The Indian movie, Taal has the eternal love triangle involving Manasi, Manav and Vikrant; the movie was released in 1999. The film is promoted as a musical love story while highlighting the acting skills of Aishwariya Rai, Akshaye Khanna and Anil Kapoor and also A. R. Rahman`s music. The film is directed by Subhash Ghai. Because of it`s popularity the movie was dubbed in Tamil as `Taalam` as well. Taal was the first Hindi movie to appear in the Top 20 Box Office charts in the USA.
Synopsis of `Taal`
The movie starts with a lovely girl Mansi played by Aishwarya Rai. She is from Chamba in Himachal Pradesh. She is the daughter of a village folk singer and dancer Tara Babu played by Alok Nath. Manav played by Akshaye Khanna is the son of a businessman who comes to Chamba with his father Jagmohan Mehta played by Amrish Puri. His uncle and his father`s employees accompany them. Jagmohan comes to Chamba to buy some land. Manav meets Manasi and falls deeply in love with her. Jagamohan and Tara Babu also become friends over a period of time. But the moment Jagamohan learns of Manav and Manasi`s love he leaves the place and moves to Mumbai. He gives the excuse that Mansi and her family are not of their standard. When leaving the place he invites Tara Babu to come and meet them whenever he comes to Mumbai. Mansi feels depressed about Manav`s leaving but he assures her about their love and promises to marry her. She in turn gifts Manav a scarf where she stitches `Manavsi`, a mingling of their names.
He promises her marriage and goes back to the city preaching that love is faith and other things are in the same vein. Tara Babu learns about his daughter`s love and becomes angry but soon he realises the thing and agrees to visit Mumbai. Tara Babu`s younger sister Prabha resides in Mumbai. Tara Babu goes to her place in order to meet Manav`s family. When they reached at Manav`s home they are ill-treated by Jagmohan`s family members and also the employees. They were waiting outside for nine long hours. After that when they go inside they were given a bench near dog`s cage to sit. When Jagmohan comes to meet them, he also starts insulting them. Tara Babu could not take it anymore and slapped Jagmohan on his face. Seeing this Manav gets angry and criticizes Tara Babu and Mansi. Mansi then comes in front and defends his father, who was getting constantly insulted. She breaks the relationship and pulls out the necklace from her neck and throws it on the floor which was gifted by Manav. Mansi and her father leave Manav`s house with a broken heart. As a matter of fact Manav was not aware of the truth that Manasi was insulted by his family members.
While retuning back to Tara Babu`s sister`s house, they meet Vikrant Kapoor played by Anil Kapoor. He is a successful and well-known music producer and director. He is a hard core fan of Tara Babu and his music. Vikrant wants to make a three years contract with Mansi about dance performances. On instigation from aunty Prabha, Mansi agrees on the contract and performs some dance numbers and remixes of his father`s work and also some of the Vikrant`s music. She becomes an instant sensation and also won various awards. Manav then eventually meets Mansi and apologises to her and says that he was ignorant about the fact that his family members insulted them; but Mansi rejects his proposal. Vikrant understands the whole thing but chooses to ignore as by that time he starts loving Mansi. Soon afterwards Manav and Manasi see that Jagmohan and Tara Babu have patched things up and become friends.
In the mean time Vikrant tells Mansi that he loves her and wants to marry her. Tara Babu and Prabha convince Mansi that it`s a good proposal and Mansi should accept it. They think that by this action Mansi will forget Manav. Mansi wins an International MTV Award in Canada. After the achievement she comes back to India and starts preparing for her marriage.
Manav comes to Mansi on the day of her wedding and tries to make her understand that marriage is not a game. Mansi loves Manav and she can`t marry Vikrant as this would be a mockery to him also. He also tells her that he loves her and will always wait for her. Mansi is in dilemma in choosing between her love and her duty. Tara Babu, Manav and Jagmohan were seen together in the marriage party. Ultimately Vikrant realizes that she loves Manav after seeing Mansi`s reaction when she sees Manav. Vikrant tells Mansi to choose Manav as he is still waiting for her. He also tells that three of them will be good friends forever. Jagmohan and Tara Babu seem to be happy when they give their blessings to Manav and Mansi. The film has a happy ending with some beautiful songs. The love of Manav was very much prominent when he sings `Nahin Samne tu, ye alag Baat hain`. Taal is shot beautifully and all the actors are made to look excellent. The locales in Himachal Pradesh are breathtaking.
Awards for `Taal`
This Bollywood movie `Taal` got many awards. Anil Kapoor got awards for best supporting actor in Filmfare Awards, IIFA Awards, ZEE Cine Awards and Star Screen Awards. Alka Yagnik received Filmfare Award for best female playback singer whereas A.R. Rahman got Filmfare Best Music Director Award, IIFA Best Music Director Award and Zee Cine Award for Best Music Director. Aishwarya Rai was nominated for best actress in Filmfare and Star Screen Award.
Soundtracks in Taal
A.R. Rahman has produced some of the hit music and songs in this movie Taal and they are:
Taal Se Taal Mila- Alka Yagnik, Udit Narayan
Nahin Samne Tu- Sukhwinder Singh, Hariharan
Ramta Jogi- Alka Yagnik, Sukhwinder Singh
Kariye Na- Alka Yagnik, Sukhwinder Singh
Ni Main Samajh Gayi- Richa Sharma, Sukhwinder Sngh
Kahin Aag Lage- Asha Bhosle, Richa Sharma, Aditya Narayan
Ishq Bina Ishq Bina- Kavita KrishnaMurthy, Sukhwinder Singh
Ishq Bina (Remix)- A. R. Rahman, Sonu Nigam, Sujatha, Anuradha Sriram
Raga Dance- A.R. Rahman
Beats of Passion- A.R Rahman
Cast in Taal
The actors who have worked in different roles in the film Taal are:
Akshaye Khanna as Manav Mehta
Aishwarya Rai as Mansi Shankar
Anil Kapoor as Vikrant Kapoor
Amrish Puri as Jagmohan Mehta
Alok Nath as Tara Babu
Jividha Ashta as Ila Shankar
Tanya Mukherji as Shanno Shankar
Mita Vashisht as Prabha Shankar
Saurabh Shukla as Banerjee
Supriya Karnik as Shakuntala
Puneet Vasishtha as Shaukat
Akash Karnataki as Siddhu
Manoj Pahwa as Santram
Rajesh Khera as Mohan Mehta
Bobby Darling as Dress Designer
Shahid Kapoor as a background dancer in song "Kahin Aag Lage"
Anita Hassanandani Reddy in the song "Ishq Bina"