Aniruddha Mahadevan Sethi

To be honest, the movie did not really stand up to my expectations. In my view the movie lacked depth. Neither was Manto's character explained properly nor was he given a proper context in the movie. for e.g. Scenes talking about partition and manto's decision to leave India lacked the emotional depth required for the scene to convince the audience as to the agony, dilemma and resolution behind his decision to leave India. The First half which had to provide a context for Manto was therefore turned out to be extremely chaotic and there was no juice to enjoy! The second half was still better but not up to the mark. there was only the court scene where he explains himself which was the only scene worth watching. I am glad that i did read a book of short Stroies of Manto whose introduction further gave a character sketch about him. this made the movie a little relate-able. Otherwise i felt that the movie failed to give the true essence of Manto. The introduction of his strories was a great idea but it wasnt executed properly. Those scenes came out as totally bland never gave the chills which his words in his books give. However acting performances were amazing by everyone who came up on the screen. Nawaz was sublime as manto and amazing performances were also given by all those who came as guest Appearances. However for me that could not lift my spirits to overlook all the above shortcomings I found. This one is a miss-hit for me.