Mirch Masala [dir. Ketan Mehta]

...or why it is a piece of classic Bollywood cinema.

Seeing Mirch Masala again after so many years only reinforces what an amazing achievement this film was, both for Ketan Mehta, and for Indian cinema as a whole. It's downright shameful that a bunch of ignorant people will avoid this film by lumping it in the category of parallel / art film, which by their definition stands for a preachy non-entertaining academic class of movies. Far from it, MM takes from the best traditions of dramatic Hindi movies and theater and stands proudly with any of the beloved classics of Bollywood.

MM goes back to the basics of what all great populist movies should aim for – tell a simple but strong story with well-etched characters and carefully chosen elements of drama, humor and thrills that must not stand as individual “items” but always be in service of the story. As Stephen King once wrote “It's the tale, not he who tells it” (or in the case of films, who directs/acts in it). Mehta pulled this off splendidly in MM, considering how early the film came in his career. His later efforts like Maya Memsaab, and to a far lesser extent Oh Darling Yeh Hai India (my guilty pleasure), had ideas and moments that caught one's interest, but were defeated by the sheer volume of extraneous and awkward elements. Much like with Ramesh Sippy's Sholay, this clarity of vision, this passion, this magic never quite came together for him again.

Set in a pre-independence era village in Gujarat, MM's story is simplicity itself – The evil villain wants to ravish the beautiful heroine (no macho action-happy hero here), and is willing to destroy all that stands in his way. How she heroically evades his clutches, escaping into a chilly pounding factory that generates the titular Mirch Masala, and how he meets his comeuppance makes for the conclusion. This plot could be the backbone of numerous Hindi movies of yore – and if you take the heroine as a metaphor for land or freedom, a far greater number than you may initially imagine. The cunning touch is that MM employs all these tropes – the heroine Sonbai is not only a sensuous but virtuous woman, she is defined by her attitude as a symbol of freedom and self-possession, and the villain's demand for her as a form of 'lagaan' (tax) reinforces the land metaphor.*

It is to MM's strength that the script is rigorous and focused – There are no wedged in “item” songs or disconnected comedy tracks, and all characters and scenes are integral to the plot, playing their role in the sequence of events that lead to the end. The final film runs a little over two hours, not a moment of it wasted. More importantly, its characters believably blend in with the backdrop, and the central archetypes are written strongly enough to be both attention-grabbing and memorable. A wealth of brilliantly honed acting talent from Indian cinema and theater bring MM to credible life. Sonbai remains a defining turn in Smita Patil's career and is a landmark amongst strong heroine characters that had subsided significantly in the wake of the "Angry Young Man" era. Naseeruddin Shah as the lecherous exploitative villain plays to the hilt, bringing the same type of archetypal menace to his role as Bollywood's most memorable bad men. Scenes like Sonbai giving water to the villain after insisting that he get down on his knees, the villain's murderous rage at his gramophone record getting broken and of course the indelible climax where the village women express their fury against the exploiter quite literally by showering him with chilly powder can never be forgotten by anyone that has seen the film.

Technically again, it is astonishing how assured Mehta is in his vision: Frame dissolves (the farewell love-making between Sonbai and her husband, which segues into the morning after where the villain glimpses at the river a now-unguarded Sonbai), slow-motion (introduction to the chilly pounding factory, the climax) and juxtaposing of shots (the villain primping himself for the final assault, while the aged factory guard, who is the film's lone male protector figure, cleans and loads his gun) are used to generate resonant powerful scenes. The sound design for the scene where the villain calls out a one to ten count for Sonbai to hand herself over to him before his men attack takes its cue from an analogous sequence in Sholay. None of this is gimmickry, style rammed in for the sake of style. Mehta has made judicious use of these and other techniques always to carry the story ahead.

In the end what we have in Mirch Masala is not some erudite chamber piece or dry social comment for a small pack of powder-puff intellectuals to politely discuss and feel snobbish about. With its strong archetypes and high voltage emotional moments, it is, in the best traditions of Bollywood, gripping full-blooded drama-music-action entertainment that everyone needs to watch.

* From a certain point the film can also be seen as a portrait of India's exploitation by outside rule and the subsequent revolutionary movement that led to its independence: the chauvinistic class-conscious supporting characters on account of their narrow-minded attitude fall submissive prey to the exploiter, and only those that are able to look beyond themselves and gather en masse in common cause (with one notable exception, all women) are able to confront the evil. Okay, enough with the academic pooh-bah, go back.

Paan Singh Tomar [dir. Tigmanshu Dhulia]

It may be said that the bigger and more epic the scope of a story, greater is the chance of it devolving into conventional tropes. Such is the case with Tigmanshu Dhulia's Paan Singh Tomar (PST). His previous venture Sahib, Biwi aur Gangster took 3 characters and spun a tight drama around them with wit and invention, but this biopic of an international class athlete forced by circumstance to become a dacoit (or from his point of view, a “rebel”) sadly feels all too familiar.

The primary mistake Dhulia makes in his approach to presenting the story is to take the linear “let's begin at the beginning and take one thing at a time” route. So one chunk of the film is devoted to Tomar's stint in the army and his discovery as a star athlete, another to the circumstances of the destruction of his family and subsequent revenge, and a third to his exploits as a dacoit in the Chambal ravines. Apart from a few instances, there is little resonance between these segments that refreshes the uniqueness of the character in the audience's mind. So while part one unfolds like a Reader's Digest inspirational story, the bulk of the film is yet another dacoit drama. Irrfan Khan's lead role performance is a mixed bag. Sure, he's the right man for the job and has “run the full mile” for the athlete segment, but in the rest of the film he only occasionally transcends the “Nana Patekar for the mumblecore generation” stereotype that has defined most of his acting resume. An undeservedly generous 2 ½ hour running time only adds to the tedium of the proceedings.

There are things to admire about the film: A lot of hard work has gone into establishing the credibility of the characters, and costumes locations and dialects have been meticulously researched (Dhulia was casting director on Shekhar Kapur's Bandit Queen). But that's part of the problem; lacking the perspective and raw intensity of its predecessor, PST never really gets away from being a less accomplished clone. Technically again, it's a toss-up. The visuals are decent but rarely striking (a nocturnal siege towards the end is captured nicely). Rakesh Ranjan provides a nicely textured soundscape but his efforts are often stymied by the obnoxiously loud and generic background score (Sandeep Chowta). In fact I suspect that the background score was inserted for this re-release (PST apparently had a short window release in 2010, primarily at film festivals) because it seems so at odds with the rest of the sound.

So while it's not bad by any means, PST feels all too been-there-done-that, which is a shame considering the potential of the story. It's still a change from most of the stuff currently playing on Indian screens.

P.S. When the film closes, it gives a list of some other Indian athletes that later became victims of circumstance. This is immediately followed by the stupid health ministry mandated warning that "Cigarette Smoking is Injurious To Health", appearing to suggest that those athletes landed in dire straits owing to their smoking habits.

NFDC's Cinemas of India series

Right, if you're on my Facebook friends list you know that the National Film Development Corporation (NFDC) has released in conjunction with Shemaroo Entertainment what they call "digitally restored" versions of some of the classics of Indian cinema in very affordable DVD editions (Priced at Rs. 199/- MRP, they are available for further discounted rates at online sites like Induna and Flipkart). From a brief skim of scenes from all the films I'd say that while these new transfers can not be declared as immaculate, nay they're far from that, they are a significant improvement over previously available editions from various companies and fans of sensible Indian films should definitely look to add these editions of their favorite classics to their movie collections.

The films released so far in this series are: Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron (Kundan Shah), Party (Govind Nihalani), Mirch Masala (Ketan Mehta), Suraj Ka Satvan Ghoda (Shyam Benegal) and Dharavi (Sudhir Mehta).

In an earlier blog post, I had made DVD image comparisons between the Ultra DVD and the Cinebella DVD (US origin, OOP) releases of Suraj Ka Satvan Ghoda, in which the latter with all its flaws notwithstanding demolished the murky mess of the Ultra release. SKSG in this NFDC edition is much closer in visual quality to the Cinebella release (close enough that I won't make additional screenshot comparisons), and therefore a highly recommended upgrade for Indian movie buffs.

I have here screenshot comparisons for some other films in this set with previous Indian DVD releases, let's see them in sequence. The screenshots were taken using VLC player version 2.0.0, no modifications made to the image settings. Images were taken from reasonably comparable shots, but not matched to the specific frame, and saved as non-resized jpg files. Please click on the files to see them in the proper size to appreciate the comparisons better.

JAANE BHI DO YAARON

Left side NFDC - Right side (Ultra / Moser Baer)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So overall the NFDC transfer, being immensely sharper and crisper, delivers a massive kerbstomp to the Ultra release. It's not all good though - some of the color tints appear suspect with the Ultra release edging towards blue and the NFDC release veering towards yellow/green, and it doesn't always seem that one party is right. Still the benefits far outweigh the doubts and this upgrade is a no-brainer. Also NFDC is providing this film in a 2-DVD Collector's edition with a feature called "Director's Perspective" on the bonus disc, which promises to be interesting viewing.

MIRCH MASALA

This is another wonderful film from the 80's and has a brilliantly composed visual palette. Ideally this should have been one of the best looking DVD's in this series. Let's see now how it holds up.

Left side NFDC - Right side Eagle Home Entertainment

 

 

 

 

 

 

As you can see there are issues with the NFDC release. It's window-boxed and while the video is cleaner, it appears to have been brightened up too much, to the point where detail is obscured. But still it has significantly better color and texture and the previous release.

DHARAVI

No need for any comparisons, the only previous release for this brilliant poetic tale of one man's struggle to realize his dreams in the big bad city was a horrible VCD from Lara Video, bleh. From what I know the film was shot on location for most sequences and is not a poster child for pretty visuals. Again, the DVD is by no means immaculate, but the best you have so far and therefore worth your while to visit this classic.

The Whisperer in Darkness [dir. Sean Branney]

Putting aside my view of the movie itself for a bit, The Whisperer in Darkness (WiD) is a wonderful example of independent film-making. It has been produced not by some major league studio with millions of dollars to burn, but by the fine folks at the HP Lovecraft Historical Society (HPLHS), a group that has turned their love for the writer and his works into a lovely little cottage industry catering specifically to the fans of Old Providence. They made their first big splash with their 2005 film of The Call of Cthulhu (CoC). Cinematic adaptations of HPL's stories are not uncommon (although good ones certainly are), but what this group specializes in is developing projects that set the stories in the time they were written. So CoC was presented as a 1920's style B&W silent film with animation and visual FX techniques that might conceivably have been employed in that period, even a faux aging effect given to the image to make it appear like a long forgotten relic of that era. This was an experiment that turned out incredibly well, especially given that few of the people involved had long-time experience in movie-making. They have also turned out some very effective radio play adaptations of HPL stories under the Dark Adventure Radio Theater label. (All of this material and several other interesting collectibles may be obtained from their website Cthulhulives.org). When I first heard that they had embarked on this new project, which would be done in the style of early talkies I was understandably excited, even though I had not by then read the original story.

Having since rectified that deficiency (and you can too, read the FREE e-text here), I can say that this film is a good adaptation of the story. Lovecraft's prose is not exactly friendly to developing movie scripts. A lot of his narratives are essentially monologues or descriptions, and feature very little character interaction, emotional variation or, heavens, action in the conventional sense of the term. The best HPL film adaptations try their best to work around these difficulties without defiling the spirit of the source material, and the WiD film is to be complimented on having *mostly* succeeded. The film has atmosphere, yes. The characters are very much in the mold of Lovecraft's prose, the script for a good way sticks to the events of the story, the production design is sometimes astounding for the film's roots (love that vintage train and those retro-futuristic electronics) and the deep contrast B&W compositions are strikingly good (the inkiness of the blacks is so good it's almost hard to believe this was shot digitally). The background score is wonderfully reminiscent of those old Universal horror films.

Where things fall a little apart is when the film tries to do its own thing. Now I'm not advocating slavish devotion to the source, far from it, but it attempts to introduce some action-heavy sequences and conventional character relationships towards the end, which detract from the tone of the story till that moment and are not the strong point of the production. Also, the move from silent to talkie exposes the stagey performances of some of the supporting actors. Yes, some of those classic horrors also had hokey acting but the problem here is that WiD does not go as far enough as CoC did to give us the “vintage” experience. The image is widescreen, as befitting more modern productions (am I a hypocrite for being simultaneously gratified that it fills my 16:9 viewing screen?), and it's pristine scratch and grain-free surface also reminds us that we're watching a contemporary effort. If you're a Lovecraft fan and liked the film of CoC, you definitely owe it to yourself to see WiD because it is made with ample knowledge of and affection for its source material, and has enough good moments to make it worthwhile. That said, I still rank its predecessor higher.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy was a pretty good film once it got underway. Oh yes, it takes its own sweet while to get there; the leisurely non-dramatic build-up may put some off and I won't blame them. There are several unannounced timeline shifts that require you to keep attentive track of what's going on. Also the film is, at least from my theatrical experience, shot in low contrast extremely dim lighting, possibly as a visual analogy to the murky goings-on of the plot. Gary Oldman heads the cast, which is mainly other Old Men (hur-hur); oh and there's Sherlock too, Benedict Cumberbatch, this time with blond hair. Most of them give fine performances (and Gary has a cracker scene mid-way where he talks about an encounter with the film's main nemesis), but John Hurt once again phones in - it's almost hard to believe now that he once brilliantly essayed The Elephant Man and Winston in the Michael Radford adaptation of 1984. The whodunit revelation at the end isn't particularly dramatic or meaningful, but this was a good diversion from the normal sort of film that shows up on screens here. The question now is, should I actually read any of that John Le Carre stuff?

Update: So I did see the 1979 TV mini-series with Alec Guiness playing George Smiley. There are definitely a great many of the usual advantages offered by the longer running time (Seven 45-min episodes). The story feels more coherent in its fleshed out avatar (no need for clumsy visual devices, like chess pieces with pictures of the suspects pasted over them), and many of the characters like Peter Guillam, Ricki Tarr and Jim Prideaux have some dimension here, unlike the cardboard dogsbodies of the film. Alexander Knox's solid performance as Control further exposes John Hurt's turn for the disgrace it is. There are more visual cues for each location shift (Tarr's stint in Lisbon comes off immensely better in terms of generating a different atmosphere) and it also helps that that there are none of the unannounced timeline jumps that made the 2011 feature a little hard to keep up with. But, blame my attention span, I still can't say I have the answers to all the stuff that happens in the plot. I won't discuss them here for fear of spoiling it for other unfamiliar with this watchable series - and very watchable it is, I'd intended to do one episode a day but ended up watching the last 3 without a break.

Which is not to say that everything in the series is better than in the film. For a crucial scene where Smiley encounters his Russian nemesis Karla, the film had Smiley simply recounting the incident to Guillam while the TV series gives us a flashback of the event....and it is the former approach that works better for me. It is one of those iconic moments which loses a little in actual presentation. As for Smiley, it's a toss-up between Alec Guiness' and Gary Oldman's performances. Both of them do a very fine job, with their personal auras bringing a wee different perspective to how you see the character. Alec is all old-world gentility and order, which makes it easier to accept how he is underestimated by his rivals. On the other hand, Gary brings a greater innate steel to the character that makes it more natural to see why the young hounds under his command would jump to do his bidding. Whatever your preference, each approach is enjoyable on its own merits.

Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows [dir. Guy Ritchie]

The 2009 movie of Sherlock Holmes was a guilty pleasure. It had very little to do with the creations of Arthur Conan Doyle, but it was a fun romp in its own way, a buddy action movie that just happened to be set in the late 19^th century and placed its protagonists in 221B Baker Street (for little time anyway, considering all the running about they did). Robert Downey's Holmes was more Robert Downey than anything else, but Jude Law gave a sassy entertaining spin to Watson, bringing that all-too-easily dismissed character to the fore. Yes, the plot was foolish and our sleuth showed more brawling skills than detective work, but the film wasn't to mine eyes any more offensive than the countless goofy plots thought up for the Sherlock Holmes radio programs and films with Basil Rathbone and Nigel Bruce.

The sequel, sub-titled A Game of Shadows, attempts to give us more of the same - more over the top action, more hoofing it across landscapes (country-hopping now), more of characters from the book being untrue to their source material. If you're one to complain how this franchise is not faithful to the Sherlock Holmes “canon” you had best stay away from this. They don't even have the decency to allow for a bit of time to pass before rushing in to tell you that Holmes survived his encounter with Moriarty at the Reichenbach falls.

Oh yes, in the second film itself Holmes has squared off against his arch-nemesis. Jared Harris does a good job of Moriarty as an evil mastermind, reminiscent of the Bond villains. In most scenes, he comes across as Holmes' superior, and even his tone of addressing the detective is one of condescension rather than the respect to which he alludes. Unfortunately, Moriarty's methods to eliminate Holmes and Watson are also reminiscent of Bond villains - Filling up an entire train with enough weaponry to take down a battalion for the sole purpose of snuffing out the good doctor and his wife? Seems rather wasteful, Professor. In fact, the usage of guns increases exponentially as the film progresses; towards the end our two heroes (and a band of ragtag companions) are dodging mortar shells and steam-era ballistic missiles.

So yes, this certainly ain't your daddy's Sherlock Holmes and it's patently absurd every which way you look at it, but is it fun? I liked the first movie a good deal, this one less so. Although Game of Shadows has the same running length as the 2009 film (which at 2 hours plus is a half hour more than what it should be), it feels more bloated, and runs even further if possible into the realms of the generic - there's a scene midway with Holmes and Watson as part of a horse-mounted posse, and it feels like you've landed in one of those Spaghetti western spoofs, Sherlock's disguise skills now extend to custom-designed leotards that allow him to blend in with the furniture, and Stephen Fry as Mycroft has a scene where he shows more naked Stephen Fry flesh than you'd ever want to see, a scene that has no reason to exist other than perhaps Stephen Fry mistakenly thinking it a good prank. But the film is not devoid of its charms: in its best parts it plays like a hilarious spoof on the original characters (Mycroft: “...a matter involving two countries that shall not be named, except that they speak French and German”). Jude Law's Watson remains endearing (Holmes in contrast is even less interesting), and several action scenes carry a good deal of energy. I also love Philippe Rousselot's classy photography that eschews the hyper-contrasted digital look favored by many of today's blockbusters for a more painterly palette.

So on the whole I thought it was quite alright as disposable entertainment. If you didn't like its predecessor, you're certainly not going to care for this.

Drowning in movies...and I love it!

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