending. For me a fairy tale's use in history is "education", the perpetuation of traditions, the transmission of values.Spoiler alarm: For me this fairy tale would have been right if it had been about the education of the human male to love his wife. Think about it: how many ghosts are there to provide a female with a loving husband? Quite on contrary, the human males have to be transformed into loving husbands! The film succeeds partly when we see the longing of the husband far away. But when he comes home lovingly though still subservient to his father the film crashes for me. For me the film needed to end with a strong husband declaring his undying love for his wife and his acceptance of the ghost's baby, while the ghost needed to go back into his tree.The wife in this film is for me such a week vessel and hollow shell that I dislike her tremendously (this impression might be enhanced by Rani Mukherjee whom I have seen only once to give a nearly realistic portrayal: in 'Yuva'). The director said something along "This film is about the decision or choice the woman makes". But this woman makes no decision, she says something like "I could not hold the first one, who am I to repulse the second one." For me this is not a decision, but only a concession. In my view, this is a very weak portrayal of a woman's choice. One point more why I dislike this film.The husband is not likable in his weakness, but the ghost for me is far more disgusting in his selfishness. He makes some magic for the family (which is already disgustingly rich) so that he can stay accepted, but he does not much for the community, and when the husband sends his messenger, he sends him away without any refreshment. Another point why I dislike this film.End of spoiler alarm: For me this is a very unsuccessful fairy tale with a very good production value. I think the director Amol Palekar was not able to make good use of the lavish support he got from the producers. I did not even like the two performances of SRK in this film, which for me are overdone and not in agreement with a fairy tale but more with a comedy like 'Duplicate' (and I normally like each of his performances). I ascribe SRK's failure to the weak direction. In my view SRK needs good directors to shine. Otherwise he usually hams which often is quite in agreement with the film's intentions and consequently there I have no problems with this style of acting.Conclusion: in no way is this a fairy tale on par with 'La Belle et la Bete (1946) - Beauty and the Beast' by Jean Cocteau or 'Tri Orisky pro Popelku (1973) - Three Nuts for Cinderella' by Vaclav Vorlicek.I gave this film 2 of 10 stars.

I recently saw this movie and thoroughly enjoyed it.When I saw the movie I thought that this movie was like an eye candy. So visually beautiful still real. This is a very simple movie based on a folktale. I loved the beautiful costumes, lovely songs. Credit goes to Amol Palekar for taking a very simple story and making it look so beautiful. I couldn't help but notice that Amol does know Rajasthan. Peacock's sound in the background when Rani and Sharukh wake up in the morning and the other attention to details made it so real. Rani did a very good job. It would have been good if Shahrukh could act too but lets not ask for impossible. Lets skip the camel race scene altogether. Unfortunately SRK can't be subtle.A word of warning for Hindi movie fans that this is not a regular commercial Hindi movie. If you liked Ankur, Avishkar(Rajesh Khanna), you will enjoy this movie. If Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, K3G is your kind of movies then stay away from this.

Paheli is a rare film.Its beautifully mounted and photographed with amazing backgrounds and costumes - totally suited to the traditional tale. For me it re-created my sub continental childhood when we were brought up on stories of princesses and Djinns in fantasy palaces-romantic and emotionally satisfying. Some people have criticised the film as being too slow and incredible. Of course it is incredible because it is a fairy tale. But once the imaginative leap has been made and its premise accepted, the film is pure delight.Shah Rukh Khan in his double role as the accountant to the core husband and the romantic spirit, is charismatic and romantic and riveting. Rani is the perfect beautiful bride, fully integrated into the world in which she lives so much so that she is completely thrown when the surrogate husband gives her the choice of keeping or rejecting him. So its a woman's rights film as well! But I just loved it on its own terms- a beautifully performed, beautifully produced, unusual film for our delectation.

It was a real treat to watch a movie starring two of my favourite stars, shah Rukh & Rani. This movie is very colorful and although the theme is 'unrealistic', the magnificent performances of all the stars makes it feel close to the heart. Shah Rukh as always plays the roles of both the ghost and of Kishen splendidly and we feel his anguish of not being believed by anybody that he is kishen when he returns home after several years and the ghost's anguish on the prospect of leaving his love and new born child. Rani is brilliant in playing the young girl with a lot of expectations of a happy marriage and of the terrible situation she faces when she learns that things are not going to be as she hoped and her performances in whatever movie always makes me feel as if its a personal experience. Its lovely to see Juhi after a long time and she plays her role superbly.