Is Vishal Bhardwaj cocking a snook at Bollywood? Well, yes and no, if his new film is anything to go by. Kaminey (Rascal), a 130-minute gangster film, is a work of astonishing bravura, far removed from the tripe and treacle of Bollywood. It is now India's most-talked about film - people are sharing their reviews on Twitter. It also takes him, again, to the top of the pile of India's filmmakers.
Bhardwaj is an audacious filmmaker. Cinema-crazy Indians are addicted to linear stories with happy songs and sunny, pat endings. But Kaminey turns every Bollywood cliché - lost and estranged brothers, the uber-exaggerated villains, the coy and cloying love interest, the retribution and redemption - on its head like no other film I have seen. He takes a chocolate-faced hero who has done very little in his earlier work apart from looking good and serenading girls and makes him do two gritty, grimy roles, one with a stammer and the other with a speech defect. He takes a former beauty pageant winner turned actress, transforms her into an ordinary Mumbai girl and keeps her in tight histrionic check.
The result is a veritable tour de force studded with contemporary tropes. There's a diabetic, chauvinistic political thug, a gangster called Mikhail who takes after Heath Ledger's Dark Knight rather than anything else, and an ensemble of more gangsters from home and abroad. With its vertiginous hand-held camera work and an infectious soundtrack fusing nu folk with almost everything else, Kaminey is a stupendous audio-visual experience, reminiscent of Wong Kar Wai and Quentin Tarantino's work. The writing is crisp, and like his previous work, Bhardwaj edits ruthlessly and abruptly, never stretching a dramatic moment to banal extremes - another Bollywood affliction. Kaminey is a work of precision and panache.Bhardwaj is a truly sophisticated director. Some critics are already calling his work 'new Bollywood'. I don't quite know what it means. But I do feel that he is going to be the first Bollywood filmmaker who will take work to international audiences to great popular and critical acclaim. He tells a good yarn in his own edgy, unique and unconventional way. He has a great sense of the dialogue and music, being a proficient musician himself.So far, unlike most Bollywood directors, he has not repeated himself - he has made a wicked children's film, a Shakespearean take on feudalism, politics and gangsterism in India's political heartland. Bad, dark guys and the underbelly are close to Bhardwaj's heart, and that is what makes his cinema so unique in a largely cliché-saddled industry. After Kaminey, he takes his position as the godfather of Bollywood cool.
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- What's this?
The swine flu hysteria
Soutik Biswas 08:45 UK time, Wednesday, 12 August 2009
Comments (9)
I spotted him outside our office in Delhi. An earnest looking young man, briefcase in hand, strode through the gathering downtown crush wearing a clunky white mask, his eyes darting from side to side. He looked straight out of a Robin Cook novel: a potential victim of a predatory, mutating virus on the loose in a big city. He also appeared to be a victim of the swine flu hysteria sweeping India these days.
Everywhere I go people are talking about the flu. It doesn't help that this is the 'flu season' in Delhi anyway when almost everybody is sneezing, coughing, feeling feverish or retching. When I caught a bug last week and stayed in, well-meaning friends called in to say that I should get tested for the flu. When I went to a neighbourhood clinic for a routine examination, the pretty receptionist reminded me that a few swine flu cases had been reported in the area where I live. I ran back home.
On return, I found television news agog with manic anchors spreading panic. A programme on the flu called itself Fear of the Unknown with an emotive visual of a glum looking father and son, presumably on their way to a testing facility. I wondered what was unknown about the flu; the programme gave me no answers. I picked up a newspaper and counted 21 stories about the flu; there were barely five stories on the impending drought. The hysteria was now threatening to disrupt my peace. So I went back to work to be greeted by more talk about the flu. Then I found my inbox running over with emails about homeopathic and other remedies to keep the pandemic away from my door. My favourite: eat raw garlic, two to three times a day; eat raw onion; eat fresh raw ginger, two to three times a day. With the stink I would raise after having this potent prophylactic mix, I risked getting lynched, even if I manage to beat the flu.
Indians love hyperbole. So it is with the swine flu 'debate'. Authorities are asking people to avoid crowded places "during weekends". A Bollywood film unit has cancelled a shoot because the actors fear getting infected. A friend called from Pune whining that his bosses were asking him to go on business meetings wearing a mask. And the latest scare is about the main anti-flu drug having side effects, despite sensible doctors saying it is nothing much to worry about. Every such media-fuelled 'outbreak' is also an opportunity for shamans and scams: one channel is even reporting a "H1N1 mask scam". Now the authorities have shut down schools and colleges in Mumbai for a week after three flu deaths in the city. All over, the fear is legitimate; the response is exaggerated..
What is conveniently forgotten is that India is no stranger to vicious outbreaks of fell diseases. Four years ago, just one state - Uttar Pradesh - alone reported 1145 cases of Japanese encephalitis in a single month. A fourth of these patients - nearly 300 - died. But encephalitis in a badly governed, poor state was not sensational enough for saturation coverage. Not many of the patients had possibly ever travelled outside the village. Apart from its name, there was nothing remotely global about this outbreak.The same year, a brain fever outbreak struck the capital, Delhi, and in just about two months, affected over 400 people. Forty eight of them died. To put things into perspective, just under two million people contract malaria in India every year. And tuberculosis kills 325,000 people here every year.But swine flu with double digit deaths - undoubtedly this number will rise - in a month and a thousand-odd patients gets disproportionate media and attention because it is imported, and affects the more affluent among us, people who go abroad and come in contact with others. In a country where globalisation means nothing to over 70% of the people, the brouhaha over H1N1 is another example of the tyranny of the minority.
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- What's this?
Sach Ka Saamna: Much ado about nothing
Soutik Biswas 15:50 UK time, Tuesday, 4 August 2009
Comments (8)
A jarring signature tune and a ring of fire fade out to a modern-day inquisition. In a studio bathed in blue lights sits a middle-aged tattooed woman in a pink sari. She calls herself an astrologer and a purveyor of all things spiritual. Opposite her, atop an uncomfortable perch, sits the show's rakish anchor, a little-known TV actor. Around them squat the astrologer's amused-looking guru with a perpetual grin, a sullen-looking father, a smiling mother and more family.
I am glad I have finally caught up with the show which has roiled India. The questions fly thick and fast.
As a teenager, did you drink milk from a feeding bottle?
The astrologer winces and looks down. Then she regains her composure, looks up at the anchor, bites her lips and suppresses a giggle.
"Yes," she says, after a pause.
The jangling music is in its crescendo; the anchor calls for the results of a polygraph test on the astrologer; he finds that the answers match and - voila! - announces some reward.
Things begin to get just a bit steamier and thornier now - by Indian standards, at least.
Do you like reading the sex column in women's magazines?
Clashing cymbals and moaning synthesisers follow the question. The astrologer fidgets in her seat, looks away, and then fixes her gaze at the anchor, who a top TV critic in town has found "seriously dishy", according to her column.
"Yes ji (sir)," replies the woman, after a long pause intercut by close-ups of her grinning guru and befuddled parents.
Now the astrologer is breathing heavily. The anchor asks her why.
"I am trying to stay calm. I take normal, deep breaths (sic). I am a religious person. I do prayers and various functions. I also solve heartbreaks. This is heartbreak season!" she giggles nervously.
The posers continue. Have you ever duped a client? Yes. Have you had a relationship with a man without knowing anything about him? Yes, says the woman. That was the two years ago. "The man lied about everything, even his name. After that I became spiritually inclined."
It is time for the question by turns described as soul-churning, culture-destroying and family-threatening - the question for which the show has gained infamy.
Do you love your father?, the anchor asks the astrologer.
The music almost blows the set off this time. The father is a divorcee. He is calm. Before he can answer, it is time for a break.
Four minutes and 13 adverts later, we return to the show to find out whether the astrologer loves her father. She doesn't disappoint.
"No, I don't," she says.
The camera closes in on the father: he appears to be unruffled. The story unfolds: he left the astrologer's mother and remarried. The father is a generous man.
"I am just a rubber stamp in my daughter's life. It's just my surname she carries. How can she love me?" he says.
And so it goes on and on. This is Sach Ka Saamna or Face the Truth, which seems to be the biggest talking point in the country these days. Many Indians find it repulsive but religiously watch it every night, well past prime time, after putting their children to bed.
Politicians debate the show in parliament, calling it a threat to Indian culture - whatever that means in a nation of a billion people and many cultures. Sociologists and writers deconstruct the show and break their heads trying to find out whether shy and conservative Indians have come out of the closet to show their true colours.
The show's organisers are laughing all the way to the bank, but also have a sanctimonious alibi - they say the show fosters honesty as people who speak the truth are rewarded. Is Transparency International listening - sorry, watching?
Apparently, people in the hot seat have been asked whether they have visited a brothel, had a child out of wedlock, dreamed of sleeping with various men, or urinated in a swimming pool.
The other night, when I caught the show, I found nothing to squirm about - what is the big deal about drinking milk from a bottle or catching the sex advice column in your friendly family magazine?
Also, it's just another reality TV show in this world of the glorification of hoi polloi with contrived situations, gasping anchors and participants looking for a shot at midnight fame (as in the case of this show) and some easy money. It's just much ado about nothing. It also makes the case that India - and Indians - have nothing better to do than get worked up over some silly TV show.
Bhardwaj is an audacious filmmaker. Cinema-crazy Indians are addicted to linear stories with happy songs and sunny, pat endings. But Kaminey turns every Bollywood cliché - lost and estranged brothers, the uber-exaggerated villains, the coy and cloying love interest, the retribution and redemption - on its head like no other film I have seen. He takes a chocolate-faced hero who has done very little in his earlier work apart from looking good and serenading girls and makes him do two gritty, grimy roles, one with a stammer and the other with a speech defect. He takes a former beauty pageant winner turned actress, transforms her into an ordinary Mumbai girl and keeps her in tight histrionic check.
The result is a veritable tour de force studded with contemporary tropes. There's a diabetic, chauvinistic political thug, a gangster called Mikhail who takes after Heath Ledger's Dark Knight rather than anything else, and an ensemble of more gangsters from home and abroad. With its vertiginous hand-held camera work and an infectious soundtrack fusing nu folk with almost everything else, Kaminey is a stupendous audio-visual experience, reminiscent of Wong Kar Wai and Quentin Tarantino's work. The writing is crisp, and like his previous work, Bhardwaj edits ruthlessly and abruptly, never stretching a dramatic moment to banal extremes - another Bollywood affliction. Kaminey is a work of precision and panache.Bhardwaj is a truly sophisticated director. Some critics are already calling his work 'new Bollywood'. I don't quite know what it means. But I do feel that he is going to be the first Bollywood filmmaker who will take work to international audiences to great popular and critical acclaim. He tells a good yarn in his own edgy, unique and unconventional way. He has a great sense of the dialogue and music, being a proficient musician himself.So far, unlike most Bollywood directors, he has not repeated himself - he has made a wicked children's film, a Shakespearean take on feudalism, politics and gangsterism in India's political heartland. Bad, dark guys and the underbelly are close to Bhardwaj's heart, and that is what makes his cinema so unique in a largely cliché-saddled industry. After Kaminey, he takes his position as the godfather of Bollywood cool.
Bookmark with:
del.icio.us
Digg
Newsvine
NowPublic
- What's this?
The swine flu hysteria
Soutik Biswas 08:45 UK time, Wednesday, 12 August 2009
Comments (9)
I spotted him outside our office in Delhi. An earnest looking young man, briefcase in hand, strode through the gathering downtown crush wearing a clunky white mask, his eyes darting from side to side. He looked straight out of a Robin Cook novel: a potential victim of a predatory, mutating virus on the loose in a big city. He also appeared to be a victim of the swine flu hysteria sweeping India these days.
Everywhere I go people are talking about the flu. It doesn't help that this is the 'flu season' in Delhi anyway when almost everybody is sneezing, coughing, feeling feverish or retching. When I caught a bug last week and stayed in, well-meaning friends called in to say that I should get tested for the flu. When I went to a neighbourhood clinic for a routine examination, the pretty receptionist reminded me that a few swine flu cases had been reported in the area where I live. I ran back home.
On return, I found television news agog with manic anchors spreading panic. A programme on the flu called itself Fear of the Unknown with an emotive visual of a glum looking father and son, presumably on their way to a testing facility. I wondered what was unknown about the flu; the programme gave me no answers. I picked up a newspaper and counted 21 stories about the flu; there were barely five stories on the impending drought. The hysteria was now threatening to disrupt my peace. So I went back to work to be greeted by more talk about the flu. Then I found my inbox running over with emails about homeopathic and other remedies to keep the pandemic away from my door. My favourite: eat raw garlic, two to three times a day; eat raw onion; eat fresh raw ginger, two to three times a day. With the stink I would raise after having this potent prophylactic mix, I risked getting lynched, even if I manage to beat the flu.
Indians love hyperbole. So it is with the swine flu 'debate'. Authorities are asking people to avoid crowded places "during weekends". A Bollywood film unit has cancelled a shoot because the actors fear getting infected. A friend called from Pune whining that his bosses were asking him to go on business meetings wearing a mask. And the latest scare is about the main anti-flu drug having side effects, despite sensible doctors saying it is nothing much to worry about. Every such media-fuelled 'outbreak' is also an opportunity for shamans and scams: one channel is even reporting a "H1N1 mask scam". Now the authorities have shut down schools and colleges in Mumbai for a week after three flu deaths in the city. All over, the fear is legitimate; the response is exaggerated..
What is conveniently forgotten is that India is no stranger to vicious outbreaks of fell diseases. Four years ago, just one state - Uttar Pradesh - alone reported 1145 cases of Japanese encephalitis in a single month. A fourth of these patients - nearly 300 - died. But encephalitis in a badly governed, poor state was not sensational enough for saturation coverage. Not many of the patients had possibly ever travelled outside the village. Apart from its name, there was nothing remotely global about this outbreak.The same year, a brain fever outbreak struck the capital, Delhi, and in just about two months, affected over 400 people. Forty eight of them died. To put things into perspective, just under two million people contract malaria in India every year. And tuberculosis kills 325,000 people here every year.But swine flu with double digit deaths - undoubtedly this number will rise - in a month and a thousand-odd patients gets disproportionate media and attention because it is imported, and affects the more affluent among us, people who go abroad and come in contact with others. In a country where globalisation means nothing to over 70% of the people, the brouhaha over H1N1 is another example of the tyranny of the minority.
Bookmark with:
del.icio.us
Digg
Newsvine
NowPublic
- What's this?
Sach Ka Saamna: Much ado about nothing
Soutik Biswas 15:50 UK time, Tuesday, 4 August 2009
Comments (8)
A jarring signature tune and a ring of fire fade out to a modern-day inquisition. In a studio bathed in blue lights sits a middle-aged tattooed woman in a pink sari. She calls herself an astrologer and a purveyor of all things spiritual. Opposite her, atop an uncomfortable perch, sits the show's rakish anchor, a little-known TV actor. Around them squat the astrologer's amused-looking guru with a perpetual grin, a sullen-looking father, a smiling mother and more family.
I am glad I have finally caught up with the show which has roiled India. The questions fly thick and fast.
As a teenager, did you drink milk from a feeding bottle?
The astrologer winces and looks down. Then she regains her composure, looks up at the anchor, bites her lips and suppresses a giggle.
"Yes," she says, after a pause.
The jangling music is in its crescendo; the anchor calls for the results of a polygraph test on the astrologer; he finds that the answers match and - voila! - announces some reward.
Things begin to get just a bit steamier and thornier now - by Indian standards, at least.
Do you like reading the sex column in women's magazines?
Clashing cymbals and moaning synthesisers follow the question. The astrologer fidgets in her seat, looks away, and then fixes her gaze at the anchor, who a top TV critic in town has found "seriously dishy", according to her column.
"Yes ji (sir)," replies the woman, after a long pause intercut by close-ups of her grinning guru and befuddled parents.
Now the astrologer is breathing heavily. The anchor asks her why.
"I am trying to stay calm. I take normal, deep breaths (sic). I am a religious person. I do prayers and various functions. I also solve heartbreaks. This is heartbreak season!" she giggles nervously.
The posers continue. Have you ever duped a client? Yes. Have you had a relationship with a man without knowing anything about him? Yes, says the woman. That was the two years ago. "The man lied about everything, even his name. After that I became spiritually inclined."
It is time for the question by turns described as soul-churning, culture-destroying and family-threatening - the question for which the show has gained infamy.
Do you love your father?, the anchor asks the astrologer.
The music almost blows the set off this time. The father is a divorcee. He is calm. Before he can answer, it is time for a break.
Four minutes and 13 adverts later, we return to the show to find out whether the astrologer loves her father. She doesn't disappoint.
"No, I don't," she says.
The camera closes in on the father: he appears to be unruffled. The story unfolds: he left the astrologer's mother and remarried. The father is a generous man.
"I am just a rubber stamp in my daughter's life. It's just my surname she carries. How can she love me?" he says.
And so it goes on and on. This is Sach Ka Saamna or Face the Truth, which seems to be the biggest talking point in the country these days. Many Indians find it repulsive but religiously watch it every night, well past prime time, after putting their children to bed.
Politicians debate the show in parliament, calling it a threat to Indian culture - whatever that means in a nation of a billion people and many cultures. Sociologists and writers deconstruct the show and break their heads trying to find out whether shy and conservative Indians have come out of the closet to show their true colours.
The show's organisers are laughing all the way to the bank, but also have a sanctimonious alibi - they say the show fosters honesty as people who speak the truth are rewarded. Is Transparency International listening - sorry, watching?
Apparently, people in the hot seat have been asked whether they have visited a brothel, had a child out of wedlock, dreamed of sleeping with various men, or urinated in a swimming pool.
The other night, when I caught the show, I found nothing to squirm about - what is the big deal about drinking milk from a bottle or catching the sex advice column in your friendly family magazine?
Also, it's just another reality TV show in this world of the glorification of hoi polloi with contrived situations, gasping anchors and participants looking for a shot at midnight fame (as in the case of this show) and some easy money. It's just much ado about nothing. It also makes the case that India - and Indians - have nothing better to do than get worked up over some silly TV show.
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