Bombay Talkies - my take

To commemorate 100 years of Hindi cinema, four current directorial spearheads of the Hindi film industry came together to celebrate the ‘magic of cinema’. A Hindi film buff like me waited with immense patience and eventually gave in to the temptation of watching it at home (and you know how!), regarding the why of it, the overseas release date was stretched way beyond my expectations, and that’s all I have in my defense. 

Anyhow, moving on, the deal was to make four films by four directors – each lasting for half hour and to be made in a shoe-string budget of 1.5 crores. Post the film’s release, no matter how hard I tried to keep away from the spoilers, it did find a way to stealthily creep into my reading links and I was in full awareness of the buzz around KJo unexpectedly walking away with all the accolades, if not for anything else, for holding up the camera to not so candy flossy subjects this one time. So one article after the other gets churned out going gung ho about how Karan Johar has managed to please the audience and the critics alike with a sensible story with a sensitive issue – a gay man trying to come out of closet after his straight marriage etc etc. To be honest, I was happy for this man, whose interviews tickle me, whose humor entertains me, and flamboyance amuses me. But then if only reviews gave you the real picture.

For whatever it is worth mentioning, KJo’s is the first story of the four, and ten minutes into the film, you already find yourself fidgeting, scratching, ones like me will even pause and go back to a dialogue like – “gale mein mangalsutra aur aakhon mein kamasutra”, wondering what was this man thinking!! I am all for tacky lines like this, I can handle it with courage, but not when it's thrown in to serve purely as a gimmick. It will leave you asking, seriously? KJo? You think you can pull off a serious film with such one liner? However, this was only the beginning to what turned out to be a stifling exchange of extremely pretentious dialogues. Karan chose yesteryear’s ‘Ajib Dastaan hai yeh’ to tie the events into a coherent whole but it did not manage to resurrect the film. The song is being sung by a young girl in the movie - a street beggar, and instead of giving a local flavor to the song, which I thought would have been apt, KJo settles for a full throttle jazz effect, couldn’t have done away with the ‘self’ afterall, so much for realistic movie making and all, sigh! No doubt, it’s a great personal journey for KJo from Dostana to this one, but if Dostana evoked a few giggles, this one, mildly put, is unintentionally comical. The actors, however, are the saving grace of the film, in fact it would not be unfair to say that one manages to sit through it because of them, besides ofcourse it being only a half an hour film. If the film began with some hope – a young man jolting his father to recognize the difference between a gay and an eunuch, its end fades out in a whimper. Matters at hand are not resolved, quite understandably so, but what about ending with a lasting impression? Not impressed KJo, not quite, you should just stick to your elements and if you go about claiming in your interviews that you like to steer clear from ‘the dark’ and’ the ugly’, why go back on your words? Yours is a beautiful world of shiny, happy and good looking people, and you were doing just fine as long as you were not apologetic about it! Grrrrr…..I could go on…

The second was Debakar Banerjee's, and anybody who has seen ‘Khosla ka Ghosla’ cannot ignore this man, no matter how fast he talks, and how much! Uff!! He’s the know-it-all too, but you still want to hear him out till the end and decide for yourself. His film’s pitching was just right I thought, and it really did bring home the ‘magic of cinema that shimmers our lives’ sentiment most poignantly and in the most heartfelt way. The flute rendition that fades out the narration towards the end is a cinematic delight and Nawazuddin’s enacting the story to his daughter is acting par excellence. So was Anurag Kashyap’s story, his was my personal favorite. Even if I try hard, it’s difficult to pick on the flaws. What I thought worked best for me with this one, is the coherent narrative and the subtle humor that lingers on even after the film has ended. Zoya’s love for the beyond-natural was evident in her film yet again. Hers is about how cinema inspires dreams in us. As uncomfortable it is to watch a young boy doing the ‘Sheila ki Jawani’ act, it is precisely to hammer in that point, that dreams are to be believed in, despite all odds, and to be lived in. 

Just about when the four films get over, and you miss some kind of in-your-face tribute to cinema (the kind we are used to), Amit Trivedi doles out a number, beautifully choreographed and conceptualized with sprinkling of great men and women from yesteryear and the present, that inhabit the studios and rule every cine goers lives. And that’s how the cherry on the not-so-perfect cake is saved for the last, and dropped in the end, making the experience memorable.