Review of Mastram

Mastram (2013)
5/10
Lost In The Makers' Stupefaction. ♦ 51%
10 May 2014
The message it tries to convey is a solid one. I have to pat Akhilesh Jaiswal in the back for coming up with such a daring venture: to talk about porn writing of the 80s/90s when there was no easy access to kinky/imaginative porn. But then, when I dived into the execution, I think I'll limit to a hand shake.

There are no background score & sounds. And the dialogs & ounces of audio it has is either precise or garbled, failing to keep the audience hooked with the respect to the video it accompanies. The narration is shoddy. The story is about an aspiring writer who ends up being the anonymous mastermind, only known as Mastram, behind the locally popular porn comics. His life goes upside down when competition and opposition from the society drives him into paranoia. The lead actor does good work but I am more impressed with the actress who plays his sweet, innocent wife. Supporting cast is fine.

Screenplay is a tad slow but as the plot advances, the pace keeps up. Coming to sex, there is not much graphically; verbal references maybe cringe-worthy for some but I can tell you they are bold enough and funny, at times. Very poor handling of cinematography, editing, sound mixing, and art/setup departments. Publicity was amazing but the final result is lackluster, owing to the theme it talks about. Even the 2-3 sex/foreplay sequences are extremely mild and let me not talk about the camera work in these sequences.

Not that I was expecting porn (literally), but when you adopt porn writing as a subject, a little boldness is appreciated by the audience if not the censor board. The trivial humor saves the day and the climax paves the way for thoughts, which is why this experimental indie is an average potboiler.

BOTTOM LINE: Give it a try when it is released to home media.

Can be watched with a typical Indian family? NO

Porn: Mediocre (no visuals) | Foreplay: Mild | Nudity: Mild | Vulgarity: very Mild
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