Bollywood Essentials: Jagte Raho(1956)

As the name of this post suggests, this series is basically about some of the best movies Hindi cinema has to offer. As a film lover and someone who has grown up watching these movies, I want to give the glimpses of my world to everyone else who hasn’t yet been initialized to it or is under the impression of it being nothing more than glitzy, glamorous melodrama and random song and dance sequences. There is more to it and I intend to showcase that through these posts.

All the films I have highlighted so far in this feature are sort of obvious inclusions. Not that they are unworthy of it, far from it, but if you ask anyone to name 10 Most Essential Hindi movies, there is a good chance that person will include 5 of these movies in that list. All these are fairly big names which have garnered quite a reputation over the years for being some of the best this behemoth of an industry has to offer. Nothing wrong with that, especially since I agree with their 'Essential' status as well. For the first time, I am going for a little obscure film in this series. For reasons that are unknown and incomprehensible to me, Jaagte Raho(1956) is not a movie that gets mentioned fairly regularly in Bollywood vernacular. It certainly deserves much more attention that it gets and if I can steer few people its way though this post, I will be extremely happy. That's what I intend to do with these posts anyway!

I have not seen it happen for a long time now but in olden days, chowkidaars or security guards and police constables on their night duty used to keep each other awake through the night with loud, intermittent shouts of "Jaagte Raho!" or Stay Awake. Title of film is a reference to that as it takes place during one single night in a big apartment complex of a city. This film follows a peasant's first night in the big city. He has just arrived empty handed from his village looking for job and is roaming through the night roads of city looking for nothing other than just a drink of water. It all fairness, it should not be too hard to find but he learns that the hard way, probably even in worst possible way.

After looking for it a while, he comes across a dog drinking water from leaking water tap inside a big housing society. He sneaks in through a small gap of their locked main door. But before he can quench his thirst and get on his way, he is sighted by a police constable on his regular night strolls. Policeman takes him for a thief and wakes up security guard of society who in turn wakes up whole society warning them of presence of a thief in their society. Next two hours consist of everyone in society hunting him like a dog and him trying to save his skin. Various encounters he has with multiple people in that society not only produce lot of dark humour but also expose dark side of so called serene, sophisticated life of city people.

First house he gets into to hide from everyone has two illicit lovers meeting in the dark to hide from girl's father. Sudden clamour this thief has created puts them at great disadvantage as these paramours can't hide in house for fear of her father, can't go out either for fear of getting caught. Next, he follows an outwardly gentleman looking guy but soon finds out this guy has lost everything on horse races and even witnesses him stealing his wife's jewellery. Then he witnesses a drunkard forcing his wife to sing and dance for him. As he goes from one house to another, gravity of crimes he witnesses that are so well swept under sham of sophistication gets more and more serious and distressful and our peasant gets trapped deeper and deeper into it. Whole thing culminates into last half hour which gives us many twists and turns but is brilliantly executed. Best thing about it though is he gets to drink water; for which he gets into all this trouble; only after he manages to get out of that building, in very last frame of film! 

Jaagte Raho was made under RK films banner which has been dormant for past few years but is one of the legendary production houses of India established by Raj Kapoor. Kapoor family is nothing short of royalty in Bollywood after producing legend after legend for four generations and Raj Kapoor is probably biggest luminary they produced. Apart from producing it, Raj Kapoor, who is considered as the greatest Showman of Hindi Cinema, plays central role of peasant. One of the joys of watching this film was getting to see so many known actors pop up in other roles. I would sooner recognize Tom Cruise in Tropic Thunder(2008) than I would Pran as reporter in this film. Ifteqar, who would go on to make a career out of playing cop, is leader of search party in charge of finding thief or Pradeep Kumar, secret lover of first house, known for Jo Wada Kiya Wo...

I will never deny him as a legend or impact he has had over the industry or on generations after him, but I have always had my reservations against Raj Kapoor both as an actor and director. Though it is mostly based on films in the later phase of his life, his films are tedious, laborious and over sentimental. He is also known for playing almost same character in every film and you see traces of that character even when he was not really playing it. But I will also be the first one to admit that this is like saying Charlie Chaplin, who BTW was huge inspirational for Raj Kapoor's act and it was evident, did nothing other than playing a tramp all his life or Hitchcock did nothing other than thrillers. Like Chaplin and Hitchcock, his act had much more nuance to it if you care to scratch beneath the surface. That act gave some of the most popular and well known pieces of art like Awara(1951), Anari(1959) or Shree 420(1955) all in same decade. That was the Golden Age of Indian cinema after all!

1950s is considered as the Golden Period of Hindi cinema and for a very good reason. '50s is to Bollywood what '70s was to Hollywood. That was the time when Parallel cinema got its biggest exposure and almost merged into Mainstream cinema. That was the time when directors tackled different subjects and presented different themes. Some of the biggest stars ventured into many different territories, something that dearly lacked in Bollywood in recent times, or even became big by doing so. And more importantly, they got recognition. Bengali directors played vital part in taking industry there. Satyajit ray, probably the only Indian director with international acclaim got his start with Apu trilogy in '50s though he didn't make a Hindi movie till late '70s. Bimal Roy, a director who inspired generations of directors to follow, was at his peak during that time. Hrishikesh Mukharjee, a personal favourite, got his start with aforementioned Anari and I am sure there are many more that I am missing. To the best of my knowledge, this is that only credit of director Amit Moitra but I would like to believe that this high tide of Hindi cinema and influence of Bengali directors then played some part in that.

Rating(out of 5):

Previous Essentials: 

Satya(1998)

Sholay(1975)

Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron(1983)

A Wednesday(2008)

Do Bigha Zamin(1953) 

Sarfarosh(1999)
Taare Jameen Par(2008)
Lagaan(2001)

Bollywood Essentials: Lagaan

Indian squad in all it's glory!

As the name of this post suggests, this series is basically about some of the best movies Hindi cinema has to offer. As a film lover and someone who has grown up watching these movies, I want to give the glimpses of my world to everyone else who hasn’t yet been initialized to it or is under the impression of it being nothing more than glitzy, glamorous melodrama and random song and dance sequences. There is more to it and I intend to showcase that through these posts. 

I wrote first entry for this series almost one and half years ago for LAMB Foreign Chops. That day I made a conscious decision of starting this series with Satya(1998) than with Lagaan(2001) because I thought later would be too obvious a choice. You would imagine I will get back to it right after and I promise I did intend to but for some unexplained reason I kept postponing it. So today as I finally sit down to do just that, I am really surprised that it took me this much time and more than half a dozen posts to get back to it. That is not a strike against the quality of this film because I believe Lagaan is a quintessential Bollywood film. It is also a monumental film, a trendsetter in many ways that I will get to little later in this post. There will be spoilers almost throughout this post. So if you haven't seen this film and don't want it spoiled, avoid this but to tell you the truth, I don't think it matters. Everything that happens in this film is trademark Bollywood. So if you know the industry, most of it will not come as a surprise to you though it's no less riveting.

It takes place sometime in nineteenth century, when India was under British rule, in a small village called Champaner. Champaner hasn't seen a drop of rain in whole year but Captain Russell, British officer in-charge of Champaner and other villages in the vicinity which were originally under Raja Puran Singh's rule, wants to double the taxes. Villagers know that it won't be possible for them to pay a penny and decide to go and request Puran Singh to exempt them for this year. Captain Russell, however, has some other plans. He singles out Bhuvan, a young, dynamic guy who has already caused some troubles for him, and challenges them for a game of cricket. Britishers have been playing this game for a while and are quite skilled in it and villagers don't even know how to hold the bat right. But catch is if they win, they will pay no tax for three years and if they loose, they will have to pay triple tax. Quite a do-or-die situation! Bhuvan accepts the challenge. Initially everyone feels like it is a suicide mission but Bhuvan is determined to go the distance. He slowly starts putting a team together but real turning point comes when Captain Russell's sister agrees to teach them the game as she thinks they should get a fair chance in this match.

Obviously, game of cricket forms an integral part of the whole narrative. As someone who loves the game, what's interesting to me is during those three days of this match, every single thing that can happen in the game of cricket does happen. You have freakish run-outs, a hat-trick, on-ground controversies, complete collapse of batting orders and unlikely partnership that leads to last ball heroics. Anywhere else all these in one place would have looked hokey but this script makes it enjoyable. I also admire that director Ashutosh Gowarikar chose to show Bhuvan's teammates to be unaware of nitty-gritties of game. No one can in such a short time as villagers were given but this David vs Goliath match-up is what makes it so entertaining and thrilling. Also, cricket is not the most well-known sports in many parts of the world. So I was always skeptical about how it will travel overseas. I am so glad to be proven wrong by many people who have enjoyed this film as much as I did despite knowing next to nothing about the game. To me that is indicative of the game being so much more than just a cricket match.

And it is not 'just' a cricket match. As the whole diaspora starts to think of this as an opportunity than calamity, it becomes a channel to vent their anger, their frustration against their oppressors. A symbolic fight to beat British at their own game, in this case quite literally. It becomes some sort of glue to bring everyone together, a communal thing that everyone celebrates together or even reproach at times. By including Kachra who is from lower cast who were socially condemned then in team, Gowarikar also uses this opportunity to make social commentary. Another aspect that I make special point of mentioning in this posts is songs. In case of Lagaan, there is a special reason for that. If you consider all the songs in any film as some sort of album, I think I can make a very strong case of this being THE best in 100 years of Bollywood. Not only is every song just so much better than the previous, there is so much variety in them that it's mind boggling. There is an inspirational song, devotional song, straight-up love song, communal rain song and sort of lovers quarrel song. Each and every one of them have beautiful meanings, offer much more than surface value and are only one-uped by probably the best music A.R. Rehman has done in his career. 

Like me, there are many who consider it to be a ‘quintessential’ Bollywood film. Whatever you can expect from a typical Bollywood movie, you will get it here. You have an uplifting story with message that has a happy ending and provides a lot of social commentary. With Elizabeth falling in love with Bhuvan and Gauri who everyone in the village knows will be married to Bhuvan one day, you also have a love triangle, songs, good triumphing over bad with our protagonist snatching the victory from the jaws of defeat. You even have a character who sells the villagers out for his hatred of Bhuvan but even he redeems himself by the end. And on top of all that, there is cricket in the cricket crazy nation of billions. What else can you want? However where Lagaan distinguishes itself from most others is it handles this juggernaut really well. Despite being a sweeping epic of David Lean proportions which many others have tried in Hindi industry to varying results, there is not much I can find fault with in here.

It has created quite a legacy for itself by being only third and last Indian film to be nominated for Oscars (Mother Indian(1957) and Salaam Bombay!(1988) were the other two). But it has nothing to do with what I was talking about being a trendsetter. As far as I remember, it was the first Indian film that had a proper marketing budget and it was done with perfect planning. Aamir Khan, who starred in the film and also produced it, made sure that it would reach every corner of the country and everyone was talking about it even before it was released. But the reason I say there was great planning behind it is despite being marketed so heavily, no one had any idea that there was cricket involved in it until the day it was released. And that cricket match consists of about 50% of it's 224 minutes run time! When people came out of theaters on the opening day, everyone was extremely surprised about it. Once it rode that wave of surprise, it literally never looked back till the day of Oscars.

I like this film. I have always liked it but at the same time, I don't consider it to be one of my favourite films. As good and legendary it is, I have always had some minor quarrels with it. Minor because I am fully aware it's unfair to hold it against it but I can't help it. I have seen this movie more than half a dozen time, last time being less than a year ago, but over the last few watches I feel like this is dated already. I also have small problem with overall acting and tone of the movie. Even though there is a lot of humour in it, it's mainly melodrama and it's so much at the knife's edge that a smidge more of it would undo everything. It never really crosses that edge for me but it feels like it would on many occasions. However here I would like to underline the fact that I still think it is one of the essentials. I will even go further and say that if you've never seen any Bollywood movie before, Lagaan is as good a start you can hope for.

Rating(out of 5):

Previous Essentials: 

Satya(1998)

Sholay(1975)

Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron(1983)

A Wednesday(2008)

Do Bigha Zamin(1953) 

Sarfarosh(1999)
Taare Jameen Par(2008)

Bollywood Essentials: Taare Zameen Par

As the name of this post suggests, this series is basically about some of the best movies Hindi cinema has to offer. As a film lover and someone who has grown up watching these movies, I want to give the glimpse of my world to everyone else who hasn’t yet been initialized to it or is under the impression of it being nothing more than glitzy, glamorous and random song and dance sequences(Believe me, it is really not THAT random. After a while, your honed senses can easily hear them coming. Now whether they are needed is a whole different ball game). I would be the first one to admit that some personal bias is bound to sip in as most of the movies I have covered so far are personal favourites but there are many more movies that I might like but certainly won’t call essential. Movies covered here certainly have some kind of “it” factor that goes beyond just being a movie I like and makes them a good sample case for whole industry. And believe me, I eventually do intent to venture into that part of the savannah I personally like to call a ‘2001: A Space Odyssey Category’ but you might have to wait a while for that because this time it is yet another personal favourite.

Taare Zameen Par(2007) is actor Aamir Khan’s first and so far only directorial effort. It is a story of 8 year old dyslexic kid Ishaan. Being dyslexic he is otherwise a very normal kid, even excels in arts but can never concentrate on his studies at school. His brother Yohan is a school genius who always tops at everything and constant comparison by everyone makes the matters only worse for Ishaan. Unfortunately, even his parents think of his genuine problem as an excuse of getting away from everything. They think of him as lazy kid who needs to be punished and straightened out so that he can follow the footsteps of his brother and be a good boy. After doing everything they can to no avail, they decide to send him to boarding school in Panchgani as an ultimate punishment. A visiting drawing teacher in his boarding school Ram Shankar Nikumbh, being dyslexic as a child himself, finally understands Ishaan’s predicament and tries to help him. But being punished constantly for something he just cannot help, being given an impression of an unwanted child especially by his dominating father, Ishaan has gone into his own shell that even Ram finds difficult to break, at least initially.

One of the reasons why I think of this as an essential watch is it stars a kid in the central role but it is as far away from being a kid’s movie as possible. It comments about something very serious like dyslexia and still is inherently about that boy or any other kid his age that can just as easily be going through something very similar, especially in a society like Indian society where any kid is considered good for nothing if he cannot get good marks in school. I cannot remember another Hindi film that even attempts doing so. Even the way parents, more specifically his father, are portrayed in it is worth looking into in it because unfortunately this is very common. Their intentions aren’t wrong and it is obvious that they love their kid but like many other dads, his father believes in being hard on him is for his own good. In 99 out of 100 cases, that might be true but he fails completely in recognizing this is that 1 rare case and keeps on hammering it on him until someone else points it out to him.

In Hollywood, there are stars and there are actors. And then, there is a rare breed of stars who are actors as well. Bollywood or any other industry for that matter is no different. Here there are stars that can make or break movies just by attaching their name to it but are more concerned about their image than anything else. Then there are actors who have made it a habit of taking the less travelled paths and for that, more power to them. And then there is Aamir Khan who has every bit of star power as anyone else in whole industry but also has made it a point of straying from the beaten down path. It is rather fortunate that in the recent years Ranbir Kapoor seems to be following the same path and hopefully he will continue to. Aamir khan, often criticized for ghost directing his films and hailed as Mr. Perfect for demanding every detail to be to his satisfaction, directs this film with creative vision and sensitivity that thrives it. Taare Zameen Par could have gone down the sappy, over preachy slide very easily but he also deserves credit for knowing where to stop, though there are couple of instances he indulges in longer than absolutely necessary.

Ishaan Awasthy is played by a child actor Darsheel Safari who made his acting debut in this film. Amol Gupte, who also deserves a lot of credit for doing a fabulous job with dialogue and screenplay of the film and is also credited as a creative director as he developed this idea initially, chose Darsheel after auditioning a lot of boys by asking them what will they do if they could bunk their school for one day? He chose Darsheel because he had just the right amount of mischief in his eyes to play this role and it is so easy to see that as he fits naturally in this role. Aamir Khan also plays the role of Ram Shankar Nikumbh with a great poignancy that this kind of role needs. Everyone in the rest of the cast plays their parts well; however one that stands out to me is Vipin Sharma playing Ishaan’s father. Once again it is an example of great casting as even his face tells a lot about how his character is supposed to be.

Let us talk a little about songs too. I want to do this for two reasons but first a little background. I have always been a supporter of songs in Hindi cinema because that is something so unique about it, something you don’t see in any other industry. And Taare Zameen Par is one of those films that actually uses them well to aid the actual story. However typically these songs are playback songs; that is they are sung by someone else and acted on the screen by someone else. The first of two reasons I went through all this trouble is TZP has only one such song, all the others, even though are fully fledged songs written exclusively for this film, are more like soundtracks we see in Hollywood and I think that is a good experiment.

Second and probably the most important reason is one of those tracks titled ‘Maa(Mother)’, written by Prasoon Joshi and sung by Shankar Mahadevan – another personal favourite. That song is so beautifully written and even better sung that it strikes every cord in my heart just right. I have only listened to that song in its entirety once, in theater, and I will not, I cannot listen to it again. Even in the theater my eyes were so full of tears that I practically do not remember the video of this song. In all probability, I will never be able to listen this song again but I’ll always love it with every fiber of my being.

Obviously Taare Zameen Par is an emotional journey to get through but it succeeds in fighting a sweet middle by making it an entertaining experience as well. With beautiful script, amazing performances and taut direction, it also features first use of claymation in Indian films in the opening credits of the film to show Ishaan's imagination. It stays away from over-sensationalizing it or making something of a typical masala movie out of it by keeping the integrity, seriousness of the subject matter intact. And for that reason alone, I think it deserves to be an essential watch for any Bollywood enthusiast.

Rating(out of 5):

Previous Essentials: 

Satya(1998)

Sholay(1975)

Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron(1983)

A Wednesday(2008)

Do Bigha Zamin(1953) 

Sarfarosh(1999)

Bollywood Essentials: Sarfarosh(1999)

We all have movies that we watch over and over, so many times that we can practically keep them on mute and fill in for the actors. No? Come on, I am sure it’s not just me. They may not be your favourite movies necessarily, just something you can watch anytime. You can call them comfort movies that you can just slide into the player and let them work their magic or sick day movies that maybe make you feel a little better. You don’t even have to see them from start. They can just turn up randomly while browsing through the channels and you can pick it up from wherever it is. LOTR trilogy is one such movie for me(Yes. For me, it is One Movie). I have no idea how many times I have seen it and how many more times will I see it. I just stopped counting after 15. It is quite possibly the movie I have seen most. But if there is one movie that can go head to head against it, it is probably Sarfarosh(1999).

Director John Mathew Matthan’s debut film Sarfarosh is a story of drug and arms trafficking across the India-Pakistan border from the point of view of Assistant Police Commissioner Ajaysingh Rathode, who is in-charge of the case. Young, dynamic and idealistic Ajay has a history with terrorism. Few years ago, his father tried to testify against some terrorist group in a case that involved one of his colleagues. To prevent him from doing that, they kill Ajay’s older brother, kidnap his father and cut his tongue out. He joins police force to take revenge on them.

When a Naxalite group with a leader called Veeran attacks a bus and brutally guns down everyone in it in the remote areas of Chandrapur forest, a special team with Rathod at the helm is assembled to investigate how did sophisticated weapons like AK47 reached in these remote areas? Initial investigation points towards a local leader Bala Thakur who immediately runs away to his supplier, Sultan, in Mumbai, the minute police come knocking at his door. In Mumbai, Ajay is great admirer of Ghazal singer Gulfam Hassan and after getting introduced to him through a mutual friend, forms a great friendship with him. Working on the case with the help of another officer, Inspector Salim, with a great network of informers, Ajay and his team try to reach to the bottom of this case and as it turns out, Gulfam Hassan becomes much more than just a friend for Ajay.

Sarfarosh has one of the best screenplays I have seen. Everything, every single piece of nugget you see on screen has some role to play. Mathew Matthan connects everything together to form a beautifully woven piece with Spielbergian accuracy. Every character, every sub-plot has a crystal clear role and they serve it with due diligence. He didn’t shy away from making blood splatter on screen but the most daring thing script does is, to the best of my knowledge, it was the first film to ever point its figure directly to our neighbouring nation for the problems across the border, their maligning intent and it’s reach very high up the order. If there is any chink in this armour, it is that most of the characters or at least the important ones are primarily either black or white. Whatever shades of grey appear in either heroes or villains are more like occupational hazards. But neither did I realize this up until very recently nor does it take away anything from the greatness of this film.

Having a love story as a part of film’s narrative is kind of a must in Indian films. Even if we can easily do without them, film makers tend to find some way to make them an important plot point of the story, sometimes even making for a disastrous output. Of course, John Mathew Matthan could not do without romantic subplot for our protagonist completely but he finds a way to use that to add another layer on the narrative. More importantly, he keeps it as a secondary storyline and never lets this peer-pressure subplot of love story smoulder the soul of whole film. In ‘90s where sweeping love stories were at their peak, this film once again stands out to me in that regard.

I have mentioned before that I have seen Sarfarosh countless many times. One of the reasons it still works after so many watches is, of course, brilliant screenplay and direction I talked about. But it is also has an incredible ensemble cast and endlessly quotable dialogues. Ajay Rathod, played by Aamir Khan and Gulfam Hassan, played by Naseeruddin Shah, are two most important characters. If you know anything about Hindi industry, you will identify them as the two of the best actors currently working and they both are at the top of their form in their respective roles. It won't be what it is without either of them but in my opinion, what really takes the cake is whole bunch of amazing performances and characters from the rest of cast.

Insp. Salim, Ajay’s Second in command, played by Mukesh Rishi, Mirchi Seth, Gulfam Hassan’s right hand man for all his illegal activities, played by Akhilendra Mishra and Veeran, naxalite leader whose attack snowballs into this avalanche that end up taking everyone down, played by Govind Namdev, are the standouts of this amazing cast. Richness of this cast runs so deep that I can write pages about them without even mentioning two main characters and words that come out of their mouths are principal reason to make even the part-timers memorable. Take Fatka, a small-time police informer, Mala, a bar dancer or police inspector in Chandrapur who pop up for an occasional scene here and there but leave with some of the best lines of film. If you haven’t noticed, I have come this far without mentioning the lead actress Seema, played by Sonali Bendre. I don’t have anything against this character or this actress. Even she does her job of providing a romantic relief well and in a way, helps Ajay find a vital clue that shakes the stagnant case. It’s just that there is so much more to admire that their love story takes a back seat.

I have so many fond memories of watching Sarfarosh. It is the only movie I have seen thrice in a single day. It is the movie two of my cousins refused to watch it with me because I wouldn’t shut up repeating the dialogues after. Considering it is such a sincere, realistic take on something very serious, it might sound weird to call this a comfort movie. But I really love this movie and I am happy while seeing it, even if someone is getting whacked on screen. After having seen it so many times, I know exactly what’s coming next and I still find myself as excited as the first time I saw it. And I also know that I will watch it again, and again and again, probably with the same excitement every time.

Rating(out of 5):

Previous Essentials:
Satya(1998)
Sholay(1975)

Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron(1983)

A Wednesday(2008)
Do Bigha Zamin(1953)