Dramapakistani®

11 episodes down, I am still hooked to Talafi. Despite all my earlier peeves with this serial, I must say I can easily understand why this is currently PTV's top-rated serial. Director Anjum Shehzad has kept the pace of the drama serial brisk throughout, and with quite a decent performance put in by the entire cast, the 'happenings' ensure you tune into it, if only to find out how Imaad is going to deal with the mess he's knee-deep into!

Story wise, plenty happened! Imaad asked Falak to leave the house after Sharmeen's over-the-top screaming and her threat to stand on the roadside as a bride, waiting for her family to take her back. Falak first goes to Umair and Faria's house and then later moves into her mother's humble abode. Sharmeen and Surraya, predictably, do not get along and Imaad is caught in the middle.

Boy, I still LOVE Surraya! She's quite a character. The way she tells off Sharmeen and makes snide comments about her "family background" is quite amusing. For the life of me, I don't know who Sharmeen's family, as she was shown to be living alone and there was no portrayal of family members even on her wedding.

Mahnoor Baloch's acting as Falak remained quite emotion-less until she burst out in anger at Imaad over the phone. That was one intense, excellently-done scene! Finally Falak reacted to being turned out of the house in the middle of the night and refused to accept a single penny from her husband as a "talafi".

Natasha Ali manages to portray Sharmeen as an irritating, my-way-or-the-highway character, but after a while, her screaming and shouting and her "Main Falak nahin hoon!" gets on your nerves. Mikaal Zulfiqar looked flat in some scenes, but managed to convey the right emotions in others. Rubina Ashraf, as always, is doing a great job!

While Six Sigma's production values and Anjum Shehzad's direction is vastly improved, I still wish some of the overly long conversations between Falak and her mother were trimmed down. I forwarded nearly all of their scenes. I feel Seema Munaf's script is still a weaker link, but the pace of the story does make up at times.

The preview promises more drama - for reasons I cannot fathom, I am actually looking forward!

Written by Drama Buff (dramabuff.dp@gmail.com)

Share on Tumblr

Share

I had stated in my previous reviews that my sympathies were fully with Surraya (Rubina Ashraf) in the quagmire that Imaad (Mikaal) had landed them all into - by making an emotional decision to marry Falak (Mahnoor Baloch). If anything, I was feeling sorrier for her in this particular episode. Apparently, the lady did not realize that Sharmeen (Natasha Ali) would be so over-the-top and even more of a control freak than her mother-in-law.

So Imaad falls heads over heels for Sharmeen and marries her - for the life of me, I cannot understand what he actually likes about her. But then I could not tell what he liked about Falak either so there you are. But Sharmeen is one twisted person - honestly, what was the grand idea about making a fuss over everything before the marriage and then demanding for Falak to be turned out of the house the minute she entered after rukhsati?

And Falak! Honestly, where is her self-esteem? You can understand her dilemma but this is the age of DNA testing, for crying out loud. Why does she think her child's paternity will be questioned if she leaves? I appreciated Faria's (Salma Azfar) advice but I cannot honestly imagine Falak ever standing up to Sharmeen.

The overly long promo of the next episode shows a Surraya-Sharmeen showdown with Imaad again caught smack in the middle. It is actually amusing (although it's not supposed to be)! I am watching it for sheer entertainment value, and of course, to find out what actually happens in the Falak-Imaad-Sharmeen saga. You have to hand it over to the team for keeping the pace of the story brisk, and bringing in a love triangle (though it doesn't seem any of them is in "love" of all things). Let's see what the upcoming episodes have in store.

Written by Drama Buff (dramabuff.dp@gmail.c0m)

Share on Tumblr

Share

Yes, I had mostly given up on Talafi - but that was BEFORE the character of Imaad started showing some human-like traits. Yes, Mr. Imaad has finally realized that you do NOT get married to a person simply because you feel you have destroyed her life and want to satisfy your own guilty conscience. However, he has yet to understand that one cannot wriggle out of a rash, irresponsible decision by making another emotional, hasty decision.

In the previous two and current episode of Talafi, Imaad and Falak's relationship graph showed an upward curve before going into a steep decline. The upward curve came as Imaad got Falak's leg treated, resulting in the permanent removal of her limp. Surraya, even with her sarcastic remarks, seemed to have accepted the marriage. But all that was before Sharmeen (Natasha Ali) made her entry in Imaad's office, and ultimately, in his heart, resulting in him becoming deeply dissatisfied with all-things Falak. Ironically, only Imaad (and his friend) are aware of this decline as Falak remains in a time-warped stupour, her emotion-less interactions with Imaad drawing him more and more towards Sharmeen. To date, Sharmeen has openly confessed her "love" for Imaad, who apparently didn't see it coming. How utterly naive of him! As Imaad spends more and more time with Sharmeen, he has to make convincing excuses in front of Falak, her mother, and his mother for "staying too long at work".

Yes, so basically, this is all that has happened. While there is absolutely nothing new or novel, and the story-telling and dialogues of Seema Munaf are average at best, I am still intrigued to find out how Imaad is actually going to resolve this. Something tells me Surraya might be behind the appointment of Sharmeen (after having given her specific instructions), but this is only guesswork on my part. Let's see if the upcoming episodes hold any surprises. Oh, and Bisconni Chocolate Chip cookies finally went out of the scene - about time,  I'd say!

Written by Drama Buff (dramabuff.dp@gmail.com)

Share on Tumblr

Share

I don't know why, but I have more sympathy for Rubina Ashraf's character (Surraya) in Talafi than for anyone else. Honestly speaking, what was Imaad thinking? Methinks it would have been much better had he tried to convince his mother to take Falak's proposal, or at least informed her that he will go right ahead and marry her, if she doesn't. Poor mother was totally caught off guard as her only son came home accompanied by his bride. And then Imaad had the nerve to believe that everything will be alright and "she will come around" eventually because oh, how can she remain mad at her only son? Well, Mr. Imaad, the only son (as his mother said) never bothered to invite her to his own wedding so what kind of a reaction should she give? As I wrote, I have zero sympathy for Falak and Imaad at this point!

Two more episodes down, and this is basically all that has transpired: Imaad and Falak's rushed marriage, and then their combined efforts to appease an angry Surraya, who has ordered her son to divorce his wife in two days and her daughter-in-law to remain within her room without venturing out for anything. The interesting thing is that Falak and Imaad are not remotely interested in each other as well, so why they are even facing this music? Throughout the two episodes, the dialogues were forgettable and repetitive, while the scenes were long and monotonous. The first scene of the 4th episode was a whole six minutes long, which says a lot.

The complete miscast in the serial is Mahnoor Baloch. I strongly feel someone who could emote more effectively should have done the role of Falak - Mahnoor's expression just does not change, which gets really, really annoying. Lady, you are such a seasoned actress - why don't you alter your expressions to look pensive, questioning, surprised, shocked, or at least, hurt? She over-hears every single conversation between the mother and the son without her expression altering to the slightest - it is as if she has heard all this before. At least, she finally changed the brown dress she has been wearing for the past couple of weeks (oops, episodes)!

Bisconni Chocolate Chip cookies made their appearance again in two more scenes - yes, these are paid product placements which have been done rather crudely. Despite the loopholes, I still find it interesting and will probably follow the serial; since it has eight episodes only, it is already halfway over.

Written by Drama Buff (dramabuff.dp@gmail.com)

Share on Tumblr

Share

For some reason, Talafi just does not seem to be the work of the same Anjum Shehzad who gave us Mora Piya. The serial sports too much talking and  an overall sleepy look, mainly as a result of very bad lighting (which makes Mahnoor Baloch look pale and ghostly). The only saving grace of the latest episode was that the story progressed rapidly.

Starting off with Imaad's proposal to Falak, the episode mainly focused upon the former trying to convince his mother to go along, while the latter's mother took it upon herself to convince her daughter that a second marriage was the right thing to do. Predictably (or else, how would the story move forward?), Falak agrees to the match and gets married to Imaad, despite his mother's staunch opposition. What follows will be (again not very unexpected) a saas-bahu saga with Imaad caught smack in the middle.

While I was overall happy to note the pace of the serial, there were more than a few eye-brow raisers. First and foremost, is this drama serial supposed to devote a certain length of time to close up shots of Bisconni Chocolate Chip Cookies? Granted they are the main sponsors, and it is routine for many companies to pay for product placements in many genres of TV content, the way it has been done here is very put-offing, to the say the least. Salma Azfar placated her irritated son with the cookies in the previous episode, and in this one, she came home with a huge box of the same! Somebody please tell me: is Salma Azfar ONLY going to brandish the said cookies throughout this serial? The last I heard, product placements are subtle!

Secondly, we see Falak who is definitely wondering what Imaad's motives are behind the marriage. But, for some reason, we don't see her suffering from any nostalgia or reminiscing about her first marriage, which seems to be a tad bit strange. Surely, some flashback or some scene with a guest actor could have been shot to give us, the audience, a basic idea about how her first marriage was. It would also break the monotony to see some happy expressions rather than the same, pained ones sported by almost the entire cast (save the ones with the cookies!)

That said, I must commend Rubina Ashraf for her spot on expressions and very relevant dialogues. She seems to be the only one who makes any sense. Of course, since she is destined to play the over the top mother-in-law from the very next episode, I am not sure how her character will eventually play out. In this episode, however, I was glad to see someone asking Imaad why he wants to marry Falak when he doesn't love her and obviously, is only interested in getting rid of his own guilty conscience.

Finally, THANK YOU, team Talafi for figuring out who the writer is and correcting the name in the end credits. It IS Seema Munaf!

Written by Drama Buff (dramabuff.dp@gmail.com)

Share on Tumblr

Share

After watching its very interesting and intriguing promos, I decided to give the first episode of Talafi (on PTV Home) a shot. My interest was piqued also by the name of the director (Anjum Shehzad), whose previous offering had been mega serial, Mora Piya. And I must say I was not disappointed with the first episode.

Thus far, Talafi is the story of a widow Falak (Mahnoor Baloch) who loses her unborn child in a tragic accident. The car that hits her was being driven by Imaad (Mikaal Zulfiqar) who then takes her to the hospital, fetches her mother (Rabia Noreen), and basically tries all he can to make up for his rash driving. Most of the episode focused on Falak's anguish, Imaad's guilt, and Imaad's mother's (Rubina Ashraf) dismissive attitude towards the accident.

The episode was definitely emotional. I wasn't sure if Mahnoor would fit the role of Falak, but she carried it very well. Mikaal basically had the same expression throughout but let's see how the role of Imaad shapes up in general. Rubina Ashraf has the exact same look as she has in Maseeha, and so far, it seems she will have a similar role too, only in reverse (evil mom in law instead of evil mom). Also, the story was mainly on a single track of Imaad and Falak. Apparently Natasha Ali, Salma Azfar, Adnan Saeed, Mustafa Kazmi and others also have a role in the drama serial though it is not so clear what it is at this point. The dialogues are probably the weakest link here - they are deep at a point (especially when they refer to digests, Urdu literature, Umera Ahmed, etc.) but then get repetitive. Also, the writer's name throughout Facebook is mentioned as Seema Munaf but the credits in the drama serial mention Samia Javeed as the writer. So who exactly is the writer anyway?

Overall, at this point, the story seems predictable but engrossing. The overall look and feel of the drama serial is as "filmi" as Mora Piya, I have to say. BUT since this is Anjum Shehzad, along with a great cast and a promising story, I am planning to follow it anyway.

Written by Drama Buff (dramabuff.dp@gmail.com)

PS: If interested, you can watch the first episode of Talafi here: Talafi - 1st Episode

Share on Tumblr

Share