Life Of Pi | English Movie | Award winner Film | Personal Reviews

Making a movie is definitely a very tough job. Making a quality movie which is entertaining and thrilling is tougher. And making a movie from a book is even tougher. Because in book when the things are explained, it is the reader’s brain who visualize the stuff.

Life of Pi is a commercially successful and critically well-received book. Ang Lee, is of course a very popular name which holds respect as a director of academy award winner movie(s). The usage of 3D animation technology in conjunction with real people is interesting enough to raise curiosity about the work. All these aspects when meet together with fantastic acting – it results into a movie like “Life Of Pi”.

It is a fascinating tale of course, but what it holds in is the message of spirituality and philosophy hidden within. So those who want to view it only for entertainment, there is stuff for them; and those who want to see a movie with a message, there is stuff for them as well.

The story of the movie (and the book) is famous so we will taking just a bird’s eye view for the same.

Yann Martel – a novelist is advised by Mr. Patel to meet his nephew Pi Patel, as he is having a fantastic tale to tell. Currently Pi (the mathematical symbol, π) is living in Montréal, Québec. Mr. Patel insist Yann that the story Pi is going to tell will make him (Yann) beleive in God. We also got to know that Pi is originally from Pondicherry, India. The writer meets Pi Patel, and the tale starts as Pi tells.

Before long ago, Mr. Santosh Patel and his wife Gita Patel were living peacefully with their two children Piscine Molitor and Ravi. Mr. Patel was a very good swimmer and fond of swimming and swimming pools. He named is younger child’s name Piscine Molitor as a tribute to a swimming pool with the same name in France. Though his schoolmates started making fun of Piscine Molitor by calling him Pissing Patel – he decided to get rid of the situation. However he cannot change his name so he decided to make popular a new short name for him – PI. And we are going to visit the tale of this Mr. Pi Patel.

In addition to be a nature lover, Mr. Santosh Patel owned a zoo as well and having a various kind of animals in the same. (In the introductory scene – you can distinguish the computer generated animals). There is a royal Bengal Tiger also there in the zoo. Interestingly when a fellow came there to drop the tiger, by mistake the name of the animal and the person who brought it, are swapped, which resulted into the tiger being named as Richard Parker!

Young Pi was attracted to Richard Parker. And once during the curiosity he put his own life in danger. He considered Richard as a friend and believed that Richard could not harm him. Though, his father, Santosh Patel was not convince. He decided to show the real face of tiger to Pi, in order to teach him a lesson which guide him throughout his life. How and what he did is better to watch on screen.

Pi was raised as a Hindu and he was pure vegetarian. At the age of 12 he decided to discover various religions to know them and he started following Islam and Christianity as well. As he simply wanted to love God. His mother was supportive to him in his experiences with different religions. His father was quite rational though. When Pi was of about 16, his father decided to settle at Winnipeg, Manitoba. He was intended to sell the zoo there as well. Pi was not happy with the movement though.

On the way to their new destination from sea route, their ship met with a storm. Pi was thrown to a life boat by a crew and saved. However he see his entire family sunk in the sea along with the ship, and he was helpless. On his lifeboat there came a zebra, an orangutan, and a spotted hyena. Eventually hyena killed the zebra and orangutan and was to attach Pi, when Richard Parker came from under the roof of the lifeboat and killed the hyena.

Now there are two living creatures on the boat, Pi and Richard Parker (the Royal Bengal Tiger)! Will they survive or will Pi get killed? The tale moves ahead and answer is unfold in the process.

Suraj Sharma portrays well the character of Pi (actually there are four actors played Pi – belong to different age group and all are convincing). Irrfan, Tabu and Adil Hussain are as competent as they used to be. Nice performances of course. The cinematography and background music is up-to-the-mark. The locales are brilliant. There are points when you realize that what is animation and what is real. But, needless to say, the animation is fantastic. The team have worked good on the body language of Richard Parker really well. The direction is first rate.

Kids will like it more than adults. (And as stated earlier, the people who love philosophy and spirituality, will have their own reasons to love this movie).

Overall a nice adventure movie to watch.