Lights, Camera....Action Replay!

It’s a tried and tested technique and an entire film industry seems to be raking in the moolah out of it. The reason you take notice is because it is the most ubiquitous, omnipotent celluloid dream factory that caters to the whims and fancies of a nation worth 1.3 billion people and more. The Hindi film industry, lovingly called Bollywood (because of course everything has to be a rehash of Hollywood, including the name of its Indian counterpart), enjoys a dominance over markets, both Indian and overseas like no other film industry in the world. Alas, it is built on a fluffy, fragile and superfluous premise: of churning out over a hundred films every year, mostly inspired/recreated/reconstructed material from successful ‘formulae’ that have never let producers and our mega heroes down film, after mind numbing film. After all, to achieve the grandeur and hype that our blockbusters demand, you need to convince an awful lot of people that this is worth your two hours and INR 200 investment. So you have sequels, prequels, remakes, remixes and then the tragic so-called original films- which are mere reflections of older movies past.

The decade of the ‘90s flourished on this premise: poor boy meets rich girl, college romances, villains in the name of fathers, villains who were always sniffing out a rape scene to get mileage from, tacky fashion sense, whacky dance moves, five songs with at least one rain song or with the lead pair singing around the trees, revenge dramas, comic sidekicks....the list goes on. Film after film was created with these massy tropes and the audience applauded every single one of them. How else do you explain the rise and rise of Govinda for instance? With due respect to him, his high-octane histrionics earned him so much fame with these familiar shenanigans, he was pelvic-thrusting his way to the bank, red shirt and yellow pants intact. He enjoyed this kind of monopoly at a time when the Khans were setting the foundation of their superstardom, with films that were similar albeit, ranked for a classier audience that went to good colleges and were very modern while respecting Indian traditions. Unfortunately, it didn’t work for him two decades later, when he tried to summon the same kind of hero worship from a vastly different audience this time with his silly caper of a film, ‘Aa Gaya Hero’. Someone please tell him it’s 2017, not 1995!

At the turn of the new millennium, fresh faces on the block like Hrithik Roshan were followed by Ranbir Kapoor, Shahid Kapoor and the like, while the Khans hit middle age and were forced to share box-office space with other, not less talented adversaries like Akshay Kumar and Ajay Devgn. Heck, even an atypical but inimitable hero like Emraan Hashmi was allowed his place in the sun, with his own brand of cinema: bold, brash and erotic, airbrushed with melodious songs and long-lasting smooches that became the talk of tinsel town. Everybody was minting their signature styles, which were reaping great profits with each film. So Hrithik was the rare all-rounder who seemed to be a director’s dream come true- what with his Greek God-like gorgeous looks, Michael Jackson-like groove and Sylvester Stallone-like muscles to flex in all those delish action stunts. Ajay Devgn had the perpetually angry and intense persona to heave onto every Godforsaken villain in town, Salman was fine-tuning his clean romedy act, Aamir was hitting the ball out of the park with his gritty roles the critics couldn’t get enough of, and finally SRK alias King Khan swept the chiffon-clad ladies off their pretty feet, with those adorable dimples and those crinkling eyes.

All was well so far but come the invasion of the internet and a sudden burst of films borne out of the web, and the grammar of cinema seems to have turned upside down. It’s no longer about making an audience sit through 3 hours of an assault on your senses just so you feel ‘entertained’. Entertainment has found new outlets, new vistas, and new languages. As an audience, you don’t need to walk to your neighbourhood cinema hall to be entertained anymore. You can watch a short film on the web, log on to Netflix to devour the latest international bestselling shows or simply download foreign language films on Torrent that are all the rage at film festivals like the Cannes. And if all this bores you, there’s always the last/latest season of Game of Thrones or reruns of Malgudi Days to catch up on. Where oh where does that leave our wonderful Bollywood, licking its wounds of neglect and apathy and now relegated to an occasional raising of the eyebrow only for an offbeat film like ‘Udaan’, or a norm-breaking ‘Queen’ or a casting coup like ‘Ae Dil Hai Mushkil’. What do our blockbuster-prone producers or the Bollywood royalty do? After all, you do need films to run the meticulously built empire, which can be awarded at the inane and n number of film awards shows that celebrate good cinema. Hit the books for new research, go scout for new talent, weave realism in to scripts to make them more ‘relatable’, scrape off the old tricks to make way for some new, zany ones that are more attuned to today’s youth....?

Dude...you are really dim if you thought any producer with  self-imposed royal status was going to go through so much effort to please you, you measly audience! No, Hindi films these days are made to please especially you- they are made to feed a superstar’s ego or help him thrive in his comfort zone, they are made to milk the stereotypical, archaic formulae (that have served the purpose these many decades) dry, they are made to appease to brain-dead, obsolete imaginations that have no room for novelty as long as you pay for a ticket at your friendly multiplex playing 18 shows to a packed house, day in day out. But look where it got the industry? A film like Bahubali, not even made from Bollywood money or for the regular Hindi-speaking audience, went on to trample every Hindi film record in history, with its sheer magnitude, star appeal in the name of a never-before known Prabhas and a story that eclipsed every creative possibility conceived of till date.

The only exception to this rule has been Aamir Khan who seems to have mastered the art of making cinema resonate with enough solid and universal messaging that it wins over both the masses and the classes. His film-making discipline is rigid as much as his cinematic persona is amorphous. Hungry to innovate with every film- through plot, story, characters and appearance, he has struck gold with every film in recent times for its juicy content without falling for gimmicks or age-old conventions. Even the otherwise commercially driven Akshay Kumar has had to hone his craft to accommodate a new style- more profound, hard-hitting and socially-connected as evident from his latest spate of films- Holiday, Airlift, Rustom and the upcoming Toilet or Padman.

Where has that left Salman? The brawny actor full of machismo and bravado may have spawned a legacy of films based on his ability to prance, romance and look askance every time another superstar gives a hit, because he inevitably manages to shine even more on the box-office scorecard. After all, who can resist that tight six-pack and bulging bicep that refuses to be tamed and hidden inside a shirt, or the endearingly innocent man-child like purity of his soul every time he goes on emotional overdrive mode. Ah! A tender heart beneath that tough exterior- every woman’s dream come true, every man’s aspirational icon. It worked for Bodyguard, Bajrangi Bhaijaan, Ek Tha Tiger, Dabangg and even Sultan. No surprises then that his next film may have given you a feeling of deja vu right from the trailer of Tubelight- innocent kid who could do with some rescuing from the baddies, the innocuous philosophy of life oversimplified for the masses, tough circumstances playing the villain and the real evil emitting from circumstances rather than moustache-twirling ruffians....similar elements in a new packing. Surprise, surprise, it didn’t work! Suddenly the same fans of Sallu bhai who swore on every film he made, were walking out of the theatres because it looks like, well, the impossible came true and that they had simply had enough. Oops! Time to put that thinking cap on again may be, after what, decades of building a castle in the air?

The bane of our superstars these days is also the fact that most of the younger crop of actors are not afraid to go miles in order to reinvent- take Ranveer Singh, Ranbir Kapoor or even Shahid who fast seems to be catching up from where he left off. They are taking on new physicalities to hit the nail on the head, changing their image to suit a new mould as per the film at hand and singing a different tune with every roll call. It keeps their audience on their toes, makes it possible to spring surprises and yet, helps them to maintain their well-earned star status through out. Of course, even Ranbir was ‘accused’ of falling in to the rut of forever playing this ‘coming-of-age’ kind of hero who simply couldn’t do without a female co-star showing him the ropes. It may have won him his fan following but also got the critics’ thumbs down, made evident as soon as Tamasha flopped. In fact, everyone cried foul over ADHM walking the trodden line, even if it went on to be declared a hit. Jagga Jasoos is being seen as his attempt at being redeemed off his folly but only time will tell if it earns him back the respect he deserves otherwise.

The only Bollywood impresario who is repeatedly struggling to find coherence in the cacophony is SRK- upheld as the eternal Romeo for too long and unable to break out of that bubble no matter how many films like ‘Chak De India’ or ‘Swades’ he does. Blame it on Yashraj or KJo, but everyone loves the lovey-dovey SRK- so all he can do is choose to bring back the golden heydays through a glimmer of hope that is ‘When Harry Met Sejal’. Unfortunately, this film through its brief glimpses so far, is again aping every marketing ploy to sell itself to its audience- it’s almost like he went back to all his past films that helped him win his label of ‘King of Romance’ and mixed it generously with Imtiaz Ali’s brand of love potion to churn out a romedy. Good old DDLJ borrowed ‘sarson ke khet’, Punjabi bhangra a ‘Nagada Baja’ style, girl-boy gallivanting in a foreign locale like in ‘Tamasha’, tourist impersonation inspired from Dev Anand’s Guide or Aamir Khan’s ‘Fanaa’- you take your pick and a foot-tapping retro number like the one he pulled off in Kal Ho Na Ho – ‘Dil hai mera deewana kya’ which was so much zingier even though it seems to have been born generations ago. How many films will it take before SRK realises the actor in him needs a major overhaul. Wouldn’t it be better to bid farewell to the relics of his past before his loyal fan base which seems to be moving on gets tired of the same old, same old? Suffice it to say, the lyrics of his new song ‘Safar’ from the aforementioned film tell his tale like only he could:

Ab na mujhko yaad beeta
Main toh lamhon mein jeeta
Chala ja raha hoon
Main kahaan pe ja raha hoon,
Kaha hoon?

Ye umrr, waqt, raasta...guzarta raha...
Idhar ka hi hoon na udhar ka raha
Safar ka hi tha main safar ka raha
Main raha...

The Pihu Diary: What not to expect of a three year old!

It’s amazing how kids cross these milestones so speedily, making you wonder where did the days go by! Of course, if one would ask me to summarise this last year, or the span of time where Pihu transitioned from being from two to three years old, I would be joking if I said it was a breeze. In reality, it was anything but that because besides managing a toddler’s inexhaustible energy for exploration and making sure her growth is healthy, happy and disciplined, it’s an exercise in patience understanding and dealing with her many moods, mannerisms and mischievous tendencies. This has been an important year for Pihu- physically and socially, sending us parents in to palpitations in order to balance the nature-nurture act! So while we were trying to ease her passage from being a home-bound infant to a smart preschooler, little did we know that we were grappling with a phase that would see her catch every virus that ever flew by meaning she would miss a lot of school and we would be feeding her a lot of medication while she healed her way through countless infections. It was also a period that would make us experience her first tantrums and realise that our little munchkin had finally come to terms with new skills she had picked up along the way like communication. This was and still is also pretty much the time when our little daughter has oriented herself to some wonderful privileges having tasted the luxury of being an only child!

We as parents often start building up expectations for and from our child early on- that she will be a bright spark in preschool, that she will be well-mannered, that she should be obedient and disciplined, that she should eat healthy, that she will be popular among her newfound friends, that she will become suddenly much more smarter and well-adjusted in life now that she is a pre-schooler, that she even might be a child prodigy etc etc. Thanks to reality shows on TV now we know, that your child may be barely three but she can sing like a nightingale, she could dance like Sridevi and even act like Kareena Kapoor. So what if she can barely spell ‘three’, at least she is ‘talented’ and this exception will take her very far. Sky is the limit when your toddler is spouting Sanskrit shlokas at an age when all she should be using her tongue is to lick lollipops and ice candies. So here’s a handy parents' guide to what not to expect of a three year old because, hell, you don’t even remember what you were like when you were at that age so let’s not even start building castles in the air already!

So don’t expect them to:

• ·        Bury their inquisitiveness: Yeah, so you think you can escape that incessant, urgent and exasperating interrogation? Whether it is Baby TV, the morning newspaper or a movie, Pihu is full of questions- from what is that honeybee doing flying around the screen like that, to what is Trump’s hair colour to what is that gentleman wearing a skirt planning to do with his sword....there is no end to it. Try ignoring those and you will be subjected to an endless attack of repetition- the weapon that kids use against parents who dare to neglect their pointed queries! And you thought you could watch or read something in peace anymore! Hahaha!  
  
  
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• Respect your privacy: Whether I am on the phone, working on my laptop or watching TV, you can rest assured that my daughter will have to barge in and first find out what I am upto, then demand to know why I am engaging in that particular activity followed by a detailed inquiry in to what that activity entails. Check this sample out to demonstrate the same.
  P: What is this you are watching? Me: Friends. P: Why are you watching it? Me: I like it. P: But you just watched it yesterday. Why are you watching it again? Me: It’s a different episode. P: No, see that guy over there, you just saw him yesterday. He’s Joey right? Why are you watching Joey again?
  Please note this is an essential tactic kids use to veer their parents’ attention from TV so that they get to watch what they want to eventually! And you thought kids didn’t know mind games.
  
  
  
  
• Remain a kid: So they may just be toilet-trained and already eating their meals without help, but their sense of independence goes beyond this. Pihu can hold an argument with my Mom on why the latter must not fuss over her eating while watching TV, she wants to choose her clothes every time she goes out and likes to believe she can switch the remote to what she wants to watch whenever she likes. Her sense of cleanliness will make her point out that little spot on the dinner table that you probably missed while cleaning up and a stoic sense of discipline will make her remind you to turn off the fans and lights once you are out of a room. She will notice that one element that has changed when she enters a room and even remember every toy she left behind at home after coming back from a long holiday.
  
  
  
  
• Be a grown up: But at the end of the day, a kid can’t escape her age and so don’t expect her to understand why she must go back to school everyday or why she can’t touch electrical equipment or eat in your favourite porcelain plate. Pihu needs reasonable explanations to why her Dad is locked in his room for an important official Skype chat, her attention-seeking tantrums need limiting and those big fat tears always threatening to overflow need plenty of hugs, tissues and kisses  before you can call it a day.
  
  
  
  
• And finally, help to retain your peace of mind: Yes, yes I am ranting aren’t I? But for all those parents who can’t stop raving about how having kids has been the best thing in their life, let me put it as blatantly as possible in case you never noticed- they make a rare commitment to sacrifice their peace of mind. It is nice to take it on your chin and call it an essential part of growing up and adulthood, a small compromise for the heartening satisfaction of having brought up a kid, blah blah but seriously, imagine the sleepless nights, the long lines for school/college admissions, the extra expenses, those emergency medical rounds to the pediatrician, the piles of homework, the messy pranks they will play, the adjustment problems puberty will bring with it, that shocking revelation they will make once they are ready to fly out of the nest....phew! And closer to my present timeline- the mental test of endurance that your toddler will put you through every time she falls ill or has a fit of anger, refuses to eat or do as instructed. It is advisable to keep that BP in check and really, take very good care of your health because you are going to need every ounce of it to tackle that bundle of joy who trundled in to your life to shake up your ‘happily ever after’ marital ambitions!

So why am I still smiling if it sounds so terrible? Ah, simple- because I signed up for it much like that much-hyped and much-coveted job you get hired for and then come to grips with the warts and all. It also immensely helps when Pihu occasionally looks into my eyes and asks, “You are my friend right?” and goes on to hug me tight or plant an affectionate kiss on my cheek when I agree. She also likes to take my face in her tiny hands and call me beautiful. Try ignoring that kid of adulation some time. Like my Mom always likes to sum up by saying, “Life is not a bed of roses”.

I find succour amidst the grim reality of being a responsible parent from the fact that at least I will know I grew a rose of my own and nurtured it right from the root to the bud she has become and from the aspiration of seeing her in full bloom one day. Bringing up a kid in that way is much like a work-in-progress or WIP as  you may call it- but isn’t life that too?!