I recently read a rather pointed, well-researched and blow-by-blow account of the encounter that had the ATS progenitor, A A Khan pitted against the notorious gangster, Maya Dolas (born Mahendra Vithoba Dolas) close to 14 years ago. The piece that appeared in the Mumbai tabloid, Mid-Day obviously was inspired by the release of Bollywood's latest take on Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs -- Shootout at Lokhandwala. The film dramatises the encounter which according to some accounts was stage managed by the police to eliminate the foulmouthed Dolas at the behest of underworld don and Dolas' estranged boss, Dawood Ibrahim. Others critiqued it as cold blooded murder by the men in uniform of five petty criminals who possessed less than half the ammunition carried to the site by the police. The police used more than three hundred to kill five.
Perhaps a case of being overprepared? Were 300 policemen required to tackle five men? Is it fair to not allow the criminal to have proper recourse to justice and a trial? After all, every man, woman, and child born free has a right to be heard. Why does the police prefer to 'Shoot to kill' when arresting the man alive could lead to vital leads in very many cases? The gangsters could have been caught alive and tried for murder, extortion, arson, whatever.
Ditto for Sohrabuddin Sheikh, Ishrat Jahan, scores in the Kashmir Valley, Khwaja Yunus, Javed Ahmad...many more. Yes Sohrabuddin Sheikh was a criminal, an extortionist. But the Gujarat police have no records to show that he was a Lashkar militant, the charge on which he was shot in cold blood. What about Kausar Bi? Was she also a militant? Ishrat Jahan -- university student, amateur tutor, shot point blank in an 'encounter' in Ahmedabad. How on earth was she shot in the head and chest if she was fleeing and trying to escape the police? The windshield of the car she was travelling in was smashed completely. The rear shield was intact. How? Khwaja Yunus -- software engineer in Dubai, picked up after the Ghatkopar blast in Mumbai, never returned home. The police has been accused of killing him in custody. The 1993 Mumbai blasts led to a flurry of arrests and torture recounted impeccably in S Hussain Zaidi's book and then filmed to perfection by Anurag Kashyap in his project which goes by the same name. The film showcases the torture scenes brilliantly, the macabre violence of it all is outlandish and scary. Thus, it is but childish to either believe or expect the police to adhere to and abide by rules. If the police manual permits torture, in fact lists it as the only method to extract information, then it is but usual that the men in uniform do not think twice before torturing suspects. And mind you, these men (sometimes women) are only suspects. The question then is -- Is is fair to get down to torture purely on the basis of suspicion?
Coming back to the Lokhandwala encounter, the police denies that the underworld bosses has any hand in the encounter and claim that it was absolutely legitimate and true. The incident had been forgotten until film-maker Apurva Lakhia (of the Mumbai Se Aya Mera Dost and Ek Ajnabi fame) decided to dig into the past and come up with a film on the encounter that shook Mumbai in 1991. He has been accused of glorifying violence and creating iconic figures out of misdirected youth ending up as gangsters. Shootout at Lokhandwala is a violent film. After all it is based on an extremely violent episode where a lot of blood was spilt. Not only did the police put the lives of close to a hundred and fifty Mumbaikars at stake by firing indiscriminately at the dilapidated flat where Maya Dolas, Dilip Bhuwa and three others were holed up for some weeks, it also converted the entire residential area into a war zone for close to six hours at the end of which the five gangsters were killed and two policemen injured.
So does the film justify the methods adopted by A A Khan? Apurva Lakhia would like to think so but Shootout... actually ends up not taking sides at all. If anything Maya Dolas emerges as a somewhat wronged antagonist who was not allowed a shot a justice. I have written about the film in the other blog I frequent and write for -- Passion for Cinema. I'll extend my argument a little bit here and say that the police went overboard. And Lakhia goes overboard in trying to make a case for Khan and his boys while all he ends up doing is convert Maya and his gang into reel heroes. Let me explain. SI Javed Sheikh, drafted into the ATS by Khan specifically because of the wide network of informers he had in the Muslim dominated areas as well as the underworld drags one of the men out of the building, alive, before Khan shoots him down in full view of the heaving, screaming crowds. 'I said Shoot to Kill meaning shoot to kill,' he says before gunning down Maya's cohort. The fact that the shooting happened in front of a thronging crowd made it look like a spectacle. The 'Breaking News' phenomena is made full use of the film as television journalist Meeta Mattoo (yet to decipher if the real encounter was filmed or not) played by Diya Mirza follows the cops to Lokhandwala. She questions the ethics of the encounter throughout the film, from the first frame to the last. Her expression after having witnessed the killing of the criminal says it all. Disgust is writ large over the character's face even though she happens to be an admirer of Khan's ways. The police, according to the rules are supposed to shoot a man only in extreme circumstances and that too below the knees to decapitate the person. This is true even for encounters. Under no circumstances are they supposed to cross the line. But they do, day after day across India, there are reports of encounter killings. Ahmedabad gangster Abdul Latif was shown bail papers, ordered to escape and then shot at. Hardly an encounter!
Thousands have disappeared in Kashmir and never returned. The lucky ones have found column space in newspapers as victims of fake encounters. Others are just numbers, statistics. The police (as also the army in Kashmir) is said to have staged fake encounters to boost their chances of promotion and to bag the cash award that comes with the killing of every militant. And mind you, all these men killed in so-called encounters are all 'dreaded' terrorists who pose a grave threat to the safety and security of India. After investigations by independent agencies and the media, the men turned out to be carpenters, teachers, tailors, farmers, shepherds, and even informers.
Two men were killed in a staged encounter in New Delhi's Ansal Plaza some years ago. Eyewitnesses recount that the men were brought in a police jeep, the bandobast was complete with coffins and shrouds to take the bodies away. People too scared to bat an eyelid later said that the men were pushed out of the jeep and asked to run...the police shot them dead after a perfectly staged drama that went on for more than two hours. Just before Diwali, the encounter of alleged militants was a feather in the caps of the Delhi police.
This is not to say that criminals are to be left free to hurt the society even more and not taught a lesson. The nature of the lesson needs to be questioned. The police went to Lokhandwala with an 'intention' of killing Maya Dolas and his men. The police manual describes and defines an encounter as an act of self defence. 300 people and Khan himself certainly did not need self defence. Thus, the encounter was intentional, cold-blooded. Was killing the only option? The film does not answer the question. Instead it raises many more. One of them is, well -- was killing really the only option? Repeated over and over again by Dia Mirza. Lakhia's attempt at glorifying the police actually doesn't work that way. It does otherwise propelling the ethical debate into the public domain. Amitabh Bachchan's question in the courtroom is misplaced and melodramatic. Would you be confronted by a gangster or the police? Ask the riot victims in Gujarat who were directed towards the murderous mobs by the police? Ask the families of the 14 Muslim men killed by the police at the Suleiman Bakery in the Bombay riots? Ask the wives of those who have disappeared without a trace in the Kashmir valley? The answers would be apparent.
The film comes at an apt time. Televised debates have been held on the question of encounter killings in the past few weeks after the Sohrabuddin story broke. But Bollywood has from time to time dwelt on the issue. Ab Tak Chappan was apparently based on encounter specialist Daya Nayak's life. Company, D and Sarkar looked at the underworld quite effectively. Black Friday was an exceptional film. Shootout attempts it...and succeeds to a great extent. Bollywood finally creates a desi Reservoir Dogs-lookalike in the form of Maya Dolas and his men after attempts such as Kaante and the ilk. By putting police encounters back in the limelight, the film, even though overtly dramatic in parts is a great try. The sepia background makes Swati Building where the encounter happened look sinister, almost imposing. The battleground becomes the backdrop of a perfect potboiler. Masterfully edited, Shootout at Lokhandwala is crisp and pithy, something a film such as this rides on. And more importantly, it put the encounter question back in the minds of the people. But will there be a public outcry? One is yet to see a public outcry in cases involving the lowly and the downtrodden. Yet one question still remains-- will Manu Sharma, Santosh Kumar Singh or even Vikas Yadav, the offcpring of powerful men ever be killed in encounters?
Friday, June 01, 2007
My take on Shootout at Lokhandwala
This has been a busy week particularly with regard to my film viewing schedules. Started with Life in a Metro which should have been named Sexual Life in a Metro as all Anurag Basu did was dwell on sleazy underbelly of corporate culture and human relationships. Fair enough, to each his own. The other film I watched was Shootout at Lokhandwala. Given a choice between romance and guns, I’d go for guns any day. The film comes hot on the heels of the Sohrabuddin Sheikh fake encounter case grabbing headlines and eyeballs in the media. Less importantly are the Khwaja Yunus custodial death case and another fake encounter case in Gujarat that of Javed Sheikh who was gunned down in cold blood by the Rajasthan and Gujarat police in 2004. All three cases are preceded by a long and sordid history of fake encounter killings and the people with blood on their hands are the usual suspects – the police and the armed forces. Kashmir has seen the worst encounters over the past many years. Some of them find publicity and media coverage and become iconic while the rest (and the numbers are staggering) remain stacked in the dusty alleys of the establishment.
Was the Maya Dolas encounter in 1991 a real one? The Bombay High Court ruled in favour of the Anti-Terrorism squad being led by Aftab Ahmad Khan, which planned and executed the whole operation. Human rights activists and citizen’s group thought on the contrary. The encounter they said was a set-up. Khan had been on the D-gang payroll and had been sounded off after Dolas got too big for his boots. The families of the five men who were killed (and according to Shootout…quite brutally at that) petitioned the court saying that their children were killed for a crime they did not commit. However, all records (I have done some research on this) state that Dolas was indeed an extortionist who fell on the wrong side of Big Bhai in Dubai and was killed in a police encounter which involved loads 327 policemen and sophisticated weaponry and put the lives of close to 102 men, women and children living in the heavily populated Lokhandwala area on 16 November 1991 in danger.
The film does not provide answers to this vexing question. But is it supposed to? I don’t know. It is a film-director’s take on an incident, which has long been lauded as the longest encounter ever in the annals of the Mumbai Police. In portions, the screenplays veers towards hero-worship of the police officers involved in the operation, there are other sequences where the film-maker makes an attempt to provide a humane face to otherwise ruthless gangsters. It is much like a see-saw. The film begins with three large blood stains on the lane in front of Swati Building, the residential block which had housed the Maya and his boys for weeks and ends with the bloodied faces of the slain criminals. Was it correct to hound the men in the fashion that the Mumbai police chose to follow? The question is raised over and over again by a television reporter (played by Diya Mirza) fuelling an ideological and ethical debate.
My only problem with the film is the unnecessary and useless song and dance sequences and characters like the bar dancer (Aarti Chhabria) and Bua (Tusshar Kapoor). Kapoor not only failed to portray the sharpshooter to any devastating effect, his command over dialogues was grotesque. He should probably only stick to comic roles and leave the gangsta flicks to Vivek Oberoi. It was nice to see him come back into his own after the searing role in Company. He is superb as Mayabhai, the young extortionist who rebels against the D-Company. Rohit Roy is decent enough in a small role while Shabbir Ahluwalia, Ekta Kapoor’s blue-eyed boy makes a foray into Bollywood as RC, the young associate who cannot get over the fact that he murdered a family in cold blood.
Scenes to die for? Quite a few. ACP Shamsher Khan kills one of Maya’s cohorts (played by Aditya Lakhia) in front of the media, police, and Lokhandwala residents. It is effective, gory, and sets the pace for the rest of the sequence. But again it is difficult to judge the tenor of the filmmaker’s ideological leanings (whether in favour of the police or ethics in general) from this one scene; however it does raise a few questions about the methods the police uses to bring criminals to its knees. At one level the film propagates the infallibility of the police’s patriotism while on the other it raises a few uncomfortable queries about the fact that criminals too need to be treated like human beings and have rightful access to the institutions of law and justice. The verbal duel between Maya and ACP Khan too is well-shot and modulated. Dutt is a model cop – uncorrupted, patriotic, and dedicated and he does a brilliant job of his role (as usual).
Yes, one more thing. The presence of just too many stars from the commercial pantheon pulled the film back a bit. But who could have played Maya better than Vivek Oberoi?
Was the Maya Dolas encounter in 1991 a real one? The Bombay High Court ruled in favour of the Anti-Terrorism squad being led by Aftab Ahmad Khan, which planned and executed the whole operation. Human rights activists and citizen’s group thought on the contrary. The encounter they said was a set-up. Khan had been on the D-gang payroll and had been sounded off after Dolas got too big for his boots. The families of the five men who were killed (and according to Shootout…quite brutally at that) petitioned the court saying that their children were killed for a crime they did not commit. However, all records (I have done some research on this) state that Dolas was indeed an extortionist who fell on the wrong side of Big Bhai in Dubai and was killed in a police encounter which involved loads 327 policemen and sophisticated weaponry and put the lives of close to 102 men, women and children living in the heavily populated Lokhandwala area on 16 November 1991 in danger.
The film does not provide answers to this vexing question. But is it supposed to? I don’t know. It is a film-director’s take on an incident, which has long been lauded as the longest encounter ever in the annals of the Mumbai Police. In portions, the screenplays veers towards hero-worship of the police officers involved in the operation, there are other sequences where the film-maker makes an attempt to provide a humane face to otherwise ruthless gangsters. It is much like a see-saw. The film begins with three large blood stains on the lane in front of Swati Building, the residential block which had housed the Maya and his boys for weeks and ends with the bloodied faces of the slain criminals. Was it correct to hound the men in the fashion that the Mumbai police chose to follow? The question is raised over and over again by a television reporter (played by Diya Mirza) fuelling an ideological and ethical debate.
My only problem with the film is the unnecessary and useless song and dance sequences and characters like the bar dancer (Aarti Chhabria) and Bua (Tusshar Kapoor). Kapoor not only failed to portray the sharpshooter to any devastating effect, his command over dialogues was grotesque. He should probably only stick to comic roles and leave the gangsta flicks to Vivek Oberoi. It was nice to see him come back into his own after the searing role in Company. He is superb as Mayabhai, the young extortionist who rebels against the D-Company. Rohit Roy is decent enough in a small role while Shabbir Ahluwalia, Ekta Kapoor’s blue-eyed boy makes a foray into Bollywood as RC, the young associate who cannot get over the fact that he murdered a family in cold blood.
Scenes to die for? Quite a few. ACP Shamsher Khan kills one of Maya’s cohorts (played by Aditya Lakhia) in front of the media, police, and Lokhandwala residents. It is effective, gory, and sets the pace for the rest of the sequence. But again it is difficult to judge the tenor of the filmmaker’s ideological leanings (whether in favour of the police or ethics in general) from this one scene; however it does raise a few questions about the methods the police uses to bring criminals to its knees. At one level the film propagates the infallibility of the police’s patriotism while on the other it raises a few uncomfortable queries about the fact that criminals too need to be treated like human beings and have rightful access to the institutions of law and justice. The verbal duel between Maya and ACP Khan too is well-shot and modulated. Dutt is a model cop – uncorrupted, patriotic, and dedicated and he does a brilliant job of his role (as usual).
Yes, one more thing. The presence of just too many stars from the commercial pantheon pulled the film back a bit. But who could have played Maya better than Vivek Oberoi?
Attending a script writing workshop with Anurag Kashyap
Writing for me is catharsis. There is nothing else in the world that gives me as much pleasure than string a motley group of words together to create a sentence. The feeling of being a creator of anything, even if it is a mere sentence is too great and immense. It is for the same reason that I watch films. To fathom at the creative ability of anyone and everyone associated with it. A film is a grandiose exposition of one’s innate desires.
Thus, when I started writing my first ever script in life (thanks to Smriti), I found voice for all the distress that has pulled me in all directions possible. My protagonist is all that I can never say in public or write formally..even in a PhD thesis that I plan to write sometime in future. He fights the system but is warped in his communal consciousness. Not because he is a fanatic or a fundamentalist but because all he was always looked at with suspicion, humiliated and systematically destroyed by the society. A society that is slowly breaking down…ruthlessness and fear gnawing at its entrails. I write because I want to. It’s all that I ever have wanted to do. And yes, as Leo Rosten once said…’the only reason for being a professional writer is that you can’t help it.’
Are there any guidelines for writing a script? How long should it be? What are the essential elements of a script? These are some of the questions that came up at a workshop on script writing conducted by Anurag Kashyap in Delhi recently. I happened to be a participant there. ‘A story is each his own. There cannot be a style sheet for writing a story. It’s entirely up to you. It’s your story. Just write,’ was Anurag’s dictum for aspiring script-writers and filmmakers. ‘You need to go out there and try to make your life.’ More often than not the discussion shifted to Satya and more recently Black Friday. At one point, Anurag quipped, ‘Can we get beck to story writing? The Black Friday compliments can happen outside…’
Watching Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window followed by a reading of the original story by Cornell Woolrich of the same name on which it was based was good fun. It was fascinating to watch how a story is altered in order to adapt it for the silver screen. Anurag then told us about the way Hollywood functioned at the time of the making of Rear Window, pretty much the same way as our very own Bollywood functions today. There are certain elements that are a must for any and every screenplay, for instance a female lover, a romantic angle, and so on. It was amazing to learn the inner nuances of movie making. Anurag’s description of how Satya came about was enriching though I thought that only a Ram Gopal Varma could afford an exercise like that. There were instances that he narrated of the compromises film-makers and screen writers have to make to do their own thing.
I was however humbled by the immense insight Anurag has into world cinema. The man’s an encyclopaedia on world cinema, its origins and current trends. And I am not saying this for saying sake. He truly is. And it was great to have met him. Finally!
Thus, when I started writing my first ever script in life (thanks to Smriti), I found voice for all the distress that has pulled me in all directions possible. My protagonist is all that I can never say in public or write formally..even in a PhD thesis that I plan to write sometime in future. He fights the system but is warped in his communal consciousness. Not because he is a fanatic or a fundamentalist but because all he was always looked at with suspicion, humiliated and systematically destroyed by the society. A society that is slowly breaking down…ruthlessness and fear gnawing at its entrails. I write because I want to. It’s all that I ever have wanted to do. And yes, as Leo Rosten once said…’the only reason for being a professional writer is that you can’t help it.’
Are there any guidelines for writing a script? How long should it be? What are the essential elements of a script? These are some of the questions that came up at a workshop on script writing conducted by Anurag Kashyap in Delhi recently. I happened to be a participant there. ‘A story is each his own. There cannot be a style sheet for writing a story. It’s entirely up to you. It’s your story. Just write,’ was Anurag’s dictum for aspiring script-writers and filmmakers. ‘You need to go out there and try to make your life.’ More often than not the discussion shifted to Satya and more recently Black Friday. At one point, Anurag quipped, ‘Can we get beck to story writing? The Black Friday compliments can happen outside…’
Watching Alfred Hitchcock’s Rear Window followed by a reading of the original story by Cornell Woolrich of the same name on which it was based was good fun. It was fascinating to watch how a story is altered in order to adapt it for the silver screen. Anurag then told us about the way Hollywood functioned at the time of the making of Rear Window, pretty much the same way as our very own Bollywood functions today. There are certain elements that are a must for any and every screenplay, for instance a female lover, a romantic angle, and so on. It was amazing to learn the inner nuances of movie making. Anurag’s description of how Satya came about was enriching though I thought that only a Ram Gopal Varma could afford an exercise like that. There were instances that he narrated of the compromises film-makers and screen writers have to make to do their own thing.
I was however humbled by the immense insight Anurag has into world cinema. The man’s an encyclopaedia on world cinema, its origins and current trends. And I am not saying this for saying sake. He truly is. And it was great to have met him. Finally!
Pray for me, Brother
A R Rahman does not stop surprising me. ‘Pray for Me, Brother’ is an exceptional composition. The modulations, especially towards the middle of the song when Rahman reaches a vocal crescendo are out of this world. Gave me goose bumps. Brilliant vocals, mind blowing music, and the presence of the genius make it one in a million. Amazing!
One goes deeper and discovers that the song as been composed under the aegis of the UN and who better to lend voice and music to an idea that germinates at the end of the road for floundering humanity that A R Rahman, the epitome of cultural amalgamation and religious unity. One of India’s greatest exports to the world of international music, he deserves every accolade that he gets. The song serenades, cajoles and forces you to think. The world’s getting smaller, but every one’s having problems making the distance. There’s death, destruction and destitution. And no one’s willing to take the first step towards reconciliation. Rahman does it with this song. The song has the potential for bridging gaps wherever they exist – a great mascot of world peace and human co-existence.
The video is cutting-edge. Neat editing and cuts make it a stunning sequence. The last scene of an African-American man embracing a Caucasian white girl is symbolic of whatever the song stands for and advocates. Another still of famine-stricken children in Darfur is mind-numbing. There’s hunger and squalor. There’s pain and pity. And Rahman evokes emotions any which way. With new-found success with his immensely improved vocal strengths (with Tere Bina from Guru becoming a huge hit) the musical genius is on his way to the hall of fame. If he has not reached one already, that is.
And this, mind you is not the first time he has attempted something like this. But ‘Pray for Me, Brother’ is by far his best attempt at theme-based music. Written against poverty and hunger an in consonance with the UN Millennium Development Goals, the song is a brilliant portrayal of the urgent need for more food reaching the famine-affected people, aid reaching the war-ravaged million, and a change of heart in general.
One goes deeper and discovers that the song as been composed under the aegis of the UN and who better to lend voice and music to an idea that germinates at the end of the road for floundering humanity that A R Rahman, the epitome of cultural amalgamation and religious unity. One of India’s greatest exports to the world of international music, he deserves every accolade that he gets. The song serenades, cajoles and forces you to think. The world’s getting smaller, but every one’s having problems making the distance. There’s death, destruction and destitution. And no one’s willing to take the first step towards reconciliation. Rahman does it with this song. The song has the potential for bridging gaps wherever they exist – a great mascot of world peace and human co-existence.
The video is cutting-edge. Neat editing and cuts make it a stunning sequence. The last scene of an African-American man embracing a Caucasian white girl is symbolic of whatever the song stands for and advocates. Another still of famine-stricken children in Darfur is mind-numbing. There’s hunger and squalor. There’s pain and pity. And Rahman evokes emotions any which way. With new-found success with his immensely improved vocal strengths (with Tere Bina from Guru becoming a huge hit) the musical genius is on his way to the hall of fame. If he has not reached one already, that is.
And this, mind you is not the first time he has attempted something like this. But ‘Pray for Me, Brother’ is by far his best attempt at theme-based music. Written against poverty and hunger an in consonance with the UN Millennium Development Goals, the song is a brilliant portrayal of the urgent need for more food reaching the famine-affected people, aid reaching the war-ravaged million, and a change of heart in general.
The Amar-Shahrukh imbroglio
The Amar Singh-Shahrukh Khan controversy has been a talking point lately. My first reaction – Ha ha ha ha ha! Then the Samajwadi biggie shot himself in the foot and made disparaging lewd remarks against Gauri Khan. My reaction – what do you expect from a man like him? Further (and this, guys is the height of it all) some idiotic Samajwadi folks turned up outside Shahrukh’s house and started sloganeering against the Khan. In all of this, Khan’s kids got a real shock and started wailing. Now obviously, it did not go down well with Shahrukh. He came out all guns blazing saying that he was a ‘demented Pathan’ and was madly protective about his family, would do anything to protect then, etc.,etc.
This Amar Singh is a strange character. He is forever part of filmi gossip for all the worng reasons. When Amitabh Bachchan wants to save up on import duty, he gets Singh to explain (to the media and everyone who cares to lend an ear) that Abhishek Bachchan’s birthday gift was his car after all which (for whatever reason) remained parked in the Bachchan residence! And he expected everyone to believe that. Well…
He also gets into certain dangerous liaisons with lissome Bollywood beauties, has lovey-dovey talks with them over the telephone, and remarks ‘meri abhinetriyon se achchi jaan pehchaan hai’. Haan haan aapki baat hum samajhte hain.
But what attracts men like him to Bollywood? We have ample examples of politicians hobnobbing with industry biggies in both reel and real life. Amar Singh is the epitome of the wily politician on the prowl in Dreamland. And whom does he have for company? The Bachchans, no less. Being enveloped in controversy is routine for him. What makes me curious about the guy is his clout in the industry. It also makes me scared. If the industry is somehow controlled (maybe not directly) by people like him, it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out the way ahead for the industry. Why can’t the industry rid itself of someone like him and get on with making ‘good’ films? I seriously think we need to think beyond ‘certain fixities’ in Bollywood and move on. There’s simply too much talent lying around.
This Amar Singh is a strange character. He is forever part of filmi gossip for all the worng reasons. When Amitabh Bachchan wants to save up on import duty, he gets Singh to explain (to the media and everyone who cares to lend an ear) that Abhishek Bachchan’s birthday gift was his car after all which (for whatever reason) remained parked in the Bachchan residence! And he expected everyone to believe that. Well…
He also gets into certain dangerous liaisons with lissome Bollywood beauties, has lovey-dovey talks with them over the telephone, and remarks ‘meri abhinetriyon se achchi jaan pehchaan hai’. Haan haan aapki baat hum samajhte hain.
But what attracts men like him to Bollywood? We have ample examples of politicians hobnobbing with industry biggies in both reel and real life. Amar Singh is the epitome of the wily politician on the prowl in Dreamland. And whom does he have for company? The Bachchans, no less. Being enveloped in controversy is routine for him. What makes me curious about the guy is his clout in the industry. It also makes me scared. If the industry is somehow controlled (maybe not directly) by people like him, it does not take a rocket scientist to figure out the way ahead for the industry. Why can’t the industry rid itself of someone like him and get on with making ‘good’ films? I seriously think we need to think beyond ‘certain fixities’ in Bollywood and move on. There’s simply too much talent lying around.
Down with K serials
Just following up on the ‘domesticated’ comment Amitabh Bachchan made…well not so recently. Reminds of the K serials! Those dreaded, dreadful, awful, disgusting, diatribes against the liberation of women and everything that comes with it. I sometimes wonder if Ekta Kapoor actually believes in whatever she makes. I hope not for if she does then hells nigh! Women of the world unite! Against this nauseating assault on womanhood, modernity, and the progression of thought that does not seem to end and trust me there’s more muck coming from the K stable.
Its good, in these days of the Parvatis and the Tulsis to rewind and go back to the era of Humlog and Buniyad, not to forget the delightfully hilarious Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi and of course Mr Yogi, a unique celebration of the common man and his uncommon dreams.
All we get to watch today are painfully slow and agonizing stories (or should I say profiles?) of ultra-rich, incredulous, pathetic families where women are made to dress in ruddy chiffons and lounge around the house indulging in the worst kinds of familial intrigues. The men have no jobs (or so it seems). Oh yeah! They happen to be business tycoons and own plush mahogany offices…but rarely seem to go to work. Tycoons too need to work, don’t they?
I am reminded of Shridhar Kshirsagar’s Khandaan broadcast on good old Doordarshan some twenty years back. A gripping story of two feuding business families, skillfully crafted. Just that my father did not allow me to watch it (said I was too young for a programme like that, etc). However, I vaguely remember Shekhar Kapur and Kitu Gidwani in pivotal roles. Later, I happened to read some commentaries on the serial. Mahesh Bhatt’s Swabhimaan too succeeded in holding my interest for a while but as in all things written by Shobha De, the serial too went the sex-and-sleaze way.
They no longer make the Byomkesh Bakshi’s and the Karamchand’s any more, do they? Even Tehkikat was not bad. Zee made an attempt some time back with Mohandas BA LLB, a nice amalgam of suspense and humour. The downfall has been rather dramatic what with Saat Phere..Saloni ka Safar being the highest TRP-earner on Zee (or is it across the board, I don’t know).
TV is rather unbearable to watch, what say? (Except if there is some cricket happening.)
Its good, in these days of the Parvatis and the Tulsis to rewind and go back to the era of Humlog and Buniyad, not to forget the delightfully hilarious Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi and of course Mr Yogi, a unique celebration of the common man and his uncommon dreams.
All we get to watch today are painfully slow and agonizing stories (or should I say profiles?) of ultra-rich, incredulous, pathetic families where women are made to dress in ruddy chiffons and lounge around the house indulging in the worst kinds of familial intrigues. The men have no jobs (or so it seems). Oh yeah! They happen to be business tycoons and own plush mahogany offices…but rarely seem to go to work. Tycoons too need to work, don’t they?
I am reminded of Shridhar Kshirsagar’s Khandaan broadcast on good old Doordarshan some twenty years back. A gripping story of two feuding business families, skillfully crafted. Just that my father did not allow me to watch it (said I was too young for a programme like that, etc). However, I vaguely remember Shekhar Kapur and Kitu Gidwani in pivotal roles. Later, I happened to read some commentaries on the serial. Mahesh Bhatt’s Swabhimaan too succeeded in holding my interest for a while but as in all things written by Shobha De, the serial too went the sex-and-sleaze way.
They no longer make the Byomkesh Bakshi’s and the Karamchand’s any more, do they? Even Tehkikat was not bad. Zee made an attempt some time back with Mohandas BA LLB, a nice amalgam of suspense and humour. The downfall has been rather dramatic what with Saat Phere..Saloni ka Safar being the highest TRP-earner on Zee (or is it across the board, I don’t know).
TV is rather unbearable to watch, what say? (Except if there is some cricket happening.)
The Ideology of the Hindi film
Have been reading a bit on the ideology of Hindi films in the past few weeks. Preparing to write a PhD proposal on construction of Muslim identity in popular Hindi cinema and hence the necessity to read. Not to say that reading has everything to do with studies and academics. Absolutely not. Anyhow, one of the first things I learnt was that while Hollywood follows the organic style of film-making where the story forms the core of all other activities associated with the production of the film, the Bombay film industry has since the early days followed the heterogenous method i.e. the finished product is an amalgamation of various specialized arts such as dance, music, story writing, comedy, etc. This encompasses the ‘formula’ that most Hindi films thrive on. A rather linear differentiation. Don’t know if films like Ankur and Manthan earlier and some of the better films being made in Bombay would fit either way.
The other interesting classification is the typographical differentiation between genres. New wave cinema, middle-class cinema, darsanic socials, musicals, and so on. While the earliest films like Raja Harishchandra and Alam Ara (of the silent era) can be classified under the darsanic social category, others like Raj Kapoor’s Sangam fall primarily in the social mould. Bhuvan Shome by Mrinal Sen and Satyajit Ray’s master works all fall under the new wave cinema category. Shyam Benegal’s Manthan and Ankur are some other works in the new wave cinema category.
The rise of the subaltern hero is exemplified in the grand and prolonged success that Amitabh Bachchan enjoyed in a period of great churning for the India polity given the socialist leanings of the policies of the Indira Gandhi government. This, as I see it is the single biggest epoch making event in the history of Indian politics in conjunction with popular Hindi cinema. The tide was changing, the common man was the flavour. Zanjeer, Deewar and Sholay, the three Salim-Javed-Amitabh blockbusters made new ground where the new political class was being feted and celebrated.
Some questions that come to my mind straightaway. What genres can we classify films like Black Friday as? Noir perhaps? Is it organic film-making? Perhaps. Will need to do more reading to figure than one out…any help is welcome.
The other interesting classification is the typographical differentiation between genres. New wave cinema, middle-class cinema, darsanic socials, musicals, and so on. While the earliest films like Raja Harishchandra and Alam Ara (of the silent era) can be classified under the darsanic social category, others like Raj Kapoor’s Sangam fall primarily in the social mould. Bhuvan Shome by Mrinal Sen and Satyajit Ray’s master works all fall under the new wave cinema category. Shyam Benegal’s Manthan and Ankur are some other works in the new wave cinema category.
The rise of the subaltern hero is exemplified in the grand and prolonged success that Amitabh Bachchan enjoyed in a period of great churning for the India polity given the socialist leanings of the policies of the Indira Gandhi government. This, as I see it is the single biggest epoch making event in the history of Indian politics in conjunction with popular Hindi cinema. The tide was changing, the common man was the flavour. Zanjeer, Deewar and Sholay, the three Salim-Javed-Amitabh blockbusters made new ground where the new political class was being feted and celebrated.
Some questions that come to my mind straightaway. What genres can we classify films like Black Friday as? Noir perhaps? Is it organic film-making? Perhaps. Will need to do more reading to figure than one out…any help is welcome.
What all was wrong with the 52nd Filmfare Awards?
Kangana Ranaut getting the Face of the Year takes the cake for me. You know guys, we are a star-starved society, we crave for icons...and Hrithik Roshan with his gymn-toned body and chiselled looks is the perfect candidate for the title…at least for the unhappy millions for whom movies are a way of getting away from daily drudgery. So Hrithik did not get the award for his performance (or should I say non-performance) in Dhoom 2 (such a bad film, it was funny to see it getting nominated). The man got the award precisely because we are slaves of the star-system in Bollywood and will do everything to keep things the way they are. So year after year, the Roshans, the Bachchans and the Kapoors will keep getting undeserved awards.
Though Fanaa was a crappy film, Kajol’s performance was above-average, if not one of her best. Deserved the award? I don’t know…
Has anyone ever considered the fact that the awards only reinforce stereotypes about actors? How many average-looking actors have won awards in the past many years? It’s all about looks in Bollywood. Or so it seems. A Deepak Dobriyal would never be nominated for the Best Supporting Actor category, would he? Such a pity. Abhishek Bachchan for KANK. Well, that movie was so bad that it being on the nominations list is the saddest day for cinema and art. It does not deserve to be called a film. And so, anyone getting an ‘award’ for that bakwaas film has got to be a case of ‘aur koi nahin mila to isko de diya’. Then again it sepaks volumes for the value we attach to art and commerce in cinema. Karan Johar is the prince of moolah and lo and behold, his movie however pathetic will end up getting nominations if not awards. And those who missed out on the Ash-wiping-her-tears act when would be mom-in-law Jaya Bachchan received some special award (yawn!), you missed the farce of the year. The fakeness of the whole act makes me cringe. It was disgustingly phony, so hypocritical that I was guffawing my guts out. I don’t know about you guys but that woman (Aish) is the epitome of pretence.
Though Fanaa was a crappy film, Kajol’s performance was above-average, if not one of her best. Deserved the award? I don’t know…
Has anyone ever considered the fact that the awards only reinforce stereotypes about actors? How many average-looking actors have won awards in the past many years? It’s all about looks in Bollywood. Or so it seems. A Deepak Dobriyal would never be nominated for the Best Supporting Actor category, would he? Such a pity. Abhishek Bachchan for KANK. Well, that movie was so bad that it being on the nominations list is the saddest day for cinema and art. It does not deserve to be called a film. And so, anyone getting an ‘award’ for that bakwaas film has got to be a case of ‘aur koi nahin mila to isko de diya’. Then again it sepaks volumes for the value we attach to art and commerce in cinema. Karan Johar is the prince of moolah and lo and behold, his movie however pathetic will end up getting nominations if not awards. And those who missed out on the Ash-wiping-her-tears act when would be mom-in-law Jaya Bachchan received some special award (yawn!), you missed the farce of the year. The fakeness of the whole act makes me cringe. It was disgustingly phony, so hypocritical that I was guffawing my guts out. I don’t know about you guys but that woman (Aish) is the epitome of pretence.
Thakeray vs. Black Friday
So Bal Thackeray wants to ban Black Friday. Says the film portrays Dawood ibrahim and the perpetrators of the 1993 Bombay blasts as heroes. Not surprising at all. Doesn’t Thackeray belong to the same gang that brought down the mosque at Ayodhya and slaughtered Muslims by the dozen in Gujarat? he is the skewed yet a living breathing manifestation of the rot that has set into the society we live in. he symbolizes the beliefs and prejudices of millions of Indians across the board. He is the epitome of the mythical entity Golwalkar called the Hindu Rashtra, triumphantly bandied about by his footsoldiers in the RSS, VHP, and Bajrang Dal. Thackeray stands for the political project that has been the cause of the most heinous crimes against humanity. Can he let a film go?
Defaming and demeaning Black Friday would give him his lost teeth. He is raring to go after the victory at the BMC hustings. Is it a surprise that he makes an unqualified statement like that? The rightist fringe has been making anti-Black Friday noises for long saying that the film ‘de-demonizes’ the (so-called) terrorists, almost ‘humanizes’ them. While they are engaged in a project that does just the opposite – demonizing the Muslims as a community. Black Friday goes against the grain, or so it would seem to those gaping out of the loony bin.
But can he ban the film? He does not hold a constitutional position, a solace to those who make up the ‘progressives’ in India, a horribly miniscule minority. But he wields immense clout with the badshahs of badmashi, the goons who can be called upon to destroy property and even lives within minutes. Therefore, if Thackeray calls for a ban, theatre owners would end up shuddering. What if their bread and butter is burnt down or broken or something? And the law enforcement agencies don’t give a damn. So a ban call might just end up working. And no one will raise a voice. Because India is already a Hindu Rashtra for many, in thought and practice. And Hindu Rashtra does not tolerate truth.
Defaming and demeaning Black Friday would give him his lost teeth. He is raring to go after the victory at the BMC hustings. Is it a surprise that he makes an unqualified statement like that? The rightist fringe has been making anti-Black Friday noises for long saying that the film ‘de-demonizes’ the (so-called) terrorists, almost ‘humanizes’ them. While they are engaged in a project that does just the opposite – demonizing the Muslims as a community. Black Friday goes against the grain, or so it would seem to those gaping out of the loony bin.
But can he ban the film? He does not hold a constitutional position, a solace to those who make up the ‘progressives’ in India, a horribly miniscule minority. But he wields immense clout with the badshahs of badmashi, the goons who can be called upon to destroy property and even lives within minutes. Therefore, if Thackeray calls for a ban, theatre owners would end up shuddering. What if their bread and butter is burnt down or broken or something? And the law enforcement agencies don’t give a damn. So a ban call might just end up working. And no one will raise a voice. Because India is already a Hindu Rashtra for many, in thought and practice. And Hindu Rashtra does not tolerate truth.
Why did Mani Ratnam make Guru?
Why did Mani Ratnam make Guru? From a glowing tribute to the spirit of human enterprise to the grittiest film ever made, the film has received accolades from all over. Genuine or generated..I don’t know. The media savvy of the people associated with the film could be one reason why the film has made it with four and five stars in newspapers and magazines across the board except Outlook. I admire Namrata Joshi for her scathing comments.
Guru is a bad film. Period. The brilliant camera-work by Rajiv Menon, artistic editing and great music notwithstanding. The film falls flat. It lacks character. It is easy to go on to the Reliance website, access the history section and get a lowdown on the rise of the company, the way in which shareholders multiplied…and so on. Why would anyone want to see it on celluloid? The propagandist nature of the film is particularly uncomfortable. Guru is blatant, in places it is even shameless. It is preachy. One does not need Abhishek Bachchan (aka Gurukant Desai) to pontificate on how Gandhi had broken the law 40 years ago only to be matched by an industrialist who flouts custom duties and all the rules, regulations, and laws of the land to end up as a tycoon. The comparison with Gandhi is where the film falters. It can only elicit guffaws and not cheers.
Ratnam also does a U-turn from his heady Yuva days and indulges in visual and verbal left-bashing. (Comrades, do we need any more bashing? Hasn’t enough been done already?) Manik Dasgupta and his crusading reporter Shyan Saxena played by Mithun Chakraborty and R Madhavan respectively are somehow in a rather sinister and cruel manner portrayed as villains who are out to get the man of the moment.
We can surely do without gutless films like Guru. If the mantra is ‘play safe’ then I am afraid, we are only running against time…not with it!
Guru is a bad film. Period. The brilliant camera-work by Rajiv Menon, artistic editing and great music notwithstanding. The film falls flat. It lacks character. It is easy to go on to the Reliance website, access the history section and get a lowdown on the rise of the company, the way in which shareholders multiplied…and so on. Why would anyone want to see it on celluloid? The propagandist nature of the film is particularly uncomfortable. Guru is blatant, in places it is even shameless. It is preachy. One does not need Abhishek Bachchan (aka Gurukant Desai) to pontificate on how Gandhi had broken the law 40 years ago only to be matched by an industrialist who flouts custom duties and all the rules, regulations, and laws of the land to end up as a tycoon. The comparison with Gandhi is where the film falters. It can only elicit guffaws and not cheers.
Ratnam also does a U-turn from his heady Yuva days and indulges in visual and verbal left-bashing. (Comrades, do we need any more bashing? Hasn’t enough been done already?) Manik Dasgupta and his crusading reporter Shyan Saxena played by Mithun Chakraborty and R Madhavan respectively are somehow in a rather sinister and cruel manner portrayed as villains who are out to get the man of the moment.
We can surely do without gutless films like Guru. If the mantra is ‘play safe’ then I am afraid, we are only running against time…not with it!
Monday, February 12, 2007
Cinema at its best
I have spent the weekend watching the two most powerful films made by two men who belong to this very woebegone and insensitive society that we have become. Let me start writing about the films with some reactions from the theatres. Parzania. Catcalls, laughter, giggles, Accha..! Oh ho! Black Friday. Why don’t you go away to Pakistan? Jai Shri Ram, more catcalls, more laughter, jeers…the works. The discerning Indian audience that we keep gloating over is nothing short of a brute, incongruous, pathetic, jingoistic, fundamentalist, fascist group of individuals. At least that is what my experience of watching these films in a social melee has been. Not surprising then that while Parzania has not seen the light of day in the one state that needs to see the film more than anyone else, Black Friday has been released without a hitch in the same state. The reasons are not hard to find.
I
Parzania not only indicts the Sangh Parivar for the 2002 genocide in Gujarat, it showcases the pain of one family to exemplify the scars of a society. What transpired in Gujarat was not only a blot on the face of Gujarat, the birthplace of Gandhi, an iconoclast of peace, it is a black chapter in the history of contemporary India. A human failing of monolithic proportions, the society in Gujarat is polarized beyond compare. Parzania says it all and much more. The film begins, and rightly so with a paen to the Almighty in the background that can be translated loosely as ‘What happened to the land of Gandhi?’ What really happened in the land of Gandhi? Parzania shows us what exactly.
The neighbourhood banter, the gruesome bloodletting, the pain, the anguish, the agony of living in relief camps, the inept, corrupt, and communalized police force, the spiritual quest for answers when all else fails is captured in vivid detail. The rioting mobs prepared with saffron bands, tridents, swords and petrol bombs converging on the Mohammadi Mansion, Muslim men calling up the police to be told ‘We have no orders to save you!’, the young Parsi mother screaming ‘I am a Parsi’ to avoid being attacked, the Hindu neighbour refusing to open the door to take the Parsi children in only because they were not Hindus pose a few vehement questions. That the VHP went door to door flagging Hindu houses and businesses leaving out the Muslim establishments to make things easier for their foot soldiers, listing out families by name, religion and caste a few days before the Godhra train burning incident, stockpiling LPG cylinders and other inflammable items for quick combustion with the active participation of women is common knowledge which is trumpeted as an attempt by whiny secularists to inflict insult upon Gujarat’s wounds by the right wing zealots in power in the state.
The film is woven together by the enraged renditions of an alchoholic American research scholar, in Ahmedabad to discover Gandhi. His dilapidated typewriter becomes the slate on which Gujarat’s bloodiest month get etched for posterity. The facts are there for everyone to see. Parzania does not make any illegitimate claims, it does not digress from the moot point, finding the lost boy Azhar Mody (Parzan Peethawala in the film), it does not tells us anything we don’t already know. Rahul Dholakia has only brought it all together to tell a story that needs to be told today to avoid perpetuating hate in future. The story of the Mody’s needs to be told because they represent the Gujarat of today, a silent tinderbox. One can only guess when the next riot will break out. A genocide of the kind that took place in 2002 can happen again. Cities and towns in Gujarat are strewn with markers of hate and mistrust. ‘Welcome to Hindurashtra’ say hoardings and placards along the railway line that runs through the state. The Bajrang Dal has succeeded in keeping Parzania out of theatres in the state. Can the next genocide be far away?
II
Anurag Kashyap’s Black Friday, based on S Hussain Zaidi’s book by the same name is an audio-visual documentation of the meticulous planning that went into the 1993 bomb blasts in Mumbai that ripped the city apart, searing the metropolis to its soul. However, this is not what makes Black Friday an example of good film-making. Black Friday is one of the finest films to hit the marquee in the history of Indian cinema because of the following reasons:
It does not shy away from taking names. No names have been changed. The characters are flesh and blood. And more importantly, they are true to the story.
The film makes no bones about what actually led to the blasts. The Babri Masjid demolition, the riots of January 1992 in which a disproportionate number of Muslims were butchered, the inability of the police to punish those responsible for the Bombay riots, the collective angst of a battered and bruised community are all there. The fact that Tiger Memon vowed to avenge the burning down of his office by bringing the city down to its knees is startlingly captured by what the director has called the hidden camera – a particularly effective style of film-making. Black Friday stands testimony to that.
The film makes no attempt to gloss over the real provocation for Memon, his aides, and underworld don Dawood Ibrahim. The Masjid demolition footage is brilliantly interwoven into the screenplay. Kashyap’s film is candid, as candid as Badshah Khan who rattles away his reasons for participating in the conspiracy. Khan becomes the epitome of Muslim anger.
The police is not glorified. The fact that third degree torture methods were used to gather information and crack the case is established and known. The film only reiterates it. The fact that hundreds of innocent Muslims were detained without reason, beaten up, the women humiliated and molested to make the men sing is portrayed vividly. Just so that the viewer knows that ‘an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.’
The actors are brilliant. I for one thank Anurag Kashyap for not inflicting stars and their starry airs on the audience in a story that would have lost steam. It has been noticed that a film derails weighed down by the million dollar stars that have made Bollywood their haven. Underrated and underpaid, character actors often carry a film on their shoulders. Kay Kay Menon, Pawan Malhotra, and Aditya Shrivastava (Naseeruddin Shah and Sarika in Parzania) just did. They are so real, one can almost feel the raging anger, the fear, the trauma.
Everything works for the film. Despite two particularly long chase sequences, Black Friday succeeds in its mission. The director is telling a story here. A story that jolted the nation out of deep slumber. The seething fury in the voice of Tiger Memon is infectious. The understated silhouette of a brooding Dawood Ibrahim is used to good effect. One cannot just miss the striking resemblance the actor bears to one of the most feared men in Bombay.
Black Friday remains till the end true to most details of the case and the book with humour, though dark thrown in for good measure. Kashyap thus has made a film that other film-makers would find hard to replicate. If you think Madhur Bhandarkar is the king of reality cinema, go watch Black Friday. It will shock and shake you. If this is what the cinematic medium can do, it is a pity that its potential has been underutilized for so many decades in an industry crowded by a surfeit of fake and artificial icons, their families, and offspring.
I
Parzania not only indicts the Sangh Parivar for the 2002 genocide in Gujarat, it showcases the pain of one family to exemplify the scars of a society. What transpired in Gujarat was not only a blot on the face of Gujarat, the birthplace of Gandhi, an iconoclast of peace, it is a black chapter in the history of contemporary India. A human failing of monolithic proportions, the society in Gujarat is polarized beyond compare. Parzania says it all and much more. The film begins, and rightly so with a paen to the Almighty in the background that can be translated loosely as ‘What happened to the land of Gandhi?’ What really happened in the land of Gandhi? Parzania shows us what exactly.
The neighbourhood banter, the gruesome bloodletting, the pain, the anguish, the agony of living in relief camps, the inept, corrupt, and communalized police force, the spiritual quest for answers when all else fails is captured in vivid detail. The rioting mobs prepared with saffron bands, tridents, swords and petrol bombs converging on the Mohammadi Mansion, Muslim men calling up the police to be told ‘We have no orders to save you!’, the young Parsi mother screaming ‘I am a Parsi’ to avoid being attacked, the Hindu neighbour refusing to open the door to take the Parsi children in only because they were not Hindus pose a few vehement questions. That the VHP went door to door flagging Hindu houses and businesses leaving out the Muslim establishments to make things easier for their foot soldiers, listing out families by name, religion and caste a few days before the Godhra train burning incident, stockpiling LPG cylinders and other inflammable items for quick combustion with the active participation of women is common knowledge which is trumpeted as an attempt by whiny secularists to inflict insult upon Gujarat’s wounds by the right wing zealots in power in the state.
The film is woven together by the enraged renditions of an alchoholic American research scholar, in Ahmedabad to discover Gandhi. His dilapidated typewriter becomes the slate on which Gujarat’s bloodiest month get etched for posterity. The facts are there for everyone to see. Parzania does not make any illegitimate claims, it does not digress from the moot point, finding the lost boy Azhar Mody (Parzan Peethawala in the film), it does not tells us anything we don’t already know. Rahul Dholakia has only brought it all together to tell a story that needs to be told today to avoid perpetuating hate in future. The story of the Mody’s needs to be told because they represent the Gujarat of today, a silent tinderbox. One can only guess when the next riot will break out. A genocide of the kind that took place in 2002 can happen again. Cities and towns in Gujarat are strewn with markers of hate and mistrust. ‘Welcome to Hindurashtra’ say hoardings and placards along the railway line that runs through the state. The Bajrang Dal has succeeded in keeping Parzania out of theatres in the state. Can the next genocide be far away?
II
Anurag Kashyap’s Black Friday, based on S Hussain Zaidi’s book by the same name is an audio-visual documentation of the meticulous planning that went into the 1993 bomb blasts in Mumbai that ripped the city apart, searing the metropolis to its soul. However, this is not what makes Black Friday an example of good film-making. Black Friday is one of the finest films to hit the marquee in the history of Indian cinema because of the following reasons:
It does not shy away from taking names. No names have been changed. The characters are flesh and blood. And more importantly, they are true to the story.
The film makes no bones about what actually led to the blasts. The Babri Masjid demolition, the riots of January 1992 in which a disproportionate number of Muslims were butchered, the inability of the police to punish those responsible for the Bombay riots, the collective angst of a battered and bruised community are all there. The fact that Tiger Memon vowed to avenge the burning down of his office by bringing the city down to its knees is startlingly captured by what the director has called the hidden camera – a particularly effective style of film-making. Black Friday stands testimony to that.
The film makes no attempt to gloss over the real provocation for Memon, his aides, and underworld don Dawood Ibrahim. The Masjid demolition footage is brilliantly interwoven into the screenplay. Kashyap’s film is candid, as candid as Badshah Khan who rattles away his reasons for participating in the conspiracy. Khan becomes the epitome of Muslim anger.
The police is not glorified. The fact that third degree torture methods were used to gather information and crack the case is established and known. The film only reiterates it. The fact that hundreds of innocent Muslims were detained without reason, beaten up, the women humiliated and molested to make the men sing is portrayed vividly. Just so that the viewer knows that ‘an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.’
The actors are brilliant. I for one thank Anurag Kashyap for not inflicting stars and their starry airs on the audience in a story that would have lost steam. It has been noticed that a film derails weighed down by the million dollar stars that have made Bollywood their haven. Underrated and underpaid, character actors often carry a film on their shoulders. Kay Kay Menon, Pawan Malhotra, and Aditya Shrivastava (Naseeruddin Shah and Sarika in Parzania) just did. They are so real, one can almost feel the raging anger, the fear, the trauma.
Everything works for the film. Despite two particularly long chase sequences, Black Friday succeeds in its mission. The director is telling a story here. A story that jolted the nation out of deep slumber. The seething fury in the voice of Tiger Memon is infectious. The understated silhouette of a brooding Dawood Ibrahim is used to good effect. One cannot just miss the striking resemblance the actor bears to one of the most feared men in Bombay.
Black Friday remains till the end true to most details of the case and the book with humour, though dark thrown in for good measure. Kashyap thus has made a film that other film-makers would find hard to replicate. If you think Madhur Bhandarkar is the king of reality cinema, go watch Black Friday. It will shock and shake you. If this is what the cinematic medium can do, it is a pity that its potential has been underutilized for so many decades in an industry crowded by a surfeit of fake and artificial icons, their families, and offspring.
Thursday, January 04, 2007
Delhi
If there is any city in the world that I have known well, it is Delhi. From that foggy, bitterly cold winter night in 1982 when I – a little tramp of a toddler – flitted about on Platform Number 5 of the Delhi junction trying to jump on to the rail tracks only to be pulled away by my mother struggling with a devil of a child, to 2007, the city has grown, evolved, changed, mesmerized, ridiculed, maneuvered, stormed ahead, hankered back, played games, risen to the occasion, terrorized, been terrorized…held by strings by the gnarled hands of time.
Delhi is often compared to Mumbai, the ephemeral city of dreams where living and living well can, at times only be a distant dream. The yardsticks do vary. While fashionistas and style gurus would bow a hundred times to the charms of the intoxication that is Mumbai and lend a perfunctory yet squiggly stare to the auntyji dressing that Delhi is famous for, political commentators, twitching their thumb would point towards the hot seat of power that perches itself right here. The hump on Raisina Hill never goes out of fashion, you see and the circular arena of unbridled commotion – the Parliament House – also makes laws for the country.
This is Delhi, a thronging part-metropolis, part-Punju fortress. For many their own city of dreams. For others the epitome of jittery rush for survival and life. And the little girl who arrived here on the cold winter night in 1982 loves Delhi...!
Childhood in Delhi is ensconced in the soothing memory of the roadside eatery near school with its piping hot samosas and a pitcher of chilled Campa Cola, a yesteryear variant of the jazzed-up modern day Coke, the winter afternoon siestas in the balcony caressed by streaming sunlight, long drives through the tree-lined avenues of the diplomatic enclaves and the lanes boasting of the power elite, and the weekend trip to Children’s Park and India Gate for fun on the swings, popcorn, and a scoop of ice-cream.
Sultry summer nights would give way to shivers as winters danced in gently goading the elders to prepare for a long haul. Heaters would face repairs even as new ones arrived at the painful collapse of the old ones. Papa would run up and down the adjoining lane looking for the electrician to fix the geysers. Winters are fun in Delhi. The food even better.
Aloo tikkis sizzle as much as bar-be-qued chicken wings. Ask the Purani Dilliwala and you would know food. Just what can beat the roghan josh and sheermal at Karim’s? Try the mutton korma! Buffeted by run-down facades of old imperial structures, the spread-out eatery is a reason to smile, something that makes Delhi special. If you think Karim’s a tad far, get across to lighted evenings at the Nizamuddin dargah. Flanked by ramshackle shops that sell everything from atrocious artificial jewellery to beef kababs, the dargah beckons one and all, the smooth strains of the qawwali wafting through the by-lanes. Jumme raat at Nizamuddin is special. How sindoor-smudged Hindu housewives, burqa-clad Muslim begums, and blanched Caucasian tourists can sit together, enthralled by the beating drums and singing voices rising to a crescendo, oblivious to the strife torn world outside, without the slightest indication of mistrust and hate, is beyond me? But as they say, Delhi can surprise you in many ways.
What can be more surprising than the tall minarets, pristine balustrades, shimmering courtyards, and glistening domes of the Jama Masjid. A study in contrast to the grimy gallis spread around. The quintessential symbol of the Dilli of the Mughals followed by miles towards the south by the thronging Chandni Chowk, where masjid and mandir sit cheek by jowl. Without fuss!
Did anyone say ‘Yes, Delhi does breathe…’? In more ways than one. The walls of the tombs and fort ruins dotting the rapidly developing landscape gently move in a bizarre symphony of pain and ingratitude. Perhaps ashamed at the present.
Slowly and garrulously the city has settled into cosy matrimony with the preposterous, ignominious, often bestial artifacts of unabashed, rampant consumerism. The monuments, mosques and dargahs still stand. Only the green swathes around and across the city have melted into oblivion and rough concrete has overtaken the silky visage of the City of the Djinns.
As evening falls and the city lights up, the muezzin calls the faithful to prayer while temples erupt with the clangs of bells and cymbals, raising a paean to the almighty. Nothing else can match the magic of the ensuing jugalbandi. Delhi as stood witness to centuries of togetherness, the reality that many parts of India have lost touch with. Is Delhi losing it too? Maybe times have changed and Delhiwalas do not pay attention to it anymore. They too have started rushing through life ignoring the melancholy resolve of those who have been before.
The hauntings never do stop. Every spire in the city has a story to tell. Perhaps even a fable. If only someone had the time and patience to lend an ear. Voices come from beyond. And Delhi remains embedded in the minds of visitors and denizens alike. They say ‘You can leave Delhi, but Delhi will never leave you.’ I have experienced it. My heart has cringed for the city I love. The ubiquitous present filling in for a grand, glorious past. And yet, the little girl who stepped into Delhi for the first time in 1982 loves Delhi. For it remains a city like no other!
Delhi is often compared to Mumbai, the ephemeral city of dreams where living and living well can, at times only be a distant dream. The yardsticks do vary. While fashionistas and style gurus would bow a hundred times to the charms of the intoxication that is Mumbai and lend a perfunctory yet squiggly stare to the auntyji dressing that Delhi is famous for, political commentators, twitching their thumb would point towards the hot seat of power that perches itself right here. The hump on Raisina Hill never goes out of fashion, you see and the circular arena of unbridled commotion – the Parliament House – also makes laws for the country.
This is Delhi, a thronging part-metropolis, part-Punju fortress. For many their own city of dreams. For others the epitome of jittery rush for survival and life. And the little girl who arrived here on the cold winter night in 1982 loves Delhi...!
Childhood in Delhi is ensconced in the soothing memory of the roadside eatery near school with its piping hot samosas and a pitcher of chilled Campa Cola, a yesteryear variant of the jazzed-up modern day Coke, the winter afternoon siestas in the balcony caressed by streaming sunlight, long drives through the tree-lined avenues of the diplomatic enclaves and the lanes boasting of the power elite, and the weekend trip to Children’s Park and India Gate for fun on the swings, popcorn, and a scoop of ice-cream.
Sultry summer nights would give way to shivers as winters danced in gently goading the elders to prepare for a long haul. Heaters would face repairs even as new ones arrived at the painful collapse of the old ones. Papa would run up and down the adjoining lane looking for the electrician to fix the geysers. Winters are fun in Delhi. The food even better.
Aloo tikkis sizzle as much as bar-be-qued chicken wings. Ask the Purani Dilliwala and you would know food. Just what can beat the roghan josh and sheermal at Karim’s? Try the mutton korma! Buffeted by run-down facades of old imperial structures, the spread-out eatery is a reason to smile, something that makes Delhi special. If you think Karim’s a tad far, get across to lighted evenings at the Nizamuddin dargah. Flanked by ramshackle shops that sell everything from atrocious artificial jewellery to beef kababs, the dargah beckons one and all, the smooth strains of the qawwali wafting through the by-lanes. Jumme raat at Nizamuddin is special. How sindoor-smudged Hindu housewives, burqa-clad Muslim begums, and blanched Caucasian tourists can sit together, enthralled by the beating drums and singing voices rising to a crescendo, oblivious to the strife torn world outside, without the slightest indication of mistrust and hate, is beyond me? But as they say, Delhi can surprise you in many ways.
What can be more surprising than the tall minarets, pristine balustrades, shimmering courtyards, and glistening domes of the Jama Masjid. A study in contrast to the grimy gallis spread around. The quintessential symbol of the Dilli of the Mughals followed by miles towards the south by the thronging Chandni Chowk, where masjid and mandir sit cheek by jowl. Without fuss!
Did anyone say ‘Yes, Delhi does breathe…’? In more ways than one. The walls of the tombs and fort ruins dotting the rapidly developing landscape gently move in a bizarre symphony of pain and ingratitude. Perhaps ashamed at the present.
Slowly and garrulously the city has settled into cosy matrimony with the preposterous, ignominious, often bestial artifacts of unabashed, rampant consumerism. The monuments, mosques and dargahs still stand. Only the green swathes around and across the city have melted into oblivion and rough concrete has overtaken the silky visage of the City of the Djinns.
As evening falls and the city lights up, the muezzin calls the faithful to prayer while temples erupt with the clangs of bells and cymbals, raising a paean to the almighty. Nothing else can match the magic of the ensuing jugalbandi. Delhi as stood witness to centuries of togetherness, the reality that many parts of India have lost touch with. Is Delhi losing it too? Maybe times have changed and Delhiwalas do not pay attention to it anymore. They too have started rushing through life ignoring the melancholy resolve of those who have been before.
The hauntings never do stop. Every spire in the city has a story to tell. Perhaps even a fable. If only someone had the time and patience to lend an ear. Voices come from beyond. And Delhi remains embedded in the minds of visitors and denizens alike. They say ‘You can leave Delhi, but Delhi will never leave you.’ I have experienced it. My heart has cringed for the city I love. The ubiquitous present filling in for a grand, glorious past. And yet, the little girl who stepped into Delhi for the first time in 1982 loves Delhi. For it remains a city like no other!
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