Jaane Jaan Movie Review

Jaane Jaan is an adaptation of the acclaimed Japanese novel, The Devotion of Suspect X by Keigo Higashino. The 2005 novel revolved around a brilliant maths teacher who is smitten by her next-door-neighbour and helps her find a water-tight alibi for murder when she and her teenage daughter unwittingly end up killing her husband. If this premise sounds familiar, well, it formed the basis for Jeethu Joseph's brilliant Malayalam film Drishyam (2013). Jeethu took the basic plot but Indianised it so well that you'd be hard pressed to find similarities with the novel. In the present film, director Sujoy Ghosh has been more or less faithful to the source. The only thing he has changed is the merging of Detective Kusanagi and physicist in Dr. Manabu Yukawa into Vijay Varma's character. Yukawa is the man who eventually solves the murder. In the novel, both Kusanagi and Yukawa discuss the crime, working on their individual lines of thought. Yukawa ultimately solves it but realises the humane concerns behind it. Here, the ending is changed, with Vijay Varma's character never learning about the inner intricacies of it. 

Jaane Jaan is set in Kalimpong. Single mother Maya (Kareena Kapoor Khan) lives with her daughter Tara (Naisha Khanna). Maya runs a small cafe which sells everything from coffee, cookies, pastries to noodles and momos. It's often visited by her shy neighbour, Naren (Jaideep Ahlawat), who is a much-beloved maths teacher in a local school. Inspector Karan (Vijay Varma) of the Mumbai police is deputised to Kalimpong to search for a rogue policeman Ajit Mhatre (Saurabh Sachdeva). Ajit is Maya's long-lost husband and the police suspect he might have gone to meet her. Karan finds out that Ajit has been killed and Maya becomes the prime suspect. He begins to hound her but she's always one step ahead of the police. Perhaps, his college friend Naren, may have something to do with it…

Sujoy is spot on with the casting. His biggest coup is to make Kareena agree to play her age in a deglam role. She still looks beautiful sans makeup and is every inch the concerned mother, the worry lines in her face speaking volumes. Vijay Varma, known for his anti-hero roles, is cast against the type as the clean-shaven inspector. The positive role suits him immensely. And Jaideep Ahlawat owns the room as the eccentric teacher whose first and last love is maths. The other 'hero' of the film is cinematographer Avik Mukhopadhyay, who has captured the fog-laden locations brilliantly. 

The film has plenty of twists and turns to keep you hooked but not everything is explained clinically. What the director has excelled in is to provide an emotional gravitas to the proceedings. You tend to sympathise with the protagonists, wanting them to win, wanting them to stretch their bluff till the very end. You're witness to their crimes but you're willing to turn a blind eye to it for the sake of humanity.

The film rests hugely on the shoulders of its three principal protagonists. Vijay Varma plays the good cop with the right amount of cunning and bonhomie, making the suspects feel safe while hunting for clues all the while. Jaideep Ahlawat is the very picture of reticence, playing the smitten neighbour with panache, saying it all through his mannerisms and body language. Kareena Kapoor Khan has outdone herself. She combines both grace and vulnerability to play a woman who has made a home for herself away from her violent past and is willing to go all the way to defend it. It's one of her best performances so far. 

Watch the film for the masterful performances by Vijay Varma, Jaideep Ahlawat and Kareena Kapoor Khan.