From a movie goer, on the verge of dejection..
All those movie patrons out there, this’s someone among you and very much like you talking. I would feel a lot better if you guys be kind enough to lend me around 10 minutes of your valuable time to listen to my non-sense and one of your strong shoulders, where my head can rest when I start weeping..
And for all those who feel a movie is simply a torture irrespective of whether it’s a bad one or a fantastic one(yes, there are many youngsters with such a take on movies,in case the readers didn’t know), it’s not gonna be fun going through this piece of literature. Hence close this page immediately and get back to your work asap. And I also wanna tell you this; at times you movie haters prove to be of much more value than we movie goers. Coz what we do is, just live, watch movies, eat, drink, sleep and die. Even you guys do pretty much the same thing except the movie part, but what makes you people stand out is the fact that lakhs or millions of years after you die, your stone- hearts can turn into diamonds (by some crazy geological phenomenon am not sure of), and embellish a women’s neck, ears and fingers. We movie goers are just as good as meals for bacteria for a few weeks once we are dead.
Alright, straight to the point.. what brings me to this state of dejection? I kept thinking..i got reasons after reasons. And I stopped thinking at some point because I had too many points which would take days to complete if talked upon.
The first and foremost being the struggle to reach a cut-off quality level, that would ensure that there would be a good return on investment and would keep the producer happy. This often to translates into a very sad thing that is very common in the movies de jour. A formula. A formula that pervades into and solves all the movie related questions regarding the cast, number of songs, sequence of comedy scenes, stunts and what not. Given the helpless situation viewers are in, these “smart” movie makers come up with some shit based on that formula, and what their peanut sized intellect can afford, totally showing their negligence and disrespect to this particular art-form and its patrons. This phenomenon is particularly evident in the Malayalam and tamil industry (of course, languages put a barrier on me to venture in to the other south Indian languages.. Though the experience of watching a handful of kannada and telugu movies gives me the feeling that the picture is not very different altogether here as well, the sample size is so small that I can’t confidently generalize).
Formula can be anything. For instance in mallu movies it could be someone like the very popular mammootty in the lead role, a very homely dressed female who would make the mallu mouths water, and an introduction song(mostly in a festive mood) with pathetic dance moves, next is the villain’s turn to be introduced and he comes up with the good old story of tortures done by the hero’s dad to his family. Torture can be anything, from murdering the villains dad, burning down his house, or even taking a one night stand on his sister , giving her a kid the hero’s dad refuses to accept. So our villain, during one of his rides(mostly in SUV) with his side kicks along the country sides, spots the heroine and starts playing pranks. Hero comes and retaliates, with dramatic fight scenes and some finger whirls, finishing the scene with a punch dialogue, usually on a funny note.
This turns out to be an open war between the hero and villain, and the climax scene would usually revolve around clichés like the heroine in the villains custody, drenched in petrol and about to be burnt, or may be the whole village going against the hero probably because of some bad word spread by the villain and his assistants. In the latter context, the hero will have to get beaten up by the villagers, spit some blood and wait for some elderly and reliable person to come and say ‘no, leave him, he is not the one. it’s this guy’, pointing at the villain.. villagers now man handle the villain and the hero- heroine hug each other in tears. The girl-in-villain’s custody- situation would demand a timely jump by the hero on to the villain just as he is about to throw the zippo on the girl. This would be followed by some serious fight scenes, the hero getting beaten to pulp by the villain and then from nowhere, he musters volumes of energy and punch and bang and thwart the villain to death. Girl again hugs him in tears, rests her face on his shoulder and the couple walks away. One or at times two or three comedians will be kicked in. they will roam around with the hero, ask him stupid doubts, get face slapped by girls sometimes for the hero and do all non-sense to make sure that the movie looks funny enough.
The Tamil formula is pretty much the same, except for a few differences.
The hero will be the best guy around, he is not too much into boozing and all that or if at all he is, he will be characterized by a set of principles on how to treat women and the elderly. Even if his friends tell him to do some crazy stuff, it’s a strict ‘no’ from him, usually followed by couple of pieces of advices. A rogue who stared at a girl for long or tried to grab her hand was a gone case because he did that in the territory of the most decent guy around. The saddest thing for that prankster is the advising from hero after being knocked down by slaps and deadly punches that made him fly in the air.
Some Tamil heroes, just by the power of their words, are even capable of making terrorists hell bent on bombing the nation, sob and weep in regret and say “sorry boss, won’t repeat this again.” Not only prayers, but advice too can do wonders it seems..
So our hero, the best guy around, is in love with this girl. She never parties, never talks to strangers and has never had a past relationship. Forget that, at times she even finds it difficult to spell words like “kiss”. Not to be misconstrued as she being illiterate, she is just so innocent. (same girl coming in spicy dresses in songs is not uncommon). Hero also tries his best to advise some girl he finds in shops or parks attired in modern outfits. He asks her to stick on to the native culture and the dressing style, the girl gets totally impressed and she starts going after him.
Many a time comedians keep coming with their stuffs (mostly pathetic), wanting you to laugh. While watching these movies, we viewers are totally at an advantage because, if we feel like taking a leak or getting a fag, we can go head without any hesitation coz the story is not gonna advance an inch during the comedy scenes.
The rest of formula is not very different, except that in the last fight scenes, if the gundas are thrown by 2 or 3 meters by the mallu hero’s kick or punch, it’s no less that 10 metres in TN.
Another curse particularly for the mallu cinema is a set of heroes who are very complacent regarding their figures or style, whatsoever. They forget that being an actor is also about having a disciplined life in terms of food habits , booze and such stuff. They party hard, eat and drink whatever comes their way and then get back to the screens with loads of tummy and rotten pumpkin- like cheeks. They presume that the viewers take whatever they are being fed, a situation comparable to bones being thrown at hungry dogs.
Alright, you guys inarguably have stuff in you. You all have. That’s why you are up there entertaining and we down here, being entertained. But how’d you feel when the vegetable seller tells you “hey, I’ve got great potatoes, but why don’t you settle for some rotten ones for the time being”??. You’d say “that’s ok. You can keep it with them; we’re good without your potatoes”. But what do we do.. We keep buying the rotten potatoes over and over again, hoping we’ll get some good ones someday. But these days, we’ve had enough and we are disappointed at large.
Emotions, oh you know how to use them in and out of place just because people want them. Was ‘stupefied’ when I saw a movie in which the hero’s been after the heroine for a while, trying to nail her down. Hero, after having failed at all the attempts to impress her, takes her to an orphanage. We see dozens of children dancing with joy, come and hug him. Heroine is spellbound seeing all these, and as a finishing move, the poor children are asked to tell her, “aunty, aunty, uncle is so nice, we have nobody, will you come here often with him??” next we see her face, tears running down. And then a heroine’s POV shot at the hero, as he is seen dancing with the children, giving them chocolates. That’s it, the hero heroine couple is off to Australia or Mauritius for their romantic song shoot. Things are pretty easy, aren’t they?
So all these are apparently what the present day cinema is much about. But though very rarely, we see some great flicks conveying some great thoughts coming, mostly from some new film makers. Probably because they have nothing to feel complacent about or to be carried away, or maybe they are above all those delusions of fame and money. Probably because they are all about delivering good, quality cinemas. We salute them. But why are they a minority and the others the majority. We say , a once in a while- mistake is pardonable. But what we see here is non sense after nonsense and then a sensible one at last if we’re lucky . Why has it to be like that? Are we giving in to kalyug wherein things tend to go wrong more often than they tend to go right? I mean you people (I mean these film makers) have your creativity and some great artists at your disposal, why don’t you make good use of them and come up with some good, responsible cinema that would knock right at our heart-doors? Take your time. We are not gonna go anywhere.
