Protraph Lack of good storyline.

Doomtomylo a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

Cody One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

springsunnywinter A really good low budget movie, the film had an amazing story with emotional intensity without violence and it takes you deep into a writer's mind e.g. Where they get their ideas and what they always think about like when Sanjay was cutting bits & pieces from magazines and putting them together to form a new idea. It's about a writer (Sanjay Dutt) who is planning to write his next novel based on his wife (Aishwarya Rai) and to do that he wanted her to have an affair with another man (Zayed Khan) so he can feel the pain and describe it in his novel because his wife & the other man are his characters. Cinematography was mind blowing especially when letters were falling from top to bottom and it had blue & white background during the scenes of Sanjay's imagination. A story like this has never been tackled before in Bollywood before but I'm not sure if it's original. Sanjay Dutt was the best he had taken care of the whole film and it was also a very different role for him because he always does action or comedy. Music was OK the song Sholon Si was the best; overall I prefer low budget films.

diana-podlewska this movie was completely not what i expected. when i was watching it i had 2 remind myself that its bollywood. although the story line seems simple, a married girl meets a guy that falls in love with her, yet the way that the whole storyline was portrayed in the movie was very effective and most of all interesting. ashwarya with her amazing beauty is stunning in this movie! however the actor playing yash just didn't fit in. the whole story had a melodramatic twist, with great music and effects, and he just seemed 2 bollywood for the movie if u know what i mean. shabd had a slow pace to it, yet it wasn't boring, there was something very capturing about the movie. it was a reflective movie about love, however minus all the colourful dancing etc. very little of that! a movie definitely worth seeing.

umuhajir Leena Yadav's surprising "Shabd" (2005) is probably the most unfairly overlooked Hindi film in recent times: its box office fate was bleak, the reviews churlish, its theme dubbed too bizarre for India. One might thus be excused for thinking the film merited a pass; one would be wrong: "Shabd" is one of Bollywood's more interesting offerings in recent years, and features fine performances from Sanjay Dutt and Aishwarya Rai to boot. The latter's efforts in particular should lay to rest the fallacy that she cannot act to save her life. Rather, as "Chokher Bali," "Raincoat" and now "Shabd" have shown, Ms. Rai needs the right script and the right director to shine. Indeed the skepticism of movie critics about her abilities says more about our collective unwillingness to appreciate non-dramatic artistes than about Ms. Rai's lack of acting talent. Leena Yadav has done a fantastic job with "Shabd," and viewers willing to lend themselves to the film will find that it holds their attention throughout with a taut script that only flags a bit towards the very end of the film. Boiled down to its essentials, "Shabd" is about a one-time celebrated writer, Shaukat Vasisht (Sanjay Dutt)-- whose most recent novel has failed miserably-- and his wife Antara Vasisht (played by Aishwarya Rai in a nuanced performance), and Shaukat's attempts to redeem himself by means of a new book that he has begun to write. The film is, according to Ms. Yadav, about the thin line separating reality from fiction...continued at: http://qalandari.blogspot.com/2005/08/shabd.html

akumar82 Sanjay Dutt plays Shaukat, a writer and domineering control freak who tries to force his wife Antara (Aishwarya Rai) into an affair with her colleague Yash (Zayed Khan) in order to survive his writer's block and write a critically acclaimed, bestselling novel. Here's what I got from the movie. (1) - Shaukat plays a control freak to the hilt, who feels like his ability to artistically create something carries over to reality. He fools himself into truly believing in the power of his work, that he's so talented he somehow has the ability to not only control his wife's actions, but also her innermost thoughts and feelings. When Shaukat realizes that he can't control Antara (I can't believe I still remember these names, by the way - I haven't seen the film since opening night back in Feb) he goes insane and loses his own grip on reality. (2) - I don't know why anyone would be interested in this cautionary tale for artists- I think the point of the movie for artists is to realize that you can't take your work so seriously as to have it control you to such an extent as Shaukat did. Realistic, natural art can't be manufactured, it flows from within. He can't forcefully create a love affair between Antara and Yash because this isn't in his control. He's so wrapped up in making a "realistic" story after such extreme critical rejection that he tries to force a situation that naturally can't occur. When he realizes that he's ultimately powerless, he loses his mind. Lets look at Shaukat's motivations besides his need for critical success and the desire for the power to make situations happen - his desire to "play god" so to speak. Abstract notions aside, I think Shaukat was also bored with his marriage and his life. He marries his student who appears to be a mysterious and beautiful young woman. He sees her as this enigma, a woman who he thinks will always be able to keep him on his toes, guessing. Antara doesn't turn out this way. She turns out to be a simple girl who eventually becomes a professor and falls into a life of predictability in marriage and work. Shaukat's notion of women is anything but simple - his character Tamanna is supposedly based on how he views his wife- mysterious, sexy, beautiful, and ultimately conniving and manipulative. But this is NOT the woman simple Antara really is. He wants to make her into something she's not because he's bored with the real Antara, so he sets out to spice up his marriage through his work by throwing this character based on what he WANTS his wife to be into an affair with Yash. Antara really doesn't enter into an affair with Yash, only managing to stay friends with him and turning him away at the end. So Shaukat fails to recreate his wife's personality and make his wife and marriage more interesting - another ironic reality he can't seem to face. She tells Shaukat in the beginning, while he's having writers block, "Don't look for your story in me, I'm just a simple woman with simple dreams." He doesn't want the simple woman, he wants the temptress he imagines in his writings. Unfortunately for Antara, he prefers Tamanna, evidenced by the her sexy dance he imagines at the restaurant while they're dancing to "Sholon Si." He sees the temptress Tamanna dancing seductively to the music surrounded by men rather than his boring, docile wife Antara, who only manages to submissively slow-dance with him. Ultimately, Shaukat can't face the fact that he's a loser, professionally as a writer and personally as a bored husband. He wants a certain lifestyle of the flashy, sensual, and mysterious wife and a hotshot career as a writer. He ends up a reclusive failed writer living in seclusion and falling into a life of marital boredom. Antara and Shaukat's dance at the end in the asylum is his submission to these facts and willingness to try to accept the ordinary life he has rather than the exciting life he covets.This is a beautiful story of a man who wants too much from life and ends up not getting any of it. It's rather cruel in a way, this writer is given an initial taste of success and a life of fame, only to have it taken away.The performances, barring Zayed Khan who was awkwardly terrible were excellent. Aishwarya plays two different characters - Antara, the vulnerable woman and Tamanna, the bewitching, mysterious, and conniving fantasy Shaukat wants Antara to be. She does both characters remarkably well and with a lot of subtle facial nuances. Her facial expressiveness brings a level of depth to both characters. Sanjay Dutt is brilliant as the alpha-male writer who refuses to accept mediocrity in life and in work. His presence is commanding. No one could have played Shaukat the way he did. Maybe if Bachchan was younger, he'd have the style and panache to do it, but no one else in my opinion. Dutt has that movie-star arrogance and charisma to make the role believable. And he has some smoldering chemistry with Aishwarya Rai. I've never seen Aish look so alluring with another male costar - she's like a block of ice with everyone else. But it looks like she's got a thing for Sanjay with the way they interact on screen. What a great looking couple. The film is beautifully shot, like a wonderfully dark painting. Everything looks classy and gorgeous, especially the songs. The movie may have been confusing but if you take the time to really explore these characters and the untold motivations behind these characters and their actions. It's all there, you just have to think about it and look hard enough. Art is subjective, even if you don't agree with my interpretation, you'll still take something of your own away from the movie. Brilliant, abstract stuff, loved it! 9/10