Rockstar is the journey of a boy – who leaves behind Janardan to become Jordan; who traverses the highs and lows of life – from simple naivete to tortured soul, from the pleasure of unaffected friendship to the torment of unrequited love, from the campus in Delhi to the international stage. Rockstar movie review..
Janardan (Ranbir Kapoor), born and brought up in the very middle class locality of Pitampura in Delhi, has a larger than life dream – of being a rockstar like Jim Morrison! But all he gets from his reluctant audience is ridicule and humiliation.
As a young boy, (Janardan ) now renamed as Jordan used to spend most of his day with the owner of a music shop in Delhi. Each day he would pick the same acoustic guitar and spend hours trying to understand its intricacies.
After Janardan fails twice in the same class in college; his elder brother forces him to quit college as he wants him to join the family transport business. But Janardan had no interest in the business. In the ensuing fight, his brother breaks his guitar. Seeing how devastated her son is, Janardan ‘s mother gives him the money to buy another guitar. This guitar is the semi pro guitar which Janardan carries with him till the end.
He’s at his wit’s end, when he realizes that all musical stars, all artists in fact, have one thing in common. And that is tragedy. They all have tragic lives. They have all suffered painful heartbreaks to become what they are.
As there is no pain in Janardan’s life – it is an oasis of peace. Unless he does something drastic, he will never become a rockstar. Heer Kaul (Nargis Fakhri) is the undisputed diva of the college campus – beautiful, talented, arrogant, rich and unavailable. She has broken many hearts.
Janardan hopes she will break his heart too. He sets out to woo Heer with the sole object of getting his heart broken. Little realizing what havoc a real heart break can cause, he’s naive enough to believe that if he gets his heart broken, he will suffer enough anguish required to become a great musician.
But when he meets Heer and he’s drawn like moth to a flame to this cool and classy beauty, which seems absolutely unattainable. On her part, Heer wants to be a carefree soul, wanting to break free of all conventions, to let go in abandonment, to ride on the wild side and to do things she’s never done before.
She realizes that only this odd ball character called Janardan, who she’s renamed Jordan has the key to unlock her wilder side. She also knows that time is ticking away and soon she will be imprisoned into boring domesticity forever.
He finally gets that heart break he’s wanted so much; and the torment of that unfulfilled love unleashes in him the musician that he always wanted to be…but also extracts a terrible price…
Ranbir Kapoor is in his most challenging role as he metamorphoses from a wannabe Delhi geek to an iconic, charismatic and pioneering rock star, whose edgy, angst ridden music is but a reflection of his anguished soul.
Nargis Fakhri is stunning as the classy, campus diva, who has the world at her feet, but prefers to keeps everybody at arm’s length. Shammi Kapoor – the iconic star makes his farewell appearance as the wise Ustad Jameel Khan who is the first to recognize that Janardan’s formidable talent cannot be caged, he needs to be set free as a musician to explore and invent his own music.
Aditi Rao plays Sheena, the journalist who’s followed and chronicled Jordan’s graph from struggling artiste to Rockstar. She thinks she knows him best, but hasn’t even come anywhere close to understanding the demons that drive him on and on.
Piyush Mishra as the canteen manager deserves an applause, while Shernaz Patel as Mrs Neena Kaul (Heer’s mother) is striking as she tries her best to understand the special bond between Heer and Janardan in Rockstar.
Cast of Rockstar:
Ranbir Kapoor as Janardan/Jordan
Nargis Fakhri as Heer
Shammi Kapoor as Ustad Jameel Khan
Piyush Mishra as Dhingra
Kumud Mishra as Khatana
Aditi Rao as Sheena
Shernaz Patel as Neena Kaul
Credits & Crew of Rockstar:
Banner – Shree Ashtavinayak Cinevision Ltd, Eros International Media Ltd
Producer – Dhillin Mehta
Director – Imtiaz Ali
Music Director – A. R. Rahman
Story Writer – Imtiaz Ali
Lyricist – Irshad Kamil
Cinematography – Anil Mehta
Editor – Aarti Bajaj
Sound – Dileep Subramaniam
Costume Design – Manish Malhotra, Aki Narula
Rockstar – movie review