Of a safe place to be dangerous

Published in The Bengal Post on 09.03.2013


Being an actor in suburban London was never easy. A sense of failure would embrace you even when you knew that you have chosen something that you love enough to give everything for. West End would be hard on you, with their notions and tacit principles about the foundations of the art form; and then if you happen to be an Irishman, well, then you didn’t just get used to the London weather, you became one and the same thing. So during the late 80s, as soon as he realised that acting was what he wanted to do, Daniel Day-Lewis decided to become just that. Cold sometimes, with unexpected warmth, and occasionally, just a little bit hope, but mostly, a very cynical sense of overcast days when it would rain for no rhyme or reason. All equipped to face the city he grew up in yet never feeling at home, he opened the door of the silly excuse of a house he was living in one fine morning, and received a bound script for a feature film. It was time for the unexpected warmth, he realised.

It was of course My Left Foot, a film adaptation of the autobiography of Christy Brown, a painter and an author with cerebral palsy and he was to play the title role. It was sent to him by Jim Sheridan, another Irishman who was also paddling through the shaky waters of cinema in the hope to be caught by a suitable tide. And both of them had one thing in common - they had no money. “It didn’t matter though,” Lewis said once, “the very idea of making such a thing, and the challenge that lay ahead of us, was trigger enough under the circumstances, to go all out.” Talking about which, “go all out” as a concept can be an extremely relative term. Actors do strange things to make their art better. Marlon Brando put grapes inside his mouth to look and talk in a certain way while he played Vito Corleone in the Godfather, Tom Hanks lost almost 30 kilos to look the part of an AIDS victim in Philadelphia and there are many such examples of strange, yet intimidating stories of dedication to “look the part”. Now picture this, Lewis went and spoke to several people with disabilities at the Sandymount School Clinic, where incidentally Christy used to visit from time to time, and then, he decided to lead Christy’s life, almost literally. Taking the much discussed and debated ‘method acting’ into a level that is seldom seen, Daniel Day-Lewis sat on a wheel chair, started speaking like Christy even off the camera, and stopped using most of his body parts for his daily chores, except for his left foot. “Going all out”, as a concept, suddenly started to mean something completely different.

That he won an Academy award and a BAFTA for his role is really inconsequential. For the sort of man Lewis is, awards really never mattered. In cinema, acting is like a camouflage of the actor who would completely vanish in the layers of the story. The viewer should in fact, irrespective of a sense of logic, forget that what he or she is watching is staged and not real. As romantic it might sound, Daniel Day-Lewis comes eerily close to giving you such a feeling. For you would cry for him when he struggles with his weakness (My Left Foot), pray for him when he is desperately trying to get justice for being convicted of a crime he didn’t commit (In the Name of the Father), and want to rip his guts out as he unleashes hell as a heartless butcher (Gangs of New York). Every one of his performance is a study in commitment, and the work that’s put behind each character is there for all to be seen. It’s almost like watching several people, as you forget what he did in the past as you watch him perform something in the present. Something, even Brando couldn’t really achieve. No wonder then that he does such less work, because for him to play the part like he plays, he needs to be close enough to the character to actually be it.

Of course he is a bit of a recluse, and of course he does unexpected things like go absconding for five years to do wood work in some nondescript corner of Italy for reasons he refuses to tell anyone, and of course these are all stereotypes of an artistic genius; but then when you are one, you are one. What he is not, however, is aware of what he has done and what he can do. As unbelievable it might sound, Daniel Day-Lewis is probably one of the last remaining geniuses who is so deep into the clutches of self doubt that he would perhaps be never sure of his work. “There is a certain sense of precariousness that is invigorating,” he once told New York University film professor Richard Brown during a rare one on one. He went on to talk about the absolute indispensability of the inherent sense of doubt that’s needed to create great art. “Some of the most talented people I have met, stopped in the track almost paralysed by that sense of doubt,” he said, and it is that sense of doubt that makes him so painfully choosy about the kind of roles he would take up. It is that sense of doubt, that natural feeling of restlessness that has of course led him to do a lot of other things in his life as well. Like he makes no bones of the fact that he hated, and still hates, his days at the Royal Shakespeare Company as a young actor. The self importance that was so much the quintessence of the classical dramatists smothered him to a level that his disillusionment soon became anger. He recalls that one blizzard ridden winter when he played Romeo in Romeo and Juliet and how creatively challenged the entire experience was. “They took me in the first place because I had the correct nose for classical drama,” he quips. As a lover of acting, stage should have been his home and it frankly was, but under the walls of archaic rigidity, Lewis realised he needed to escape in order to breathe.

Being under the influence of that pleasant precariousness has always been the trigger that has made him go that extra step to bring his characters alive. It didn’t matter if he had a job or not, what mattered was if he were to express, he would do it for the things he believed in. “I loved theatre, but what those people at the Royal Shakespeare could not digest was, I also loved films,” and that was something that was too big at that point of time to ignore. For classical dramatists, cinema has always been the lesser art that exists to ‘lure’ people towards ridiculous money and fame. But then, in the midst of such ideologies, Lewis was also watching Mean Streets and On the Waterfront. He was also falling in love watching Charles Laughton portray the Hunchback of Notre Dame with such ferocious intensity and yet innocence that it didn’t take him long to gauge the tremendous scope this medium of art could open up for the volcanic actor that stayed leashed within him. So he dived in with nothing to lose as so many actors have often done, and found wings to fly. Yet, what kept him company was still the ability to question, whether he was good enough.

As a boy mothered by an actress who was quite popular in the British play circles, Lewis grew up staring at a theatre (now the famous Greenwich theatre) that was re-built from ground up after being destroyed during the Second World War. It was through that theatre that Lewis came in contact with a lot of actors and realised that actors were very gentle people, something that was somehow very important to him. His tryst with acting, however, was an uncanny result of his naughtiness and even a penchant for petty crimes. It was the same reason he spent some very bad years at a boarding school, which, fortunately had a dramatics room. In his own words, “That was the only place I found to be forgiving of people like us, so it became a congregation of reprobates in a manner,” and he started acting in small time plays. Soon, that restlessness came back in a different form, as he realised the classist nature of London’s society. He told Brown that even if by culture he is an Englishman, he never really felt at home there. And it was then, through his father who was also a poet, he realised how much Dublin beckoned him. For unlike England, Ireland never gave him a sense of alienation from his own society, it was his fatherland; it was where he was always meant to be. And that comes across in his trilogy of Irish films, be it My Left Foot, Boxer or In the Name of the father, Lewis portrays the rage, disillusionment, sorrow and pain of the Irish society with so much ease, as if this was what he was meant to do.

His method is so intense, that with every character he plays, it takes away with it, a little bit of him. And by the time he was finished with a handful of films, he escaped to an indefinite hiatus. It would have perhaps remained the same way if his favourite director Martin Scorsese himself didn’t pursue him to come out of it to play the Butcher in the Gangs of New York. It is actually amusing to watch him talk starry eyed about the director, like a boy who just saw his favourite superhero. However, he would still be unsure. He would try and find excuses to say no to the role he is offered, and once he runs out of them, he would finally gather the courage to take it up. And once he takes it up, directors find it very difficult to differentiate where the actor ends and the character begins. Ask Stephen Spielberg and he would tell you “working with Daniel Day Lewis is an experience in itself” and you would know why, when you see him as Abraham Lincoln slouching near his window staring at the moon and fighting with the demons that plague his mind. You would know why, when he would make you smell the oil on his skin playing an oilman on a ruthless quest for wealth with an erratic shift between fatherly care and heartless coldness, as he ravages a young priest saying “I will drink your milkshake!” in There Will be Blood. You would know what heartache feels like as he quietly stares at the window of the woman he has loved all his life and walks away anyway in The Age of Innocence and you would know why Daniel Day Lewis is beyond awards and accolades. You would realise that the self doubt that he fiercely embraces, is perhaps the trepidation that lends him a muted courage to take up journeys that no one would dare to take. You would realise, if you watch him closely, why after every role he portrays, he comes out a more humble man than before. He must be feeling drained as the character leaves his body like a successful exorcism; he must be feeling a fierce lonesomeness that no amount of accolades or recognition can replace.

At a felicitation ceremony recently, his co star Sally Field said Daniel Day Lewis gave her a safe place to be dangerous. It is something a lot of his co stars and directors also share; which leads one to wonder, how much courage he must need to create that safe place around his co stars. For he himself has no such place, and he becomes a fortress that allows defiance to take wings within the limitless boundaries of his talent. He perhaps has an idea about that limitlessness, so he disguises it with trepidation, disgruntlement and doubt. He knows about that limitlessness, and that’s why he was shaking as he received his third Oscar, winning it more than anyone else, living or dead.

For now, he continues to be like the weather, swinging from the dark to the sunny, so others can dance in his sun and rain and be dangerous doing so.

The ‘almost’ love story of kitsch and Bollywood

Published in The Bengal Post on 2nd February 2013.


Irrespective of the general dislike you have for the over exaggerated and melodramatic numbers dished out by Bollywood, it would probably be difficult for you to completely ignore the poster of Rowdy Rathore. A digitally painted Akshay Kumar wears glares to hide the arrogant rage of his eyes, fingers tightly in a fist. In the background are confident brush strokes of crimson, black, yellow and orange, in an explosion of colour. You get enthralled by the raw energy of the poster, the rustic mode that almost gives you a sense of adrenalin. It’s loud, but you do not mind, it’s an antithesis of anything that’s suave or classy, but you somehow feel more drawn to this than anything else. Little do you realise, that in a way, the poster is the same melodramatic exaggeration that you have come to associate Bollywood with. You end up loving it anyway, for sometimes, it’s very difficult not to, when it comes to kitsch.

The dictionary meaning of kitsch is succinct – ‘characterized by worthless pretentiousness’. A few others describe it as excessively garish or sentimental art; usually considered in bad taste. What’s more, its etymology also is quite in line with what it has come to mean in the general sense of the term. It’s a word that entered the German language in the mid 19th century, and often was referred to as a synonym of the word ‘trash’. It came in the common tongue in the 1860s and 70s in the art markets of Munich describing, as stated above, loud art of the very cheap taste. So to begin with, ‘kitsch’ was never something that one would have ideally aspired to pursue in the aesthetically sensitive world of art.

However, it was made of stronger character. Much like the black sheep who rose against all odds in an unsuspectingly underestimating family, kitsch slowly found a very interesting space of its own in art. Mainly for its populist appeal, it became a very effective medium for the artists to use it as a statement against the elite; so ironically, it became a popular art form which, in a way, was also existential. In the mid 20th century, it was utilized to describe both objects and a way of life brought on by the urbanization and mass-production of the industrial revolution. So it touched a very complex topic about the mass culture and commercialisation of art in the society. What started off as garbage art for the less intellectual, became a counter movement to anything that was avant-garde.

The trouble with kitsch though, lies in its adaptation in other forms of art. While in painting, it can make an all encompassing statement, almost celebrating melodrama and thick sentimentality by loud colours and superfluous rendition of anything that is utterly mundane (Andy Warhol’s Banana for example), the same principle often ends up creating a less amusing appeal and more of just bad art if one tries it with cinema. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what Bollywood seems to be prescribing right now. “Cinema is a different art form, and hence, utilisation of certain aspects becomes different,” says cinematographer and filmmaker Anirban Lahiri, saying that kitsch is something that can actually enhance a film with proper utilisation. “It should be used like salt is used in cooking, if you give a lot of it, it would become too salty to taste, but the correct amount would enhance the dish.”

This underlying utilisation in the two different forms explains the difference of the quality of the posters of Rowdy Rathod, Khiladi 786 or Singham and their respective films. While their posters are impeccable illustrations of finely produced kitsch art with a generous use of colour, drama and emotion, the problem with these movies is the fact that their narratives are just that. “Kitsch in films should ideally be a means to the end,” says Avishek Mukherjee, a screenplay writer, stating that if used intelligently, it can be really interesting. Interestingly, that is something that Dabbang did very well. The tackiness was markedly shown more as a parody than it giving the impression of taking itself more seriously than required. Lahiri, a professor of film studies at the DA Film School, makes the point that one of the reasons Dabbang was intelligently made was the fact that it was, in a way, a return of the angry young man, only in a funnier avatar. “So people who have grown up on the Bachchan films of 70s and 80s were reminded of those films through Dabbang, more in a fun way than making the very same thing. And for viewers of 18 or 19 years who weren’t exposed to those films, it was a new experience altogether,” he says. Chulbul Pandey was loud, crass, disrespectful and dishonest, he was angry, but also funny at the same time, and so were the film’s colourful villains. It never really gave an impression that even for a moment, Dabbang was taking itself seriously, and that’s how kitsch works.

In sharp contrast to that, the unnecessary blowing up of cars, or the roar of the tiger to announce the arrival of an extremely angry Ajay Devgan in Singham, is neither here nor there. For Singham never really makes up its mind as to how it should be seen, as a serious action story or an over the top parody. It ends up taking itself a little too seriously than it should have and becomes neither. It’s a different matter altogether, that it is also a reproduction of something that has already worked in the south so an effort to carve out an original identity of the film itself was never the issue. Then there are movies like Son Of Sardar that misuses kitsch in other ways. SoS is something that exemplifies Lahiri’s analogy of making salt the main ingredient of the dish rather than a supporting element. It is nothing but two hours of garish content with absolutely no reason or continuity or meat or even a proper story, which might sound very unique, but at the end of the day, if those elements become the crux of the film, then the film becomes just that, jarring and garish.

Why then, do these films work? As records would proudly tell, that both Singham and Son of Sardar were able to keep the cash register ringing. And it wouldn’t be unfair of someone to come out and say that if so many people like them, then what’s so wrong with over utilisation of kitsch in films? “If you put a certain concoction of spices in a particular dish and people happen to like it, then they wouldn’t mind having the dish over and over again,” says Lahiri. Dabbang paved the way for a certain kind of films which had a serious Dabbang hangover, and people would not mind that for a while. But the problem lies with the fact that soon, they would become what they are, the same thing in different packages and something new will have to be thought about. It happened with the revenge stories in the 70s, family dramas of the mid 80s and romance in the 90s. The unfortunate part about the whole matter in the context is, as Bollywood moves on to some other tried and tested concept to overuse, it would also do a great disservice to kitsch as a potential form in Bollywood cinema. For it’s not rocket science to realise, that the both are made for each other.

Czech writer Milan Kundera once said, “"Kitsch causes two tears to flow in quick succession. The first tear says: How nice to see the children running in the grass! The second tear says: How nice to be moved, together with all mankind, by children running in the grass! It is the second tear which makes kitsch, kitsch." And it is this second tear that Bollywood has historically loved to cry. “One of the best kitsch films of Bollywood is Om Shanti Om. For it covers all the basic aspects of kitsch and at the same time uses it as a tool to tell a certain kind of story, in a certain way,” says Mukherjee. Om’s almost laughable melodrama with his even more melodramatic mother, the tribute to the cheesy song sequences of 60s, 70s and 80s, the deluge of colour in every scene reminding us the underlying lightness of the story no matter how serious the scene is, are all examples of how wonderfully Bollywood and kitsch can come together. As a classic instance of losing the plot though, OSO’s maker Farah Khan went ahead and crossed the line in Tees Maar Khan; where she decided to make the colours and the loudness and over the top drama the main elements of the film, disregarding the story completely. She used her film to express kitsch, and not the other way round, and the result was there for us to see. All TMK became was a ridiculous waste of money with nothing but stupidity to talk about.

This is the fine line that Bollywood commercial filmmakers should not cross if they want the art of kitsch to revel in their cinema. “Ideally, the characters should follow the story, but today in Bollywood, the story follows the character,” observes Lahiri, “which is fine. But when the characters themselves are not complete and are just a kitschy assemblage of certain traits, then we have a problem.” Directors often end up doing that when they make kitsch the end itself. One of the most striking memories of the 1992 film Rangeela was the bright yellow clothes that Aamir Khan wore to take his lady out on a date. We remember it not so much for the fact that it was ridiculously yellow, but because what that yellow did for the scene, and how it helped explaining the character’s inherent insecurities and also the desires that he could not express. It was garish and loud, and yet, it said much more than just that. It was of conventional bad taste, yet, that same fact very subtly took the narrative forward. That’s what kitsch can do to cinema.

Whitney Rugg from the Department of Art History, University of Chicago, observes, “Kitsch does not analyse culture but repackages and stylizes it. It reinforces established conventions, appealing to mass tastes and gratifying communal experiences.” Hence it is more like an adornment than the body to be adorned and that is something filmmakers often forget. The west has gotten over its mental blocks and has started celebrating kitsch as a respected art form. In fact, with the advent of post modernism in the 1980s, the gap between kitsch and high art has blurred further and today, much of pop art celebrates the basic ideas of kitsch. With a little awareness and effort, we can make some serious contribution in the evolution of this exciting form. It would be interesting to see whether Bollywood takes the much needed step towards more interesting content, or it loses kitsch in its characteristic sands of stereotype.

Picture courtesy: lensenth.wordpress.com

Ma, revisited.

For me, as someone who grew up in the 90s, Raveena Tandon’s wet pelvic thrusts to the beats of tip tip barse paani in that dingy cave was perhaps the first taste of sensuality. Not sexuality mind you, for that can come in a very well written raunchy porno where the story and the build up make the ultimate act sexier than it is; but this is deeper than that. It is sexuality with a certain restrain that makes you fall in love. You don’t need to know the story, and you really don’t care about what she plans to do. You see her move, and you just know, that this woman, has the power to dig trenches inside your brain and live there through a hundred Holocausts. I for one, was and am in love with Raveena Tandon in that yellow sari for those few minutes watching her seduce her man; completely ignorant of the fact that she would become some sort of a motif when it comes to sensuous rain dances in Hindi cinema.

So it was a bit sad when I watched Bhuddha Hoga Tera Baap and found out that she has made her big ass come back as a bimbo who is smitten by Amitabh Bachchan who really doesn’t give a rat’s ass about her. But she doesn’t care, she goes on playing the middle aged slut with a pretty neat body and tries to seduce him like those women who become irritating, nagging and incorrigible, not knowing what the man wants. I am sorry, but she is way better than that. If her role had a significant part to play in the storyline I would have understood, but then, I am probably being juvenile and mixing my personal feelings.

But this isn’t about that, it’s not even about an actor like Makrand Deshpande in a role that could have very easily been played by rejected Bhojpuri actors turned to unemployed mimics in the streets of Bhopal. It’s about something else. It’s about something that I have experienced before, but not in this way. It’s about watching my mom, along with a few more unknown middle aged women in the theatre, watching the big screen with stars in their eyes.

I knew that this film was a tribute to Amitabh Bachchan and his pulp cinema of 70s and 80s. I also knew that whatever he did, he was a rage amongst the Indian youth. And though I have mocked and ridiculed his histrionics in those completely brainless films, never for one moment did I not have fun watching them. Of course, now we enjoy them as films that aren’t supposed to be taken seriously, as India’s lovable kitsch films, as sources of popular culture reference for anthropologists trying to decode the pre liberalized India. But in those times, he meant much more to the Indian youth than what film stars of today mean to us. He gave them that perfect gateaway which wasn’t really too much away from reality. He was the rebel that every unemployed man wanted to become if reality had a sense of humour and allowed them to do so. He was more than a movie star, (and oh yes he was such a movie star!), he was a source of catharsis for middle and lower class India, that gave them the strength to face the reality once out of the cinema hall. There was less romance I thought, but more rage. There was less sex I thought, but more idol worship. Everything Amitabh Bachchan said or did in those films was larger than life, and it was the perfect way to instill some imagination in the dreamless eyes of people; imagination, which was not unabashed, but somehow grounded to reality.

And so as a tribute to him and his movies, watching BHTB would be like revisiting his mannerisms and confidence, which he showered on the less than ordinary and almost nondescript adversaries with a mix of wit. I knew Bachchan had a very strong female fan base, and my mom is definitely one of them. But what I didn’t know was that, he had the power to make them teenagers again. I wondered what women like my mom would be like when Bachchan used to kick those goons with his long legs so many years back. They must be fresh out of college then, getting stolen away by young men in bell button jeans and thick side locks. There would be Kishore Kumar, R.D. Burman and Bob Dylan, there would be educated naxalite movements and political emergencies, with a smattering of Eastwood and Redford westerns. And there would be Bachchan, rude, yet subtle, angry yet witty, condescending yet with a tone of modesty, a sort of rawness that has kept some space for hidden polish, standing in all his 6 feet 2 (or something like that) avatar, making the women go weak in their knees. Today, when he reminded the audience how the queue starts from where he stands, he probably wanted to collectively take all these women for a ride in the time machine. I know my mom took that ride with a delicious smile in her face.

“It’s him who is singing isn’t he,” she asked almost not wanting to hear any other answer but a yes.

“Yes, but the rap portion was by Abhishek Bachchan.”

“Which was that? The English portion? Where he keeps saying Go Meera Go?”

“Yes, there was a bit more but yes.”

“That was hardly anything. But mostly it was him right?”

At that very same moment, I thought about a few other women I know of, and I wondered how they would have reacted. I wouldn’t really bet against them reacting in any other way. But looking at my mother’s star struck and completely infatuated face, I sat back sipping my coke with a smile in mine. I realized, that beyond the expected mediocrity and a series of clichés, beyond the offensive casting of the heroine of my dreams and beyond the over the top bullshit inspired from playing-to-the-gallery genre of cinema, this film still manages to somehow rise above the average. No, not in the “so what it’s still a hit” kind of a way, but in a proper way, as a good film must be. For it would not only make the guys at the stalls throw coins at the single screen theatres, but it would also make a lot of women like my mom, become silently gushing teenagers. And for those who completely dislike these pretentious tributes to below average movies, they might just take a pinch of salt as they enter the theatre. It’s a perfect mothers’ day gift if there was one.

I for one am mighty happy. For I finally saw my star struck mom romance for two continuous hours. It was dreamy, fierce and short lived, like love stories should always be.

Feminaticism

I don’t generally adhere to criticizing someone else's thoughts when they diligently decide to articulate them in print. Some of them inspire, while most somehow manage to be labeled as analyzing and perceptive individuals who have made it a point to carry the gauntlet of western intelligentsia. And though most of their articles, I admit, grab my attention till the first or sometimes the second paragraph before I quietly move on to the sections that comment on the garb on Paris Hilton, it’s the dream of every writer to be a part of that elitist community.

But sometimes, even a mundane mind can’t help but resort to hollow shouts against certain so called commentators of popular culture. What’s more, they show their vanity by stressing on their over-the-top belief system and try to incorporate that system on every wordy essay they decide to ejaculate in the process of their intellectual masturbation. Like for instance, I happened to come across this particular article. And needless to say, the wonderful woman considers herself, and am sure quite proudly, as a feminist. And true to her clan, she also proves to the world, how anal and uptight the community can be.

I don’t know, whether it’s their inherent insecurity or their everlasting desire to connect everything with one single thought process, but when I read something like this in one of the most prestigious publications of the world, I can’t help but snort.

  “The director Christopher Nolan features heroes grieving their wives' tragic demise in a good number of his films: Memento, The Prestige and Inception. But he's not alone: Hollywood films contain more dead wives than Bluebeard's basement."

I am sure Ms. Gregory had a nice day before writing this. Walking down the wet stony London lanes lazily avoiding a drive to feel the wind slap her face. And then quietly typing the words on her laptop with a smirk on her face thinking that she has successfully done what feminists of the 21st century have been mentally conditioned to do --- Find out any single pin hole of an opportunity where the subject in question, even remotely signifies objectification of the female species.

Imagine a man writes a story about dreams and the prospect of stealing them, of manipulating them, of being a slave to them and trying to create a time line between the complex structures of dream and reality. Where buildings and townships go upside down, where mirrors face each other in an attempt to visually represent the concept of infinity, and then imagine a woman or a man (lest I objectify) sitting through all this, and thinking “why did he make the wife die and show the man growing emotionally”. It takes talent, to reach such levels of myopia.

The problem is, when these people watch anything that gives them the right to analyse or judge, they can’t decide which role they should take. For if they watch a film from the point of a normal viewer, they would start feeling a little run-of-the-mill I guess. “It’s a fantastic film. And so says everybody. But what about feminism?” And it gets ridiculous at such humongous levels that the ridicule ceases to invite a chuckle anymore. For am sure they would watch Kill Bill, which is perhaps the exact opposite situation where a woman is shown struggling through her emotions after the loss (in a way) of her husband, and come up with something like “Oh, Tarentino is trying to use his films to show women as a part of violent fantasia.” And perhaps some of them, who haven’t yet reached the levels of bullshit as the others, would probably ask their children to not watch it because of the violence and gore, while they scratch their heads to find an “insult to feminism” angle to it.

And it’s not like they don’t know what they are doing.

    “I don't want to sound like I'm down on any film or filmmaker in particular, just this godawful trope. Inception is an intelligent, thoughtful film that self-reflexively challenges ideas about narrative. But sometimes it seems like enjoying popular culture and being a feminist seem mutually exclusive. I don't want to have to turn my feminism off in the theatre just so I'm not niggled by the fact that….”

So it is a switch right? And every time she sits down to watch a movie with her preconceived notion worn loosely on her sleeve, rest assured it’s “turned on.” And then of course she shows off her ability to see both sides and talks of the mutual exclusivity. Well, if it is, then I don’t know what the point of the article is in the first place. And if it is as she says “sometimes” then those “sometimes” come a little too often for comfort.

If anyone thinks that finding such convoluted points in a movie that took ten years of imagination, and hard work that these pseudo idealistic uptight pieces of pop culture analysts can not even dream about, is intelligent writing, then I am happy being a daft prick. For they will sit and read  Lord of The Rings or watch Jerry McGuire, and just before they are going to gasp in wonder, they would stop and start objectifying anything and everything because they are that damn passionate about thrusting their so called thought process, just to show the world that they are different.

But then, how would one truly expect them to appreciate something like Inception. After all, it’s about dreams.

Of women wrapped in measuring tapes

Some things in life exist to play a certain specific role that you just can’t avoid. They will be there. You shrug your shoulders, jerk your head, jump up and down on your new mattress when your mother is not looking, avoid, run away; they will continue to breathe your air. Take Indian television for example. It’s an accepted fact that most of us can’t really avoid watching it. Whether we demean it in front of a group of friends thereby proving our intellectual fervor for things and showing our frustration about the mediocrity that so conspicuously surrounds us, or casually make an eye gesture stating that we are not from this world, and wherever we are from, we can’t relate to this bullshit, most of us come back and watch at least a part of it. Whether it’s spy cams or glycerin, film trailers or live lottery shows, on-air weddings or shocking revelations of girls and boys put in an apparently far away island, television today exposes our penchant for all that is immoral and grey so shamelessly that one has to take a moment and bow in agreement. Who knew articulate feature writers in lifestyle newspapers would analyse, if not justify voyeurism and make people nod in appraisal in moving buses and trains. Who knew that Facebook  status messages would talk about plastic wedding shows in the pretext of mocking at them. Yes we might mock, but we do watch. And after we watch, who the hell cares what we do with them, mock or revere.

But it’s not really our fault. We watch whatever we are given. We watch whatever is deemed cool at that point of time. We watch, whatever we do not get to watch but always thought in out stolen lonely moments with a smirk on the corner of our lips that it would have been nice to watch. So we see a girl watching her boyfriend touching another girl on the roof of the same building she is sitting in, and we see her cry or get angry or feel the pain. And then we see her being asked whether she wants to go up and talk to him right now, and if she says no, we see her being given a justification for why exactly she should do that. And some of us get disgusted, while some others, suspicious. Some of us get scared, while some others, just have fun. And by the end of it all, we say hello to the new age of television.

From Nukkad and Chunauti to Emotional Atyachaar, television has come a long way in this country. I remember watching a delightful film by Tapan Sinha called Golpo Holeo Shotti, it was probably a film made in the 60’s or 70’s, am not sure, and there was this art guy in an advertising firm, sketched a woman who was wrapped only by a thin swirling measuring tape. When the orthodox middle aged protagonist expressed his reservations about such an “inane” display, the artist nonchalantly stated that it’s not supposed to pass through a moral judgment, it is supposed to sell. And then he used a term called “shockumentary”- the new age documentary that will only grow in its stature. And now, it’s all about that. Being a prude was never cool.  But so wasn’t being shamelessly mediocre. But now, as far as television is concerned, mediocrity works, and hence, it is probably the coolest thing to happen in the visual art form on the small screen. From News channels to reality shows, it’s shockumentary all the way. And we love it.

But then, why would one televisionise films? Why would one try and cash in the content that is being successful on the small screen and try and make the versions in cinema? Probably because of the same reason. But then, something tells me not to appreciate it. I don’t know. Call me a hypocrite. May be because of the hugeness of the screen, may be its all a compact storyline that actually gives a conclusion to the story, or may be, at a very personal level, cinema still has managed to earn a certain sort of respect that television has lost long ago. But suddenly, I become very uncool and touchy and aware when it comes to cinema. So when I watch a couple in love being murdered and cut into pieces on camera, I don’t call it cinema. I call it sadistic orgasm. I call it pornography. I also call it very smart business because when we read all those stories on newspapers, we keep visulaising them and wonder how they would be like, and this is the answer to those questions. I call it demented display of blood and gore in the name of art.


I love the way Scorsese shows violence as a cause of someone’s loss, or a result of circumstances. I can appreciate Tarentino’s (however controversial they may be) bordering abnormal ideas and portraying them on the big screen with mind bogglingly beautiful music. I remember a lot of arguments surfaced after the release of Inglorious Basterds. And while some could not see the point of such ruthless cathartic display, I loved the film. Because somehow, I could see a story written with a lot of care to put it on the screen. Somehow I could see a man sniffing his wife’s handkerchief once before he went on to try and save a group of jews from a vicious Nazi officer. Somehow, I could feel the pain in the rhythm of the music in the midst of the blood bath.  I could see art, in some form, and I appreciate it. But I do not understand something like Love, Sex or Dhoka. It might be grammatically perfect, but I do not see art in it. But then, who am I to judge. As Sinha said, it’s shockumentary. And so might be others, but what scares me is, it’s JUST that. Nothing else. It was made in order to shock people. I can see Mr. Banerjee going up to his producer and saying, “this time let’s make something that would just shock people, shock them so much that they might not want to watch it again… but then who the hell cares… they will remember the film as something else”. So what is next? May be the last phone conversation before a plane crashes, or may be a realistic short film on the tandoor case. And while I can accept it on television, may be I am too rigid to accept this in cinema. For you see, I actually love the latter.

I don't know what ensues in the name of visual media. But I think it’s time I learnt to appreciate instantaneous shock therapy.

But then again, I went and watched Alice in Wonderland. And it wasn’t a smirk at the corner of my lips that followed, it was a smile that stretched the lips till it pained.

And thank god for such a smile.

Lovely. Nonetheless.

A close-up shot of a Colt revolver points towards the camera. And before the lid of your eye reaches the midway before batting, a subdued shot gets out of the metal leaving the steams of the fired bullet floating haphazardly like mist.

Camera moves real fast. Almost as if it’s competing with the wind that plays such an important part in the entire story. Yes it does. As it makes the overcoat on a chilly dusk flutter, or the hair of a protagonist flow, or in an absolutely Archemedian moment of cinematic effect, a stout screw quietly roll off a cupboard and drop inconspicuously on a kerosene filled tin. Does enough to make a few drops of oil fall on the floor, so that when a cigarette butt is thrown with stylish carelessness, the entire area blows up. And the back draft of that fire, also, is given life and character, by the same wind. Yes, wind, plays such an important part.

No scene is allowed to linger. Succinct. Sharp. Snip, snip, snip. Sudden change in the pace of narration (much like this paragraph). Make the dialogues incomplete, let the audience understand the rest of it. Actually no. Don’t. DON’T let the audience linger on the last scene even a second more than the scene gets over, throw in the next scene, next foul-mouthed-British-slang-showering rusty yet street smart witty man who is really pissed off with the moral system of this cruel cruel society comes in. And oh, the Brits make ‘motherfucker’ sound so deliciously delectably pretty. The Americans can never do that. A few powerful, manipulative and confident women later, build up a story line that should have something to do with heist. Why heist? Because it’s sexy. It’s immoral, yet, not harmful. It gives a scope to be smart, and of course, it gives a scope for a chase sequence.

Rock. Underground. Blues. Throw in a little bit of pop and package it in a way so you are making fun of it. And oh, when there is an explosion, massive bloodshed, hero (if there is/are any, because everything in life is grey and all that) is getting his ass badly kicked (and no, women don’t get raped, it’s too gory and vicious for Anglican packaged noir), then use music that would represent a mood which is exactly the opposite. So Symphonies, and some heartbreakingly romantic opera, and how the contrast works! Beautiful music, that rings in the ears long after the film ceases to. Showing the power of music in visual media. And in oh-so-British way.

Who said Brits are uptight? That they can stop a war in the middle because it’s their tea time and wear suits to dinner table? Welcome to the world of Guy Ritchie, a world that very few people will dislike. And I am no exception. So Robert Downey Jr. (may everything that has the power to bless, bless him and more) plays the king of deductive logic in surrealistic Victorian England. With perhaps, an attempt to shock audience by giving them a Sherlock Holmes that makes a mockery of the subtlety of Doyle. So he shows off his abs, oops, abdomen, and cracks outrageous jokes. No he isn’t tall. And yes, he has no qualms about making out with darn it, snogging, Irene Adler. And there he is, naked and gagged, with a pillow put on a strategic position, nonchalantly asking the house maid to help him out.

So it was the perfect Downey Jr.-meets-Ritchie-to-make-a-movie-adaptation of a dark detective classic that we have grown up reading and loving and has always reminded us of an overcast London with horse carriages and dimly lit lanterns which failed to brighten up the streets. So all those who went to the theatre thinking it would have the same mood as the book, or even the past films or play adaptations, obviously, don’t know much about Guy Ritchie, or for that matter, Robert Downey Jr.

Yet, the core characteristics of Holmes remain the same. Love for chemistry, violin (though comically shown to make fun), obnoxious nature, compulsive loner and stylishly eccentric. They were all there. But in three to four doses more than the original character perhaps. And I loved it. For me, it was such a refreshing way of seeing the world of Baker Street. And other than that crow as a symbol of murder, there was nothing really dumb or obvious in its obviousness. If Ritchie had a world of his own, then Arthur Conan Doyle would have written Sherlock Holmes just like this.

But for some inexplicable reason, I have forgotten most of the film, the minute I came out of a particularly crowded Sterling theatre. But then I realized, that’s exactly what Ritchie movies are like. Forgettable pieces of fun and gore, with razor sharp editing and a storyline that’s written to support the movements of camera. And I say to myself, that thank god it was a different story. Or imagine watching The Hound of Baskervilles, without soul.

And oh, this remains incomplete without a mention of Jude Law. The man gives a heart to even a Ritchie film.

Well, almost.

It suffices

I don’t believe in reviews. I think they are the worded weapons of insularity. I don’t get why a person who claims that he would understand the quality of cinema better than the general public and expect everyone to take his or her analysis of how good or bad a story is, should be taken so seriously. It deducts the thought process of a person completely ignorant of a certain film into should he watch it, or should he not. I think that is unfair on the viewer and the film in itself. I really don’t think there is any universal good or bad in works of art, it all depends on people and their tastes and preferences, which in turn depends on their socio-cultural background. So when I write about films, I am writing about my views, because I have this rigid mindset that stands up with a cane and thrashes my backside red before deafening me with a strident sermon saying: FILMS SHOULD BE WRITTEN ABOUT.

Really. We should all write on films. Not lecturing the so called viewers whether or not they should go check the films, but to see, how a story ranging from two to three hours strikes some chords in you. And trust me it does. Even the worst film that you thought was ever made, has in someway struck some chords in you. And I think unless you spare some thoughts about it, you would probably never know how. And then there are certain films that don’t make you work hard for it.

3 Idiots for me, is one such.

The idea of knowledge in today’s Indian society, has probably become more warped than open relationships and literate politicians. And let me not get into why and how it has become so. Instead, let’s look at a pair of eyes, hardly batting, and almost star struck in the middle of an otherwise gloomy classroom. Eyes that swallow rather than see, and perhaps the contents of whatever they swallow, are so delightful, that the smile just refuses to go from the face. Like a child who has just been asked to become the taster of an experimental candy factory. Asked about the reason of such an almost bordering foolish but in a strange way calmly sated smile, the humble reply says, “I am just happy to be here and learn what I love.” If a nation can have students who go through that exact experience even once a year, I think it gets reason enough to celebrate education, and the system through which it is promoted.

Aamir Khan has a thing with portraying education as it should be. He really does. He did it as a teacher in Taare Zameen Par, and now as a student in 3 Idiots. But let’s not talk about him here. A lisping Principal as the viciously strict academician might have reminded a lot of people about a lot of teachers who kept them awake in the silent nights of December; a geeky go-by-the-books fiercely competitive but lacking imagination pain-in-the-butt being mocked at might make a few call some of their friends up and tease them about how they used to be or how they still are; or even the choice that one takes between passion and pain, that would awake a few bitter feelings that some thought they had finally put to sleep. Whatever it was, 3 Idiots, has hardly missed out on any emotion that we might not be able to relate to as an Indian student.

And Mr. Hirani has done all this making sure that we have that smile in our faces, similar to Rancho, throughout the length of the movie. It was almost like a fierce resolution. That the audience should smile. Through sorrow, through pain, loss or happiness. Audience. Watching his film. Has to smile. And what else could I have asked for. Going through failure, and standing by friends, learning with honesty and drinking till the wee hours of night, urinating in revenge, and getting electric shocks in the process, proposing while drunk, and kidnapping the bride to take her to her lover, getting paralysed, and getting out of it, living, loving, hating and well, conceiving, with a smile in our faces. What else, could I have asked for?

The calmness of a student who has faced death and come back. The excitement of another who has suddenly discovered wings that have given him the courage to face people who have forever scared him, perhaps more because of his own presumptions, rather than the kind of people they actually were, and the devastation that leaves its remnants on the face of a man who finally faces the reality of which he had played an ignorant but vicious part. Mr. Hirani has able to make a film that tells you stories that could disturb you in more ways than one. Yet, he has managed to make you smile at the end of it. What else, could I have asked for?

Institutionalisation of anything, is in a way limiting its possibilities from being taken to the stretches that could  changed the world. But just like most things that govern us in our civilized society, it is also a necessary evil. But institutionalizing education, is perhaps defying the cause of education itself, irrespective of the necessity of its evil. And therefore someone in a black sherwani with a pretentious rose sticking out of his breast pocket would give an articulate solution in perfect English on TED, saying: “We should change the system, within the system.” And changing the system within the system does not depend on rule books, it requires human beings. And therefore, that teacher who makes his students believe that everything is possible in this mad manic world becomes so valuable a person in today’s society. For when that teacher sees a student consistently fail while answering the questions set by someone who is more or less invisible, he understands that the student probably, was never meant to take that examination.

3 Idiots hardly had such a teacher. Yet, it somehow managed to create the presence of an invisible being, who in our subconscious minds was telling us what exactly was the right thing to do. It took us to a life where we used to wish for such a teacher so desperately every time we failed in a subject that we never got and were made to believe that we were weak. A life where a two digit number on a dreaded mark sheet, became the ultimate weapon, and excuse for intimidation. Where someone took a permanent marker, and drew a line dividing what was correct and what wasn’t, without letting us spare a thought about what was correct, and what wasn’t. For sparing a thought, unfortunately came in the wrong side of that same division.

Bollywod is perhaps going through its rebellious teenage time of its life. Thinking, rule breaking, albeit with slight fear, little amateur, little stupid even, but with lots and lots of promise, of a really shimmering future.

And what else could I have asked for?