The Blue Umbrella

yet again vishal bharadwaj tries to capture pitfalls of being human by a simple story... he does it pretty well this time also... the story is very simple

pankaj kapoor is a tea stall owner in some interior village of himachal and it does very good business during tourist season, he is well off compared to other villagers... the village is very small and pretty much everyone knows everyone... there is a small girl biniya who manages to get hold of a japanese blue umbrella which is very beautiful, she roams around with that all over the village and soon the blue umbrella becomes talk of the village and reason to be jealous about and an object of desire... pankaj kapoor is very much interested in getting that umbrella but she does not budge... then one fine evening the umbrella is lost and biniya is heart broken... she suspects that pankaj kapoor has stolen it but he manages to come out clean and gets an exactly same one to prove his point... some detective skills from biniya manage to prove otherwise... and the whole village comes to know that pankaj kapoor is a thief and liar... he is boycotted big time and ppl make fun of him... biniya feels bad for him and eventually forgives him... 

the story is set in a village in himachal and captures the scenic beauty of it very well... the simplicity in life and hardships they face looks so different from the urban life... acting wise pankaj kapoor is excellent and the young girl has done pretty good acting... not a movie for children but it teaches a very basic lesson - "chori karna buri baat hai" :-)... watchable if you want an offbeat movie otherwise passable...