TAARE ZAMEEN

PAR

Directed by - Aamir Khan, Amol Gupte

Produced by Aamir Khan& Kiran Rao

Written by Amole Gupte (also Creative Director)

Starring Darsheel Safary Aamir Khan Tisca Chopra Vipin Sharma Sachet Engineer Tanay Chheda M.K. Raina

Music by Shankar- Ehsaan-LoyLyrics: Prasoon Joshi

Cinematography Setu

Editing by Deepa Bhatia (also concept and research)

Distributed by Aamir Khan Productions (India - film) UTV Home Entertainment(India - DVD) Walt Disney Company Home Entertainment (International - DVD)

Release date(s)Theaters:21 December 2007 India DVD: 25 July 2008 Disney DVD:12 January

STORY LINE

‘Taare Zameen Par’ is about a little boy, or a little flower that has been nipped so many times in the bud that it begins to wilt. But then comes the gardener, the man who lets, and helps, the bud to flower fully.

Ishaan Awasthi (Darsheel Safary), an 8 year old child, is different from all the other kids of his age.

He is busy looking at dogs, fishes, colourful things etc and painting while the world around him is busy buried in their own work.

He had failed in Std 3 and there was no improvement in him. His family consisted of his mother Maya (Tisca Chopra), Nandkishor (Vipin Sharma) and Yohaan (Sachet Engineer) who are all fed up of him.

After repeated complaints, Ishaan’s father decided to admit him in a boarding school so that he’ll learn discipline there and become a studious and obedient boy.

There his life remain unchanged and plus, he had to bear the trauma of separation from his family.

Slowly, he became an introvert and stopped talking as no one understood him.

One day, a new art teacher came to their school, Ram Shankar Nikumbh (Aamir Khan).

An enjoyable and cheerful man, he was not like the rest of the ‘disciplined’ types teacher.

He loved and taught his students to enjoy life and to bring out their emotions by painting.

He spotted the sad, scared and lonely Ishaan and decided to help him.

This film describes the relationship between a student and a teacher.

ISHAAN AWASTIHe is an eight-year-old whose world is filled with wonders that no one else seems to appreciate; colours, fish, dogs and kites are just not important in the world of adults, who are much more interested in things like homework, marks and neatness.

His father, and teacher’s used to humiliate him saying ‘duffer’ and ‘idiot’, he remains the laugh stock of the class.

He also lacks motor coordination skills and finds it difficult to throw a ball in a straight line

He has a passion for painting but no one understands and appreciates it.

It is not his concentration but the disability to read letters. Neither his parents, teachers and classmates understood. This is one of the reason that his presence of mind was not in class but was always wandering outside the class.

His disability to read and write diverted his attention outside he class.

Ishaan is like Calvin, from the comic strip, whose hyperactive imagination helps him negotiate the tedious everydayness of daily life.

Ishaan transforms into a character like (Calvin’s alter ego) Spaceman Spiff upon encountering a pesky math problem, clearly convinced that the only way to tackle multiplication is by hopping into a spaceship.

He has one of the most open faces you’ve seen, without a trace of artifice in it, and he carries the film with hardly any dialogues, merely with close-up after affecting close-up. 

He bunks the school and experiences the world himself. A vendor making a ‘gola’, the stray dog, the drop of paint on his face, the sea, the sight of poor children playing - is there a sense of beauty and curiosity in these that an adult is unable to see or comprehend? That’s what we see through the eyes of Ishaan and through the lens of Aamir Khan.

Always at the back of his class, he is sent to a boarding school by his parents to be ‘disciplined’ which is, oddly, its biggest strength as well as the beginning of its undoing.

Things are no different at his new school and Ishaan has to contend with the added trauma of separation from his family.

In the earlier half, Ishaan’s mother comes across as a genuine presence in her son’s life.When he roughs up a kid and breaks a neighbour’s flower pots, his father slaps him, but his mother kneels down and gently tells him to go and have a shower, after which she’ll apply Dettol on his wounds.

He gives her hell in the mornings as she tries to get him ready for school, but just as she puts him on the bus and just before the bus takes off, she kisses him goodbye.

Mother cared but did not go beyond this. She never researched and tended to follow her husbands paradigm of parenting. She did not use her brain creatively.

She’s endlessly exasperated by Ishaan, but she loves him endlessly too – even if, strangely, there’s little protest from her when her husband announces that he’s sending Ishaan to boarding school – and it leaves a huge vacuum on screen, and in Ishaan’s life, when she practically vanishes during the second half.

In fact he shares a good bonding with his brother and tells him about bunking.

It is to Ishaan’s credit to that inspite of beating, he never discloses that it is his brother who has written the leave application for bunking. The song called ‘MAA’ deserves special mention because of revelation of a son’s dilemma in absence of his mother.

MOTHER – SON RELATIONSHIP

STEREOTYPE FATHER Father belonged to the old school of parenting- “ Spare the rod and spoil the child” OR Beat them into “ shape”.

the first meeting of Ram with Ishan fathers when the father says Is talent ka kya faida ?The teacher Ram comments‘Sarre unglian ek jaise nahin hoti- ungli ko keech ke barabar bana do chahe ungli toot kyon na jaaye’.

Strong, silent , unfeeling and in control. Blames mother for all the ills-patriarchal attitudeTakes unilateral decisionsThey are not strong with the outside world -Ishaan’s father is a typical stereotype father -beats Ishaan –calling names- idiot, duffer and slaps/beats him.Blames/pile on the mother –’Puja karo iski’Cannot face the neighbours aggressive attitude on threatening and complaining; all his machismo is on his family while he is very courteous/polite with the neighbours

Duty of he parents should be to be with their children in their developing age; laps are more important than laptops

How the father emotional blackmails him by saying that I am leaving home and going away. Ishaan is shocked and pleads not to leave him and promises to study harder and do his homework. The father still do not react and it is the mother who could not bear and blurts out that father is going on official tour. As parent very few tries to understand . Compare the reaction of Youhana and Ishaan 's father on the issue of Ishaan ‘s bunking classes. Youhana is not judgemental and ask why did you bunk. Where did you go? Even when the neighbour’s are complaining the elder brother is the one who tries to intervene but told to shut up by the father.While the father just screams , shout and start hitting him. The story Amir Khan told that in Soloman Island if the farmers want to cut a tree they abuse, curse and call names and in few days the tree dies on its own makes him weep.

Empthasize with the child- point the mistake and not the child.For example say that the mistake is bad not the child is bad…

WHY WAS NIKUMBH SIR DIFFERENT?He “really” cared- and then acted with his heart and brain both.Nikumbh Sir :-Actually looked and observed-Listened deeply-Tried very hard to see -find the cause for the “ bad “ symptoms-Used intelligence and creativity and not just old methods to solve the problem-Researched the problem 

Compare the teaching of the other teachers with Ram teaching.

Ask the students to use their imagination, self discovery and imagination

Does not react to difference/accepts it and explores it-not set format

Does not scold Ishaan even when he has not drawing/painting anything

Motivated them with appropriate role models- Einstien, Edison, and Abhishek Bachchan.

 

Ideal teacher goes out of the way to take responsibility for a child.

How Amir Khan observes, investigates enquire from his friend and go out of his way to meet Ishaan parents.

He argues with the Principal takes onus and extra effort to train Ishaan and then organizes the art competition.

Nikumbh recognized the inner potential of Ishaan –remember telling the boarding school principal –see his such bold use of colours and strokes.

His comment that ’patri se hat ker kitne bcachche chal pate hain ’.

We look around Praveen Kumar , Irfan -cricketers , if had listened to their parents then instead of being successful would be anonymously doing some common job ... etc. and most important would be very unhappy and frustrated. Ultimate responsibility of every teacher and parent is to discover and nurture the inner potential of the child.

TEACHER – STUDENT RELATIONSHIP

Towards the end, there’s a moment when Ishaan climbs down a few stairs and he stumbles just as he nears Nikumbh, who – of course – steadies the child.

It’s the capping-off visual metaphor for their relationship, one that’s somewhat like the relationship between Rani Mukerji and Amitabh Bachchan in the melodramatic Black, another story about a student with a handicap and a teacher with radical ideas. But where that film was heavily stylised and impossible to read at a real level – if you had an engagement with it at all, it was at a hyper-emotional level, for nothing in it resembled anything around us – Taare Zameen Paris set in a world that’s recognisably lived-in.

There comes an art mela where Ram organizes a painting competition between teachers and students and the Ishaan wins the same over Ram and regains his self confidence.

Beautiful simplicity of this plot of the film has then been detailed in a series of interesting episodes. The movie is made of some beautiful scenes, which adds up to making these episodes beautiful.

ROLE OF THE TEACHERS The teachers are expected to teach students sensitively but look at their cruelty.

They call out the marks publicly humiliating students and affecting their selfesteem.

They do not listen to the children but abuses ,humilate and beat the students-he is called medhak, moorkh shiromani, lazy idiot , duffer.

Look at the words they use-kuch bachche badnaseeb hote hain and Koi keh nahi sekta yeh Youhana ka bhai hai

Look at the situation of Ishaan when his parents are called to discuss him in the principal loffice he is standing in the corner while the teachers ar epiling on saying jann bhoojh ke karta hai.

Even the principal of the boarding school sighs with relief when he is told that Ishan has dyslexia that he has got the perfect excuse to throw him out.

Every one of the teachers at boarding school is an offensive cartoon painted in the broadest of strokes, and cruel too – like the instructor who raps Ishaan on the knuckles with a wooden ruler. Aamir, by contrast, laughs and sings and clowns around (literally; his entry into the film is in a clown suit).

Ishaan’s father is so insensitive to his children’s needs that he can’t handle something as small as the elder son losing a tennis match.

Aamir, by contrast, is so sensitive, he cries at the mere sight of children.

He sees differently-abled kids perform in an Annual Day celebration – and his eyes well up with tears. He sees a kid mopping up tables at a roadside eatery – and his eyes well up with tears.

He sees Ishaan’s paintings – and his eyes well up with tears.

It’s no wonder that, at some point during his visit to Ishaan’s house, he asks for a glass of water; you’re not surprised, considering his constant loss of fluids.

AWARDS2009Apsara Film & Television Producers Guild AwardsWon: Best Movie - Aamir Khan (Producer)Won: Best Director - Aamir KhanWon: Best Screenplay - Amole GupteWon: Best Lyrics - Prasoon Joshi - MaaWon: Best Male Playback Singer- Shankar Mahadevan- MaaWon: Best Story - Amole GupteWon: Best Special Effects - Vaibhav Kumaresh, Dhimant Vyas National Film Awards (for year 2007)Won: Best Film on Family WelfareWon: Best Lyrics: Prasoon JoshiWon: Best Male Playback Singer -  Shankar Mahadevan - Maa2008

Filmfare AwardsWon:Best Movie- Aamir Khan (producer)Won:Best Director - Aamir KhanWon:Best Story - Amole GupteWon: Critics Award Best Performance - Darsheel SafaryWon: Best Lyricist - Prasoon Joshi

2008Filmfare AwardsWon:Best Movie- Aamir Khan(producer)Won:Best Director - Aamir KhanWon:Best Story - Amole GupteWon: Critics Award Best Performance - Darsheel SafaryWon: Best Lyricist - Prasoon Joshi

V. Shantaram AwardsWon:Best Film (Gold)Won:Best Director (Silver) - Aamir KhanWon:Best Actor in a lead role - Darsheel SafaryWon:Best Writer - Amole Gupte

V. Shantaram AwardsWon:Best Film (Gold)Won:Best Director (Silver) - Aamir KhanWon:Best Actor in a lead role - Darsheel SafaryWon:Best Writer - Amole Gupte

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DIVYA THUKRAL

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