Mumbai
Gangster, Potya gets killed in a Police encounter…..
Noted Industrialist, Ritesh Sahani is murdered
in broad daylight in the guise of a suicide…
Failing to curb her drug use, a high profile
model, Shonali Gujral dies of overdose….
Unable to cope with her husband’s
indiscretions, prominent socialite and activist, Anjali Thapar commits suicide….
Dominic
D’Souza, a lowly conman and drug peddler dies of drug overdose….
Ever noticed how Madhur
Bhandarkar kills off one of his lead characters in the second half of all his
movies? No? Well Atul Kulkarni (Potya) died in Chandani Bar. Kay Kay Menon(Ritesh) gets murdered in Corporate. Soni Razdan (Anjali) commits
suicide in Page 3. Ranvir Shourey (Traffic Signal) and Kangana Ranaut (Fashion) both died of drug overdose. He
did rock the boat gently in Heroine
with Helen’s character dying in the second half. Bold attempt considering she
wasn’t a ‘lead character’!
In an industry that churns
movies in the thousands each year, the number of flops outnumbers the hits by
an epic proportion. While I’d love to quote exact figures, a quick Google
search reveals that while creating a list of all movies released each year in
Bollywood is easy, putting an exact figure on the number of movies in the
article is a Herculean task! While I could still figure it out using some of my
nifty programming skills, I frankly have better things to do on a Saturday
evening! Hence, I’ll put it in perspective through analogies. It’s easier to
win Takeshi’s castle than to make a hit Bollywood movie. It’s easier to run a
full marathon than make a hit Bollywood movie. It’s easier to cook a nine
course meal for 32 guests than make a hit Bollywood movie. It’s easier
to….Aaahhh you get it!
Hence to have a successful run
at the movies in India is no easy game! If you are a filmy keeda like me, you
have seen umpteen interviews of ‘stars’ and directors say really pseudo-intellectual
and heavily-doped-up-artsy things like ‘Film
making is an art.’ ‘Nobody knows what the audience wants.’; ‘I don’t get into
the numbers game. I just follow my instinct’, ‘I don’t understand the business’,
‘Do you understand the business?’, ‘What do you think the first weekend
collections will be?’, ‘the audience has “opened up” to all kinds of cinema’;
‘The Indian audience is schizophrenic’. And my personal favorite -‘I love my craft’.
While I want to give due credit
to some filmmakers that genuinely ‘love their craft’ and who ‘tear the
envelope’, ‘push the boundaries’, ‘explore themselves and their craft’, most Indian
film making is not as much as ‘respecting the art’ as it is ‘following a tried
and tested faar-mu-laah’. Nobody knows what the audience wants? I beg to
differ. We all know that Indian audience love scantily clad women dancing to
racy music laced horrible but immensely catchy lyrics. It’s been two years but
I still can’t get ‘Hookah bar’ outta my head! Indian audience also loves flying
goons to a single punch. They love loud and predictable comedy. They love sad
romantic songs!!! No seriously… Case in point…
They love ‘hero-giri’, item songs, cheesy
dialogues, romantic songs in foreign locations, monologues against corruption,
item songs, heavy and outlandish action that defies all laws of Physics, a
maniacal villain, item songs, beautiful women and did I mention item songs? And
do you know what they love most of all? All of these things in 1 single movie!
If you think about it, every
mainstream director, actor, producer has made his/her career based on a single
formula that has worked for him/her. Since Kick released last week, let’s start
with Bhaaaiiii... Need I write further?
·
Step
1: Take off shirt.
·
Step
2: Do not follow the choreographer’s instructions and repeat the dance that you
did in that Baarat that one time
·
Step
3:Beat up what would be an entire rugby team, in a single punch
·
Step
4: Introduce a non-Indian actress with no Hindi diction but a beautiful face
·
Step
5: Behave like a brat throughout but insert random acts of kindness because
deep down you have a heart of gold.
And the list goes
on….
Every Rajkumar Hirani movie has
a social message wrapped up with comedy and emotions…. Mahesh Bhatt movies have
‘great music’… Emraan Hashmi would kiss an actress in the middle of her dad’s
funeral if he had to…. Rohit Shetty has made a career out of blowing up cars….
Abbas Mustan movies have ridiculous plot twists inserted in the movie because
‘that’s what our audience expects of us’…. Sanjay Leela Bhansali has lavish
sets mixed with a lot of color and heavy dose of emotions…. Imtiaz Ali is
always defying society’s norms…. Prakash Jha makes ‘real movies’ based on ‘real
events’ with ‘real actors’ like Arjun Rampal and Esha Gupta. Prabhudeva makes
South Indian remakes with a regressive touch coupled with dance numbers. YRF
and Dharma continue to doll out tutti fruity love stories. Farah Khan signs SRK
and inserts a lot of filminess and dance numbers. Milan Luthria films have a
heavy dose of dialogue baazi moving around a razor thin plot and Ram Gopal
Varma…..well….hhhmm…ok….Two minutes of silence for Ram Gopal Varma.
While most of this is dreadful,
there is one formula that I quite like. And that formula belongs to my favorite
Indian filmmaker, Vishal Bharadwaj. Some of his formulas are well known. Most
of his movies are literary adaptations. The subject/handling is ‘dark’. The
characters are quirky. They are based in hinterlands of India. His wife, Rekha
Bharadwaj usually sings a track in the album.
There is however one formula that hasn’t been talked about. And this formula
is hidden in his movie albums. Before I reveal it, a little trivia. A little
known fact about Vishal Bharadwaj is that he became a filmmaker because his
music composing career was at a low point and the only way he could continue
making music was by directing his own movies. And boy am I glad he did! Without
further ado, Vishal Bharadwaj’s formula……<drum rolls>…..is…..that….each
album of his movies has a soulful track…. <crickets chirping>…..<baby
crying>….
I agree that doesn’t seem like
much. But what makes it special for me is that each of these tracks is
fantastic! It’s underrated. Hell it’s not rated! Most of the tracks that I am
about to link in here are probably unheard. Each of these tracks are soulful,
deeply poetic and really soothing to the ears. They are beautifully voiced by
Vishal Bharadwaj himself. The ‘Beedis’ and ‘Dhan te nan’ of the worlds have
rocked a lot of parties but somewhere these gems have remained undiscovered. I
would love to describe them further, but I am going to let the songs do the
talking...rather the singing! If you’re a Honey Singh fan, you are in the wrong
neck of the woods! Turn around!
Kaminey-Kaminey
Khamakha-Matru Ke
Bijli ka Mandola
Bekaraan-Saat Khoon
Maaf
O Saathi Re-Omkara
Zabaan Jale-Dedh
Ishqiya
