The Dirty Picture

Silk Smitha was a bomb. She was the face of bold sexuality down south a couple of decades ago. I wouldn't call her particularly pretty but she had an air of beauty and arrogance which had made her something one couldn't ignore. As a kid, I remember having watched a couple of movies in which Silk Smitha played the vamp. She had eyes which could be looked at as 'evil' just as well as they could be taken for 'appealing'.

It was definitely difficult to digest the fact that the decent housewife-faced Vidya Balan was chosen to represent the sex diva. But I must admit, Vidya Balan surprised me just as much as she did, a lot of critics!

All through the movie, it was surprising that I forgot about the Silk 'Smitha'. Vidya presented a wholly new personality that was uncomparable to anything she did before. It wouldn't be an over statement to say that the performance was wasn't something that could be expected out of a lot of other actresses today!

Though Vidya Balan essentially reminds most of us of her role in Parineeta as a woman with very-homely morals of integrity, selflessness and sacrifice it is difficult to ignore her outstanding performances in other movies like Ishqiya, Paa and No One Killed Jessica. With a face that does not very easily give versatile impressions, it must be extremely challenging for an actress to play such different roles.

And, somehow, having started this post wanting to write about Silk Smitha, I ended up writing more about Vidya. Probably, that's what happened to The Dirty Picture itself too!

Cheers to Vidya. Good job there!