Music: Sharib Sabri, Toshi Sabri & Shamir Tandon
Cinematography: Kalpesh Bhandarkar
Editing: Devendra Murdeshwar
Dialogue: Raghuvir Shekawat
Screenplay: Madhur Bhandarkar, Manoj Tyagi, Anuradha Tiwari
Direction: Madhur Bhandarkar
Producer: Madhur Bhandarkar
Release date: 6 November 2009
Story
Parag Dixit (Neil Nitin Mukesh) is a savvy executive from a top firm. He has a sexy girl friend (Mughda Godse), swanky car and suave life style. He falls in to the plot laid by his friends and lands up in jail on the allegations of possessing heavy amount of narcotics. He will be sent to judicial custody and is kept at a jail. He hopes of getting bail because his girlfriend goes all out to make sure that he is out of jail by hiring a top lawyer. The rest of the story is all about the bitter experiences in jail and how he come in terms with it.
Actors:
Neil Nitin Mukesh looks vulnerable in the movie and he suited the role of a man who becomes a victim in unforeseen circumstances. Manoj Bajpayee who is know for eccentric antics did a role that has needs of underplaying. And he is good. Mughda Godse is neat. Arya Babbar is excellent in the role of Kabir. Kaveri Jha is adequate. Atul Kulakarni is impressive in the role of a lawyer.
Technical departments:
Story - screenplay - direction: Story of the movie is treated in biographical manner with hero not trying to do anything heroic. There is one loophole in the movie which marred the entire viewing experience. When hero is taken into the custody, he was not holding any revolver and he was not running away from the cops like his friend did. And neither hero nor his girlfriend tried to clarify it through the lawyer. The audience know about it and they still have to sit through the entire movie till Atul Kulkarni explains the same in the final hearing. There is a difference between being innocent and being dumb. The character of hero is treated more like a dumb character than an innocent character. Hence the characterizations are weak. There are couple of things I liked in the movie like how lawyers mercilessly extract money from the clients and the one moment where hero refuses to runaway when he gets a chance. Direction of the film is adequate, but screenplay is not interesting. There seem to be a few references from POW jail break films from Hollywood.
Other technical departments: A film like this doesn't require any songs. Hence all the songs appear irrelevant. Dialogues are realistic. Cinematography is nice. Art direction is good and a jail set it erected for this movie in Ramoji Film City.
Analysis: Jail movie is a slow-paced one with boring moments most of the time. It is neither a commercial subject, nor an artistic film. However, the last 15 minutes of the movie is better. There are two types of Jail films. One is of commercial type where Jail break happens. This kind of film provides thrill. The other one the type where they show the journey and experiences of jail inmates. There will be lot of heart-touching content and these kind of films have human triumph towards the climax. Only film that managed both thrill and human triumph is 'The Shawshank Redemption'. Madhur Bhandarkar's JAIL does neither give you thrill not touches your heart. A slight disappointment from Madhur Bhandarkar.