Sanjay Leela Bhansali, Black (2005) (India – 2005)

Black is a real tear-puller with a most convincing performance by the genial actor Amitabh Bachchan. The movie was based on screenwriter Prakash Kapadia’s Gujarati play “Aatam Vinjhe Paankh”, which was inspired from The Miracle Worker (1962), the classic story of Helen Keller. The movie has a few brilliant scenes which reveal the script’s origin in theatre, and a powerful performance of one of the best actors around Amitabh Bachchan. But little has been done to translate the original white, western story to an Indian setting, which resulted in an odd setting resembling an upper-class Swiss spa and a cast of ‘white Indians.’ All in all an interesting but odd combination of class theatre, Indian sophisms, a brilliant Bachchan, a few inspiring scenes and a eerie attempt to convert you to Christianity in the closing scene.