Pranali is the movie released this Friday. The movie is directed by Hirdesh Kamble and producer is Nikhil Mathur. Nikhil decided to make this film based on the centuries old Indian tradition of Devdasis. In fact, he had visited several places where this tradition of Devdasis exists even today.
Really, the producer seems to be nourishing the idea of giving legal sanction to such women who are practicing this age-old tradition in the name of God. So, Nikhil thinks of changing the social concept of treating Devdasis in a disrespectful way.
But the problem with Pranali is that director Hridesh Kamble does not know how many elements to bring onto the screen. He has an interesting subject but manages to blow the gun in his face by going off track and telling too many stories. Instead of two hours, if Kamble had stuck to a little over an hour and eliminated the usual 'politician wanting to take mileage' situation he would have packed a mighty punch and saved the audience from boredom.
The movie begins when a foreigner known as Judy comes across a prostitute named Pranali whose husband is writing a book on her life. Then the movie goes into flashback: In a famine hit poor village, the parents of a little girl (Pranali) get convinced by a priest to allow their daughter enter into the system of Devdasis.
Under this system in the name of God young girls are forced to carry out prostitution. The rich and famous strata of the society is afflicted to the Devdasi system. So, Pranali is handed over to the priest to carry out the system of Devdasis.
No sooner Pranali reaches the Mumbai red light area than she decides to give birth to a baby and she seeks education for her child but her kid is barred from getting education from the place where all the socially sanctioned people are teaching their kids!
Here enters the scene a NRI who helps Pranali to get her kid educated; he also writes a book on Pranali's life. The NRI helps Pranali's co-sex workers to get out of the wretched tradition and also tries to get a legal sanction for the so-called profession of sex-workers. However, the movie suffers in several departments.
But if light is thrown on the cast of the movie, performances of almost all the actors fall below average but for Nargis the others fail miserably in doing their jobs.
On the whole the movie may not ring its cash registers because of its failure to appeal to the general moviegoers.