Director Ang Lee (Brokeback Mountain, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) creates a groundbreaking movie event – Life of Pi, about a young man who survives a disaster at sea and is hurtled into an epic journey of adventure and discovery. While cast away, he forms an amazing and unexpected connection with another survivor…a fearsome Bengal tiger.
The film Life of Pi is based on the best selling novel by Yann Martel. It is an imaginative adventure story of a teenager – Pi Patel (Played by Suraj Sharma) and now he is grown up an adult (played by Irrfan Khan) who narrates the story to a young author in the film.
Pi Patel is the son of Gita Patel (Tabu) a mathematician Santosh Patel (Adil Hussain) who is the owner of a private zoo in Pondicherry (India) who decides to move to Canada, for a bright future. They have to surrender the zoo land to the local municipal authorities, so they decide to take the animals with them to Canada, where they could get a nice price for them.
The family takes a ship journey to Canada along-with their animals, and on the way in the deep Pacific Ocean, the ship sinks. After the shipwreck, Pi finds himself stranded on a 26 foot long lifeboat.
He then realizes that he has company on this small boat. That of a zebra, a hyena, an orangutan and a 450 pound Bengal Tiger. All of them fight for survival, and ultimately it is Pi who is left stranded with the sole company of the Royal Bengal Tiger, named as Richard Parker.
Here onwards, it is a fight for survival for Pi – against the tiger, the rough seas and nature.
The film excels in the departments of cinematography, direction, characterization and even the vivid depiction of imaginative island.
A bit tiresome in the second half as one sympathizes with the teenager and the struggle he goes through. The stormy seas, a man-eater island, the stars in the dark night and the bright, colourful depiction of the various moods of water, land and sky.
Suraj Sharma is the star of this film Life of Pi. Due credit has to be given to the special FX team for sketching out and showing various emotions of the tiger – the roaring fearsome, while later on the obedient and finally the ailing tiger. Excellent.
Some scenes seem stretched, especially when marooned. Except that, Life of Pi’s a visual treat.
Cast of Life of Pi:
Suraj Sharma – Pi Patel
Irrfan Khan – Adult Pi Patel
Tabu – Gita Patel-Pi’s Mother
Adil Hussain – Santosh Patel-Pi’s Father
Shravanthi Sainath – Pi’s Girlfriend
Ayush Tandon – Young Pi
Vibish Sivakumar -RaviPatel
Credits of Life of Pi:
Directed By Ang Lee
Screenplay By David Magee
Produced By Dean Georgaris, Gil Netter, Ang Lee, David Womark
