They say that in Bollywood, romance is dead. It isn't, really, but romantic comedies don't have the same box office draw that they did in the days when King Khan reigned supreme. However, things are different on the other side of the border; apparently the Pakistani film industry is happy to turn out wholesome romances like Mumbai used to make twenty years ago. Exhibit A: Lahore Se Aagey (2016).
Lahore Se Aagey is apparently a direct sequel to a movie I have not seen, Karachi Se Lahore, and picks up right where the previous movie left off, so I was initially very confused, but I soon realized that Moti (Yasir Hussain), a stocky, bearded guy with a pronounced stutter, is our romantic lead. Moti is on his way to see his rich uncle (Behroze Sabzwari), but he is being chased by hitmen A and AB (dunno who plays A, but AB is Omer Sultan.) You can tell they're serious and scary assassins because as soon as they show up onscreen, gratuitous slow-mo doves appear.
However, they aren't very good at assassinating people; Moti loses the killers by mugging a passing fashion designer for his clothing and then ducking through an outdoor concert being held by aspiring rockstar Tara (Saba Qamar). After the concert, and after Tara breaks up with her annoying boyfriend, she nearly hits Moti with her car, then saves him from A and AB. And that's basically the plot; Moti is on his way to see his uncle, Tara is on her way to a big concert which turns out to be basically "Pakistani Idol", and they travel together, fighting, talking, dodging assassins, singing songs, having adventures, and inevitably falling in love.
Even for a road movie, Lahore Se Aagey is very episodic; Tara and Moti stumble into a strange situation, sing a song, grow a little closer, and move on. Most of the time this works, but there is an extended sequence involving offensive tribal stereotypes, a secret jungle rave, a dance-off to the death, and a whole lot of product placement for KFC which drags on for far too long. (And, again, the treatment of tribal people in the scene is genuinely terrible.)
The humor is hit and miss; many of the jokes rely on references to or cameos by various Pakistani celebrities that I have never heard of. I did catch the occasional Sholay reference, and there is a lovely gag involving a power drill that transcends cultural boundaries.
The romance is a bit more interesting. Tara acts tough, but deep down she's just hoping to find someone who will actually listen to her. And Moti is spellbound by Tara, but he's so insecure that he sometimes hides his feelings by acting like a sexist jerk. I think the relationship would be an absolute disaster in real life, but that's often the case with romantic comedies.
In the end, I'm not sure what to make of Lahore Se Aagey. I feel unprepared; I think I really need to see the first movie and pick up a working knowledge of Pakistani pop culture before I can judge it properly.
Saturday, June 27, 2020
Saturday, June 20, 2020
Something is rotten in the state of Kashmir.
"Denmark is a prison" according to Hamlet, and as author and general smart person John Green points out, he is absolutely right. Hamlet's Denmark is a surveillance state in which everybody is being watched by someone, and sometimes seeming to be mad is the only safe choice. That's even more true of the Kashmir seen in Haider (2014); this is Kashmir in the nineties, dominated by insurgents, military checkpoints, and civilian disappearances. It's a world where an anonymous tip can be deadlier than ear poison.
Let's take it from the top. Haider (Shahid Kapoor) is a college student who returns home to find that his father, Doctor Hilal Meer (Narendra Jha), has disappeared, taken away by the army, who blew up the house for good measure. Ghazala (Tabu), Haider's mother, has taken refuge with her brother-in-law Khurram (Lay Kay Menon), and they are entirely too close for Haider's comfort.
Rather than mope around his uncle's house, Haider scours the country looking for his father, helped by his childhood sweetheart Arshia (Shraddha Kapoor), and later joining protests with the family members of other disappeared. Khurram, meanwhile, uses his brother's disappearance to further his own political ambitions, while Ghazala tries desperately to reconnect with her son.
And then Arshia is contacted by Roohdar (Irffan Khan), who claims to have a message for Haider from his father. The message is, as you might guess, "avenge my death." According to Roohdar, Khurram was responsible for Hilal's arrest. Hilal and Roohdar were cellmates, and so Roohdar was present when Khurram arranged to have them both murdered. To prove his claims, Roohdar directs Haider to his father's grave, and then, since this is a tragedy, everything goes to hell. There are soliloquies (so many soliloquies), antic dispositions, a big musical number which is the thing wherein to catch the conscience of the . . . lawyer with military connections turned powerful politician, and a climactic and astonishingly bloody gunfight in a graveyard.
This is not Hamlet the play, it's an adaptation, and that means there are differences. The treatment of the female characters is markedly better; Arshia isn't just Ophelia, she also fills in for Horatio, which means she displays a lot more agency than her Shakespearean counterpart; she is Haider's partner, rather than someone to be lied to and avoided. Like Ophelia, Arshia is present for Haider's big "To be or not to be" speech, but unlike Ophelia she gets to interrupt him to ask what the hell he's talking about.
Ghazala, meanwhile, is basically a tragic hero in her own right, She is torn by conflicting loyalties, has an even more complicated relationship with her son than the notoriously complicated Hamlet-Gertrude relationship, and yet remains an active character throughout the film and goes out on her own terms. The entire cast is great, and Shahid Kapoor may well be my favorite cinematic Hamlet, but Tabu is even better. It's an amazing performance.
Haider is also an intensely political film. Haider is not a prince, he's a common man crushed under the weight of an oppressive system. The film's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern analogues are obsessed with Bollywood actor Salman Khan, and the film will sometimes cut between snippets of Khan's goofy nineties movies and the casual brutalization of the people of Kashmir during the same period, including meaningless checkpoints, targeted arrests, torture, and the extrajudicial murder of prisoners. This is not just a meditation on the limits of personal revenge, it asks big questions about how to change a system that has no intention of changing. There are no answers provided.
Let's take it from the top. Haider (Shahid Kapoor) is a college student who returns home to find that his father, Doctor Hilal Meer (Narendra Jha), has disappeared, taken away by the army, who blew up the house for good measure. Ghazala (Tabu), Haider's mother, has taken refuge with her brother-in-law Khurram (Lay Kay Menon), and they are entirely too close for Haider's comfort.
Rather than mope around his uncle's house, Haider scours the country looking for his father, helped by his childhood sweetheart Arshia (Shraddha Kapoor), and later joining protests with the family members of other disappeared. Khurram, meanwhile, uses his brother's disappearance to further his own political ambitions, while Ghazala tries desperately to reconnect with her son.
And then Arshia is contacted by Roohdar (Irffan Khan), who claims to have a message for Haider from his father. The message is, as you might guess, "avenge my death." According to Roohdar, Khurram was responsible for Hilal's arrest. Hilal and Roohdar were cellmates, and so Roohdar was present when Khurram arranged to have them both murdered. To prove his claims, Roohdar directs Haider to his father's grave, and then, since this is a tragedy, everything goes to hell. There are soliloquies (so many soliloquies), antic dispositions, a big musical number which is the thing wherein to catch the conscience of the . . . lawyer with military connections turned powerful politician, and a climactic and astonishingly bloody gunfight in a graveyard.
This is not Hamlet the play, it's an adaptation, and that means there are differences. The treatment of the female characters is markedly better; Arshia isn't just Ophelia, she also fills in for Horatio, which means she displays a lot more agency than her Shakespearean counterpart; she is Haider's partner, rather than someone to be lied to and avoided. Like Ophelia, Arshia is present for Haider's big "To be or not to be" speech, but unlike Ophelia she gets to interrupt him to ask what the hell he's talking about.
Ghazala, meanwhile, is basically a tragic hero in her own right, She is torn by conflicting loyalties, has an even more complicated relationship with her son than the notoriously complicated Hamlet-Gertrude relationship, and yet remains an active character throughout the film and goes out on her own terms. The entire cast is great, and Shahid Kapoor may well be my favorite cinematic Hamlet, but Tabu is even better. It's an amazing performance.
Haider is also an intensely political film. Haider is not a prince, he's a common man crushed under the weight of an oppressive system. The film's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern analogues are obsessed with Bollywood actor Salman Khan, and the film will sometimes cut between snippets of Khan's goofy nineties movies and the casual brutalization of the people of Kashmir during the same period, including meaningless checkpoints, targeted arrests, torture, and the extrajudicial murder of prisoners. This is not just a meditation on the limits of personal revenge, it asks big questions about how to change a system that has no intention of changing. There are no answers provided.
Saturday, June 13, 2020
Desi movie, Scottish play
Veeram (2017) isn't my first Indian MacBeth, but while Maqbool was a gritty tale of love and murder in the contemporary Mumbai underworld, Veeram is aiming for epic, with big battles, stunning scenery, and a storyline which mixes Shakespeare with traditional ballads.
Chandu (Kunal Kapoor) is a warrior, a master of the martial art of Kalaripayattu, and member of a clan of duelists. While returning home from a successful duel, Chandu and his friend Kelu (sorry, Kelu, but the internet won't tell me who plays you) wander into a cave, where they encounter a sorceress and her naked medium. The medium makes the expected predictions; Chandu will become the lieutenant to the clan chieftain, and then chieftain himself, while Kelu's son will be chief after him.
The pair laugh off the spooky naked prophecy and continue their journey home. When they get there, they learn that Chandu has been promoted to be the lieutenant to the current chieftain, Aromal (Shivajith Padmanabhan). Aromal is a bit apprehensive, since he personally prevented Chandu's marriage to the lovely Unniyarcha (Himarsha Venkatsamy), but everyone assures him that it will be fine, since Chandu is such an upright and honorable man.
Everything is not fine. Chandu is suddenly filled with ambition. Unniyarcha is suddenly very interested in Chandu, despite already having a husband, but Kuttimani (Divanaa Thackur) manages to win his heart, then Lady MacBeths him into sabotaging Aromal's weapon for an upcoming duel. And when that doesn't work, the pair tale matters into their own hands, everything takes a turn for the decidedly tragic.
This is post-Baahubali MacBeth; the budget is lower, but the scale is still suitably epic. The fight scenes are lovingly choreographed and make great use of the urumi, my personal favorite impractical melee weapon. The cinematography and set design is even more impressive, making stunning use of color and scale. And the
If the movie has a weakness, it's the dialogue. Like many Indian movies, Veeram was shot in multiple languages. I watched the English version, and while some of the lines were lifted directly from Shakespeare, much of the dialogue sounds like a modern translation aimed at students, replacing the original poetry with something more . . . prosaic.
Still, while the dialogue is a bit mundane at times, nothing else in the movie is. This is tragedy on a grand scale, like Baahubali's art-house cousin.
Chandu (Kunal Kapoor) is a warrior, a master of the martial art of Kalaripayattu, and member of a clan of duelists. While returning home from a successful duel, Chandu and his friend Kelu (sorry, Kelu, but the internet won't tell me who plays you) wander into a cave, where they encounter a sorceress and her naked medium. The medium makes the expected predictions; Chandu will become the lieutenant to the clan chieftain, and then chieftain himself, while Kelu's son will be chief after him.
The pair laugh off the spooky naked prophecy and continue their journey home. When they get there, they learn that Chandu has been promoted to be the lieutenant to the current chieftain, Aromal (Shivajith Padmanabhan). Aromal is a bit apprehensive, since he personally prevented Chandu's marriage to the lovely Unniyarcha (Himarsha Venkatsamy), but everyone assures him that it will be fine, since Chandu is such an upright and honorable man.
Everything is not fine. Chandu is suddenly filled with ambition. Unniyarcha is suddenly very interested in Chandu, despite already having a husband, but Kuttimani (Divanaa Thackur) manages to win his heart, then Lady MacBeths him into sabotaging Aromal's weapon for an upcoming duel. And when that doesn't work, the pair tale matters into their own hands, everything takes a turn for the decidedly tragic.
This is post-Baahubali MacBeth; the budget is lower, but the scale is still suitably epic. The fight scenes are lovingly choreographed and make great use of the urumi, my personal favorite impractical melee weapon. The cinematography and set design is even more impressive, making stunning use of color and scale. And the
If the movie has a weakness, it's the dialogue. Like many Indian movies, Veeram was shot in multiple languages. I watched the English version, and while some of the lines were lifted directly from Shakespeare, much of the dialogue sounds like a modern translation aimed at students, replacing the original poetry with something more . . . prosaic.
Still, while the dialogue is a bit mundane at times, nothing else in the movie is. This is tragedy on a grand scale, like Baahubali's art-house cousin.
Saturday, June 6, 2020
Romancing the large bag of cash.
Kshana Kshaban (1991) opens with a bank robbery gone bad, leading to a shootout with the police. Ringleader Narayana (Horse Babu) manages to escape with one accomplice and a bag of money, but he kills the accomplice and runs off with the money, infuriating his boss, quirky crimelord Nayar (Paresh Rawal). After concealing the money, Narayana hides out in his brother's photo studio, where he is quickly caught and tortured.
Narayana did leave directions to the treasure, but through a series of coincidences the directions wind up in the hands of one of the photo studio's customers, spunky office worker Satya (Sridevi). One of Nayar's men tracks her to her apartment, and after a brief struggle over a pair of scissors, he winds up dead. Unfortunately, Satya's creepy neighbor chooses that precise moment to drop by, and even more unfortunately he's from the Village of People Who Jump to Conclusions, so Satya suddenly finds herself on the run from the police.
And that's when she meets Chandu (Venkatesh Daggubati), a streetwise thief with the requisite heart of gold. he saves her from a pair of Eve teasers, and when the police show up looking for Satya, he assumes they're looking for him (because thief), takes her hostage, and the pair flee into theFire Swampnearby forest.
Kshana Kshanam has a remarkably straightforward plot, especially for an Indian movie from the Nineties; there's a clear MacGuffin, and Satya and Chandu look for it while dodging both Nayar's goons and the police. Sridevi handles the bulk of the comedy, so there's no need for a comic relief subplot. Still, the movie is two and a half hours long, and fills its running time with wild changes of tone. The opening bank robbery is dark and bloody and features no dialogue, while the scenes of Satya's daily life are bright and brittle, painting a picture of a woman who is not happy and hasn't realized it. And yet when Satya and Chandu begin to fall in love (because of course Satya and Chandu fall in love) we get dance numbers. Colorful, enthusiastic, occasionally silly dance numbers.
Kshana Kshanam was director Ram Gopal Varma's second film, and it shows; many of Varma's directorial quirks are on display here, including his trademark weird camera angles, but they lack polish. It is an interesting idea to film part of a car chase from the underside of a car, for instance, but it doesn't really work well in practice. Still, while the movie is sometimes clumsy, it is consistently interesting. Granted, sometimes the movie seems to be coasting on Sridevi's natural charisma, but she's got charisma to spare, so you can do that.
Narayana did leave directions to the treasure, but through a series of coincidences the directions wind up in the hands of one of the photo studio's customers, spunky office worker Satya (Sridevi). One of Nayar's men tracks her to her apartment, and after a brief struggle over a pair of scissors, he winds up dead. Unfortunately, Satya's creepy neighbor chooses that precise moment to drop by, and even more unfortunately he's from the Village of People Who Jump to Conclusions, so Satya suddenly finds herself on the run from the police.
And that's when she meets Chandu (Venkatesh Daggubati), a streetwise thief with the requisite heart of gold. he saves her from a pair of Eve teasers, and when the police show up looking for Satya, he assumes they're looking for him (because thief), takes her hostage, and the pair flee into the
Kshana Kshanam has a remarkably straightforward plot, especially for an Indian movie from the Nineties; there's a clear MacGuffin, and Satya and Chandu look for it while dodging both Nayar's goons and the police. Sridevi handles the bulk of the comedy, so there's no need for a comic relief subplot. Still, the movie is two and a half hours long, and fills its running time with wild changes of tone. The opening bank robbery is dark and bloody and features no dialogue, while the scenes of Satya's daily life are bright and brittle, painting a picture of a woman who is not happy and hasn't realized it. And yet when Satya and Chandu begin to fall in love (because of course Satya and Chandu fall in love) we get dance numbers. Colorful, enthusiastic, occasionally silly dance numbers.
Kshana Kshanam was director Ram Gopal Varma's second film, and it shows; many of Varma's directorial quirks are on display here, including his trademark weird camera angles, but they lack polish. It is an interesting idea to film part of a car chase from the underside of a car, for instance, but it doesn't really work well in practice. Still, while the movie is sometimes clumsy, it is consistently interesting. Granted, sometimes the movie seems to be coasting on Sridevi's natural charisma, but she's got charisma to spare, so you can do that.
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