A quest with an aftertaste, but not all pleasant

Film review - Finding Fanny

Finding Fanny
Hindi / English(U/A) ¬¬¬
Director: Homi Adajania
Cast: Naseeruddin Shah, Pankaj Kapoor, Dimple Kapadia, Deepika Padukone, Arjun Kapoor

He burst onto cinephiles’ collective consciousness with ‘Being Cyrus’, and then gave us the slightly under-delivered ‘Cocktail’. Homi Adajania seems to have re-found his groove with ‘Finding Fanny’, a story that has many layers and strong characters, but is told in less than two hours.

It’s a story of quest, as the name suggests. But that quest means something different for each one of its participants. Overtly, postman Ferdi (Naseeruddin Shah) is looking for the love of his life after his proposal from 46 years ago comes back unopened. Local girl Angie (Deepika Padukone) is trying to help him on that quest, aided by Savio (Arjun Kapoor), a prodigal friend-who-could-have-been-more. Also on the ride are Angie’s matronly corpulent mother-in-law Rosie (Dimple Kapadia), ostensibly to protect the wife of her long-dead son, and artist Dom Pedro, who is trying to find his last muse in Rosie. So do they find Fanny? And what else do they find?

The director has painted a delicious canvas of not-so-rural Goa with a good balance of deft and bold brush-strokes. Each character is fleshed out well, and has shades that leave a lasting impression.

Heck, even a cat’s carcass becomes an interesting plot point! What lets “Finding Fanny” down is a somewhat lax ending. Yes, there’s closure, but it comes in a way that hardly complements the rest of a beautifully narrated tale. Even the music is not worth much. The two songs that stand out are too infuriatingly in Punjabi to fit in. some maddening loose ends are irksome too.

Also, a word of caution: If you are to watch this film, watch it in English, for the Hindi dialogues leave much to be desired.