Further Acquisitions

Featuring:

1. 3 Novels by Cesar Aira (Ghosts, An Episode in the Life of a Landscape Painter, The Literary Conference)
2. कालजयी कमबख्त (अमित दत्ता) (tr. The Damned Classic, Amit Dutta)
3. दोज़ख़नामा (रबिशंकर बल) (बांग्ला अनुवादक: अमृता बेरा) (tr. Chronicles of Hell, Rabishankar Bal, translated from Bengali by Amrita Bera)
4. अभेद आकाश: मणि कॉल से उदयन वाजपेयी की बातचीत (tr. Impenetrable Space: Udayan Vajpeyi's conversation with Mani Kaul)

निरी आर्ट फिल्म

"सतह से उठता आदमी" मेरे लिए मणि कॉल की पहली पिक्चर थी. इस फिल्म में वे सब गुण थे जिनसे आम इंसान थोड़ा घबराते हैं - बोझिल संवेदना, धीमी चाल, अवसादोन्मुख यथार्थ - और एक सजग, सघन कलात्मक आत्मतुष्टता.

इन शार्ट, बेहद पकाऊ.

बचपन में इन्ही कारणों से मैं आधुनिक हिंदी साहित्य से बचता था. देवकीनन्दन खत्री का मैं भक्त था, लेकिन इतना मुझे भी मालूम था कि बड़े राइटर खत्री बाबू नहीं, बड़े राइटर मुक्तिबोध हैं, या उनके टाइप के अमूर्त, निम्न-मध्यवर्गीय पर्यवेक्षण में लिप्त उनके चेले चपाटे. कॉलेज के दिनों में मैं स्वतः हिंदी साहित्य के प्रति पुनर्जिज्ञासित हुआ, लेकिन इसका श्रेय निर्मल वर्मा को देना बेहतर होगा - निर्मल वर्मा, जो यूरोप में दोस्तों के साथ बियर पीते थे, उम्दा यात्रा साहित्य लिखते थे, नयी कहानी के प्रणेता थे; और कूलता की सारी हदें पार कर चुके थे. बीच बीच में मैं फिर से मुक्तिबोध की तरफ लौटता था (हूँ) ("शायद इस बार कुछ चमकेगा!?") लेकिन उनकी अमूर्त कविताओं का लौह आवरण अभी तक अभेद रहा है - बू हू!

कुछ ऐसा ही सोच के मैंने फिल्म देखने का फैसला किया था. ये सोच के कि कम-से-कम किताब पढ़ी है, खुद को हौसला भी दिलाया था. "पिक्चर बोरिंग है और पल्ले भी नहीं पड़ेगी", ये स्वयं को आगाह भी था. लेकिन जैसा सोचा था, वैसा ही हुआ - सतह से उठता आदमी, सुपर थकाऊ और सुपर पकाऊ पिक्चर निकली - निरी आर्ट फिल्म सुसरी!

लेकिन मैं उसे भूल नहीं पाया.

ये लखनऊ की सरज़मीं (या ढिंचैक टाइमलैप्स)

Brief Interludes With Hideous Men

NF's corporeal form will be locatable in Lucknow from December 13th to January 7th. Those who can, please drop by to say hello.

The Son Also Rises

Via the always brilliant Scroll.in, the fabulous Mayank Tewari reports on the blinding rise of a dazzling talent in Hindi travel writing - a long neglected genre within the mainstream Hindi writing establishment - Anil Yadav's Wah Bhi Koi Des Hai Maharaj (वह भी कोई देस है महाराज (tr. (Is) That too a country my lord)). The article charts the cult status the work has suddenly attained and also the searing intensity of Yadav's writing. An excerpt from Mayank Tewari's article:

His second and most recent work, which came out last year, Wah Bhi Koi Desh Hai Maharaj (Is That Even a Country, My Lord!), an account of his travels in the North East in the early 2000s, has taken the Hindi literary scene by storm. Largely ignored by a Bollywood-obsessed media, the book is all the rage among the depleting mass of Hindi readers and is on its way to attaining cult status.

The 158-page book is the story of India’s most neglected region told by the narrative voice of a poor, petulant reporter. Anyone who doubts the power of Hindi must read it. 

Tewari compares Yadav's sincere, honest-no-holds-barred writing to David Foster Wallace and his manic dedication to nothing but literature to that of a character from Bolaño's oeuvre.

At 45, Yadav is angry in a healthy sort of way. Sequestered in a Himachal village, he is working on his first novel, which he hopes will be out in the middle of next year. He has a mobile phone, but no internet connectivity. "I don’t have to worry about anything here," he said. "All I do is write." 

... 

Before dinner he has a drink. For the rest of the time, he writes, and reads. He comes across like a character from a Roberto Bolaño book, a reclusive writer with an untrained mind, someone like Hans Reiter from 2666. His soft voice, firm but not intimidating, betrayed no trace of the anger that sometimes burns on the pages of his writing. 

The excellent article also resurrected long forgotten memories of my own epic trip (taken along with many other friends from S'kal) to the same region, though (for reasons best not explicated) much of those wonderful memories died instantly along with the brain cells they were attached on to. If however, we ever write our memoirs of times in the NE, they'll be quite different from those of (the Lucknow based(!)) Anil Yadav who was masquerading as a Delhi journalist writing on the Bihari workers' killings taking place there. 

And so I did manage to hunt down some excerpts from the book at the ever-awesome Pratilipi.in where the book was being promoted in 2012 when it first came out. Those who want to read the passages from the book may do so here (part 1) and here (part 2). As Tewari correctly points out, the writing is real, hard-hitting, scorching and yet very funny - a rare combination indeed.

Which brings me to the last point regarding this wonderful development. Pandu, if you're reading this, then seriously...fuck you! When are you going to put your head down, get your ass to work and write the irreverent, morbid, funny, grotesque, convention-smashing book that we all have a right to read? And if you're incapable, let SatyaVrat take the center stage.

To fellow mortals - go read the article. To those who can read Hindi - go read the full book - as I intend to do!

Update: Here is an interview of Anil Yadav who doesn't disappoint at all in the refreshing honesty of his opinion.

बेजिन हाकुमेई के सौजन्य से: कटियाबाज़

 

 

बहुतै भयंकर कनपुरिया कटियाबाज़!

(संगीत: इंडियन ओशन)

Recent Acquisitions

1. लाल तीन की छत (निर्मल वर्मा) (पुनः) (tr. Red Tin Roof (Nirmal Verma) (again))
2. तिरिछ (उदय प्रकाश) (tr. Bent (Uday Prakash))
3. और अंत में प्रार्थना (उदय प्रकाश) (tr. And in the End, Prayer (Uday Prakash))
4. प्रतिनिधि कवितायें (केदारनाथ सिंह) (tr. Representative Poems (Kedarnath Singh))
5. नेताजी कहिन (मनोहर श्याम जोशी) (tr. Sayeth Mr. Politician (Manohar Shyam Joshi))
6. पत्थर अलपत्थर (उपेन्द्रनाथ अश्क) (tr. Stone Al-Patthar (???) (Upendranath Ashq))
7. रसीदी टिकट (अमृता प्रीतम) (tr. Return Ticket (Amrita Preetam))
8. Dongri to Dubai: Six Decades of the Mumbai Mafia (S Hussain Zaidi)
9. अरेबा परेबा (उदय प्रकाश) (tr. Areba Pareba (???) (Uday Prakash))
10. मोहन राकेश की यादगारी कहानियां (मोहन राकेश) (tr. Memorable Stories of Mohan Rakesh (Mohan Rakesh))
11. Life & Times of Michael K (J M Coetzee)
12. अग्नि और बरखा (गिरीश कर्नाड) (अनुवाद: रामगोपाल बजाज) (tr. Fire and Rain (Girish Karnad) (Translation: Ramgopal Bajaj))
13. हयवदन (गिरीश कर्नाड) (अनुवाद: बी वी कारंत) (tr. Hayavadana (Girish Karnad) (Translation: B V Karanth))
14. मोहन दास (उदय प्रकाश) (tr. Mohan Das (Uday Prakash))
15. The Master of Petersburg (J M Coetzee)
16. जलती झाड़ी (निर्मल वर्मा) (पुनः) (tr. Burning Bush (Nirmal Verma) (again))
17. पीली छतरी वाली लड़की (उदय प्रकाश) (tr. The Girl With the Yellow Umbrella (Uday Prakash))
18. Waiting for the Barbarians (J M Coetzee)
19. खामोश! अदालत जारी है (विजय तेंदुलकर) (अनुवाद: सरोजिनी वर्मा) (tr. Silence! Court is in Session (Vijay Tendulkar) (Translation: Sarojini Verma))
20. घासीराम कोतवाल (विजय तेंदुलकर) (अनुवाद: वसंत देव) (tr. Ghasiram Constable (Vijay Tendulkar) (Translation: Vasant Dev))
21. तुगलक़ (गिरीश कर्नाड) (अनुवाद: बी वी कारंत) (tr. Tuglaq (Girish Karnad) (Translation: B V Karanth))
22. काशी का अस्सी (काशीनाथ सिंह) (tr. Kashi's Assi (Ghat) (Kashinath Singh))
23. दूसरा सप्तक (संपादक: अज्ञेय) (tr. Second Saptak (Editor: Agyeya))
24. हर बारिश में (निर्मल वर्मा) (पुनः) (tr. In Every Rain (Nirmal Verma) (again))

A Short Photo Essay: December '12 - January '13

Music for Airports

NF is visiting his hometown of Lucknow from December 14th to January 23rd. All those jobless enough are enjoined to visit.

शनिवार की सुबहें / बुरी स्मृतियों के गड़े मुर्दे

आओ श्रम के लिए, सेहत के लिए, हम करें रोज़ व्यायाम
देखे हमको सारी दुनिया, हम करें कुछ ऐसे काम

<*पेंपें-पेंपें-पें, पेंपें-पेंपें-पें, पें... पेंपें-पेंपें-पेंपें
पेंपें-पेंपें-पें, पेंपें-पेंपें-पें,
पें... पेंपें-पेंपें-पें*>

हम हैं नवयुग के निर्माता, काँधों पर बोझ उठाना है
हम हैं नवयुग के निर्माता, काँधों पर बोझ उठाना है
आगे बढ़ने की चाहत, पीछे ना कदम हटाना है
आगे बढ़ने की चाहत, पीछे ना कदम हटाना है
हम हैं मंज़िल के दीवाने, कर पड़े हैं हम अभियान
देखे हमको सारी दुनिया, हम करें कुछ ऐसे काम

...



कुछ यातनाएं अकेले समेटे रखना उचित नहीं है। उन्हें मित्रों के साथ बांटने से (सुनने में आया है) प्यार बढ़ता है।

Notes for a future film

Omkara meets Stalker, in a near future Lucknow. 

Long, Tarkovskian shots of dung heaps, urban waste, old city architecture, listless faces, the lawlessness in the anarcho-capitalistic Hindi heartland.

A Gulzar voiceover, a mish-mash of B&W and color photography, slo-mo porn and swoop down camerawork, deep focus lenses and a potpourri of khari boli-Awadhi-Bhojpuri dialect that's the lingua franca of the then Balkanized north India.

A Kumar Gandharva soundtrack with bits and pieces of Indian Ocean, My Bloody Valentine and Radiohead.

The atmospherics of Wong kar Wai, the minimalism of Kim ki Duk, the brutality of Park chan Wook, the effortless humor of Vishal Bharadwaj, the savage, savage intelligence of Tarantino.

The poetry of SatyaVrat.

Naseeruddin Shah, Om Puri, Pankaj Kapur. Tabu, Nandita Das, Tannishtha Chatterjee. Nanga Fakir in a cameo appearance.

Acid rains and impending calamities; rogue AIs and Turing police; decaying Mayawati statues with Hello Kitty handbags; high tech and low life.

...

The only person in the world who can pull it off is Somnath. 

Take that redux

Lucknow has become obscenely beautiful. So much so that it hurts the eyes. So much so that it's a blot on the consistently impeccable third world, poorest-nation-in-the-world credentials of India.

Just plain unfair!

Take that you Dilliwallahs! Take that!

Why so Serious?

Sonu and I caught up with the premiere show of The Dark Knight at the East End Mall today. First day, first show, first to be seated in the hall. And what a dazzling two and a half hour blast!

Go see it...now.

Latest

Having nothing to do at home forced me into reading The three mistakes of my life -- the latest offering by Chetan Bhagat. I proceeded to correct the situation the very next day and bought shitloads of books to help me pass time. I also made Sheri and Sonu buy those books which I have had in mind to read but were getting too expensive for my shoestring budget. The list is the following:

1) Choke -- Chuck Palahniuk
2) The Idiot -- Fyodor Dostoyevsky
3) Netochka Nezvanova -- Fyodor Dostoyevsky
4) मेरी प्रिय कहानियाँ -- अज्ञेय
5) कुरु कुरु स्वाहा... -- मनोहर श्याम जोशी

The Idiot because my collection of Dostoyevsky lacked this. Netochka Nezvanova because Dostoyevsky pulled a fast one on me and I found that there exists a fiction book he wrote that I had not read (yet again!).

I made Sonu buy The Stand on Zanzibar by John Brunner and Sheri bought American Gods by Neil Gaiman and Diary by Chuck Palahniuk.

Finally, seems like an interesting summer.

This post has no title

Among the first things I am going to do in Lucknow is watch Sarkaar Raj. This will be followed shortly by viewings of Aamir, Speed Racer and Hellboy II: The Golden Army.

Sarkar Raj, because obviously it's a RGV film; Aamir because it is made by Rajkumar Gupta -- a protegé of Anurag Kashyap (he is the producer of this film); Speed Racer because it is written and directed by the Wachowski Brothers and is based on a cartoon series I used to follow on Cartoon Network a long time ago, and Hellboy II because it is made by the awesome Guillermo del Toro - the man who made El Laberinto del Fauno (Pan's Labyrinth).

The Outsiders

Bangys have finally risen against the nitwit immigrant population (Link).

CJ is a happy soul I am sure. Many a time during many a conversation, his semi-humorous, semi-serious loathing against non Kannadigas (especially stupid philistine Northies) came to the fore. I don't know if he knew that among the worst of the worst immigrant philistines that he poked fun at, I should have, on all counts, figured at the top of the list on account of my prominent connections with East UP and Bhojpuri culture. If he pokes fun at the laborer class, then most of them are from UP. If he pokes fun at Northies (read Hindi speaking junta) then too I am indicted for having played a part in soiling the glorious culture.

I did not have a particularly nice time in Bangalore either. That I lived in an obscure corner which most Bangys themselves would not know about didn't help matters much either. The auto rickshaw guys fleeced me regularly. The buses were few and far in between. Was it because of the cultural stain that my people were on the immaculate fabric of Kannada culture? I don't think so.

Did I get pissed off when 'my people' were ridiculed? Not at all. I'd like to imagine that I am at the forefront of such 'ridiculous' activities. But of all emotions that could've surfaced, the most prominent one was that of immense surprise. That genuinely smart people like CJ would hold the views that they do (some of his more outrageous ones are simply to ruffle stupid politically correct people's feathers) comes across to me more as a problem of the remarkable existence (and domination) of irrationality in humans as a whole - irrespective of how smart/brilliant/talented they are individually.

But we - the poor, stupid, backward, uneducated, uncultured blundering buffoons (read UP/Biharis) get fucked wherever we care to go. Mumbaikars are pissed off with us and they'd hate to let us see our "Sasura Bada Paisa Wala" and "Ab ta Ban_ja Sajanwa Hamaar". Modern Bangys hate us because we can't speak English and don't understand the power of Rock and Roll. Old Bangys hate us because we speak Hindi/don't learn Kannada, are insular, are hell bent on polluting Kannada culture and are a general nuisance. Delhi hates us because we eat up resources which don't exist back there in our state. (Link)

Bascially, we are to India, what India was to the world twenty years ago -- poor, corrupt, diseased and showing no chances of recovery. South Indian mothers are afraid to send their children anywhere more north than Mumbai (AK's mom fretted if in IIT Kanpur, he will be eaten alive by mysterious Northie rakshasas).

What is the solution to the problem? And more importantly, does there exist a solution if you have people decrying the strain immigrant junta are on their resources in one breath and congratulating themselves on the success of their US placed sons/daughters in the other?

Being the misanthrope that I am, I think not. What I think will happen is that every now and then, some smart guy, to his advantage, will stir up and manipulate gullible (read stupid) junta into killing some poor rickshaw pulling sons of bitches from the Dark Land (read UP-Bihar). This will lead to the consolidation of the poor Northy in the civilised South. Which will entail a demand for a representative of the community during elections. This will help some Northy parties fight it out for the chunk of the aforementioned votes. Since BJP plays the culture card, it wouldn't be able to side with the cultural polluters in the South. These poor fellows will find their true leader in the charismatic Mayawati of the BSP. Slowly the spread of the BSP will increase and in due time BSP will will rule the Centre leading to the entire MG Road in Bangalore being turned into Parivartan Chauk II.

(Link to news of Mayawati's Prime Ministerial ambitions)

A Bangy will then rise to beat the shit out of the Northy motherfuckers. He will be called CJ. And so shall Mayawati be assassinated.

PS: Although the Garden City of India is Bangalore, I still think that there are more gardens/parks in a mere one kilometre radius around Parivartan Chauk in Lucknow than there are in the entire city of Bangalore.

Childhood, Adolescence, Youth...my love affair with Comics

The inspiration for writing this piece came from the introduction (in Wikipedia) of various comic book characters that I used to be a fan of during my adventures as a little kid in Lucknow. I remember very well, the times when these comic books were the sole means of 'timepass' (I know the purists will cringe at my use of non existent English words but let them!) of a single kid in the long and hot summer vacations when you weren't allowed to go out of the house because of the raging 'loo' (double entendre intended).

Let's see what these descriptions are like:



Note on Image uploaded: I used to read comics in Hindi. So I wanted this image to be a representative of the comics I used to read. But the website of the cartoonist Pran has English translations only.

Chacha Chaudhary: "...Chacha is seen in waistcoat which has a double inside pocket. He has a 'gandhi watch' to see time and enjoys eating watermelon with relish. Whenever Chachi nags him he takes off for a walk with Sabu and Rocket...

"Chacha Chaudhary not only fights them off and help the common man but also teach them moral lessons and good behavior. Most of the events end up with goons embarrassed of their deeds. You can see middle class dealing with everyday's problems. In a way Pran takes a whip at those problems still maintaining a happy go lucky feel with twinkling eyes and smiling faces."

I have a feeling that the guy who wrote this up was in the pay of Diamond Comics.

Sabu: "Sabu is an alien from the planet Jupiter, always faithful to Chachaji and provides the physical strength in time of need. He is huge and strong, about 20 feet tall. In some comics he is able to increase his size. He wears only a wrestler's kachha (briefs), a pair of ear-rings and a pair of gum-boots. Sabu decided to stay at Earth with Chacha Chaudhary when he tasted delicious paratha and halwa made by Chachi during his visit to earth. Sabu has a twin brother called Dabu and the giant earrings that Sabu wears had been gifted to him by his mother when he left Jupiter. It is said that whenever Sabu gets angry, some where a volcano erupts. (It is generally depicted in a small bracket in a corner). Whenever he performs an act of great strength, he utters the cry, "Hu-Huba!" Sabu eats 108 chapatis at one time,12 kilos of halwa and about 20 litres of lassi in one meal.

This is a perfect example of Wikipedia being as accurate as Encyclopaedia Britannica. No comic book expert could have got those figures right unless he was a totally wasted, wretched and jobless kid in a small town in India. I personally vouch for the accuracy of the above cited figure of 108 chapatis, 12 kilo halwa etc. I have read that issue in which Chachi gets fed up and cites this figure to sober up Sabu and shake him from his jobless existence. The ruse is effective and Sabu promptly scoots off to fetch sabji for Chachi from the bazaar. Ditto for the 'Hu Huba'.

Chachi:"...In one comic she is shown with stirring a giant pot with a ladle for Sabu and serving him more affectionately than Chachaji."

When you're a kid, somehow you don't get subtle undertones of marital infidelity/extra marital affairs in Chacha Chaudhary. I am sure that the little Harry Potter fans wouldn't have guessed that Dumbledore is gay from the nuanced writings of JK Rowling either.

"Chacha's comic with 'Raaka ki waapsi',' is one of the best selling comics of Diamond Comics. Apparently Raka was put to sleep by some potion given by a saint from Himalayas and buried in the ocean in the first time. On his return by another potion he was reduced to a small size, closed in a bottle and buried in a grave."

This is indeed true. For more dramatic consequences of this read a previous post Boy Meets Girl whose hero Ghongha Basant claims that it is his favourite comic book of all time.

Another comic book that took my world by storm was the "Fighter Toads" series. It was a cold hearted rip off from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series with the creators confident that Indian kids wouldn't know who the latter are. And they were goddamned right. We loved the Toads even though their comics were expensive.

Here's the Wikipedia entry:

"Fighter Toads are the four innocent but very brave toads. Fighter toads features in Raj comics. There names are Fighterr, Masterr, Cuterr and shooterr ("terr" is the sound that toads make in Hindi comics). These were created by "Dhananjaya", one of the friends of Super Commando Dhruva, another Raj comics character.

An inspiration from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, these characters became a superhit in their very first year. These comic books were of giant size but after some time raj comics reduced the size of these comic books to normal size."

Again, I vouch for the accuracy of all facts stated but for the "...innocent but very brave toads.." part.

As I re-read whatever I have written about the passion (by no means extinct) for comics that I have nursed for so long, I realise that one post cannot do justice to all those years spent in fervent hopes of getting one's hands on just one more comic book. So let me just finish off this part without concentrating on the other comic book characters that I was fond of. So although I focus on only the clownish acts of the Indian Comic book industry in this post, I will try to cover the other, more mature facets of the same in other parts of the series of posts that I plan to write in this area.

I end with a miscellany:

The following is the video that Raj Comics have released about Nagraj. It's funny to see the new emaciated version of Nagraj in the video as well as the Matrix ishtyle stuntmangiri that he indulges in. I don't know this Nagraj...my idea of him was the usual more macho superhero. Anyway...



The following, I remember well, was the first Nagraj comic book:



This is the first Super Commando Dhruv comics "Pratishodha ki Jwala" (I remember I asked this question in the India Quiz in Inci '07 of which I was the Quizmaster):



Read "Muft Dhruva ka ek Poster". I was a total sucker for such collectibles.

The following is Doga. The Dog-Raja (hence "Dog-A"??? I wonder...) who communicated with dogs. It was a pretty dark and very violent comic with multiple scenes of mutilation, bloody killings and gore all round. I remember we had named our PT teacher "Doga". The name was so popular that even he knew it and approved of it! I still remember the day when he was called to the dais in the morning assembly for some shit and the entire college was shouting out "Doga...doga...doga...". Boy...is this nostalgic! It was a cold winter morning in December (I think) with the dystopic fog that Lucknowites know so well covering us from head to foot.



Now we come to Bhokal. The fame of this character rested on his talwar (sword) and his popularity can be gauged from the fact that "Bhokali" meant brilliant/bond/chaapu etc before we had discovered the engineering lingo that forms the major chunk of our vocabulary now.



There is also Fauladi Singh-the android whom I believe was the first instance of Science Fiction used in Hindi comic book medium. I remember it being brilliant for its times. It was one of the reasons that I found Science interesting and it made me resolve that I would become a scientist when I grew up (in response to the overly cliched question that elders bug kids with "Beta bade hoke tum kya banoge?") (...That I changed my mind as soon as the World Cup '92 (Italy) aired on Doordarshan and promised to myself that I will become a footballer instead is a different question altogether).



And now, I turn my attention to my favourite comic book of all times: Bankelal. This was a real goofy character similar to Tantri the Mantri that you read in Tinkle. One of my earliest memories is reading the first comic book of this series (below) in my room with the sunlight from the windows falling slantingly on the book (a gift from my Uncle).




The End

TRIBUTE: The inspiration for this post is Vishal Patel. I dedicate this wretched little effort to him and his pioneering work on the comics of the '80s.

PS: This is the longest, biggest and baddest post I have written, ever! Took me close to four hours.

Of Anwar, Lucknow, B Grade Townships in recent movies and the likes

I saw "Anwar" a few days ago. I didn't want to write about it because I was feeling lazy and I thought it did not deserve mention. But it kept hovering over my mind and there were many things about the movie that kept coming back to me. And yes, the movie has much of Lucknow in it. Given that not many movies mention the city and the few that do, often go back in time and dwell on the famous Lucknawi tehzeeb and nautch girls etc (a notable exception is "Main, Meri Patni aur Woh" which captures beautifully daily life in a small, upcoming and growing city) I thought I gotta write about this.



The first thing you'll notice is the absolutely topnotch album of the movie by a guy called Mithoon (exceptions are the atrocious songs "Bungla Khulla khulla" and "Maula Mere Maula(remix)") but more about this later.

I want to first talk about the Director here. The guy is Manish Jha and has to his credit a previous movie called "Matrubhoomi" which I remember clearly, polarised the movie watching junta of our hostel into those who had liked the movie and those who simply couldn't stop laughing at what the movie turned out to be (Nitesh was in the laughter gang). I didn't see the movie but was intrigued. Hence when I came to know that this guy has made another movie, and that too about Lucknow, I grabbed the chance to view it (online!).

The Directorial vision, in my view, in deeply flawed. I'll tell you why. Basically, most important characters are in deep shit on account of their love life. This is one common thread that connects all major characters. Vijay Raaj meets his sorry end because the cute dramatics chick tells him that he is a bhikhari, the local junta gets fucked and Valentine Day celebrations turn sour because the minister gets L'd by the wife of the IAS officer (incidentally all love lives in this movie get fucked on Valentine's Day...some kind of fancy symbolism on the part of the Director?), the hero, obviously suffers on account of his love for the cute Nauheed Cyrusi who, incidentally, looks delectably cute in the movie, most of all in the "Maula Mere Maula" song, which in turn is what a beautiful song. Manisha Koirala longingly takes out a picture of Sushant Singh (who never comes up in this movie again apart from this photo) and is shown to have broken up with her boyfriend or something, the SP harps upon his wife dying due to Cancer and he not being able to do shit about it...basically no end of this sorry state of affairs, all due to stupid love problems.

Now all this is not bad per se. And I think the Director is trying to say that even after this shit, love is cool etc. Again, not bad by itself, but in the Universe of Manish Jha, politicians are evil, scheming villains trying to take control of the world (or India as the case may be) just like The Joker or The Penguin would try to do the same in Batman Comics or what Daku Gobar Singh and his sidekick Dhamaka Singh would try to do in the homegrown comic world of Chacha Chaudhary. He would also want a comedian like Rajpal Yadav to indulge in lameass comedy and totally forget what happened to him in between the movie (he totally vanishes after a certain point in the movie and what happens to his efforts to nab Osama bin Laden etc is something that the Director seems to have forgotten to mention).

The basic criticism of the movie is that it lacks subtlety. It has to be loud mouthed about every which sensibility that the Director cares to speak about and this is what pisses me off most. The Director is not without talent. Certainly, I would definitely see his next movie (again, probably online) even after all this but I would expect that he understand that evil, bad criminals and politicians don't act that way brazenly, even if they pride themselves on being evil and bad and have taken up office only because they are in the pay of Pakistani intelligence agencies. It also looks like that a lot of serious editing has been done and many things have been left incomplete (Manisha Koirala's role and Rajpal Yadav's etc are examples) and the basic premise of the movie-the suspicion of terrorism and the follow up to that on the basis of some stupid sketches is laughable. Even evil, criminally insane ministers of god-forsaken states (like UP, Bihar and Orissa) would never create such a ruckus based on that flimsy piece of evidence.

If this was all that the movie had to offer, I would have not written about it, nor would this movie have occupied my mind for such a long time. Actually every other thing apart from the above in this movie is wonderfully done. It captures very smartly the atmosphere of Lucknow, its ruins, its dilapidated, no longer paid attention to mausoleums and palaces. All this is done not in an obtrusive way, not in loudmouthed way that could've meant "Hell, we're shooting in Lucknow, so you've got to see this". This subtlety is thoroughly lacking in the other departments of the movie. The dialogues sometimes sound corny but not corny enough to receive flak. The movie also has a good story and does a decent job of telling it. It also takes a very good and informed look of the ambience of UP, the villagers that dwell in there, the ways they are manipulated, the local flavour of the love story, the interesting side love story, the betrayal, the redemption-all of it adapted well to the setting that must have been chosen very carefully etc. This is something only those who would've stayed in UP for a long time and absorbed all of its nuances could've done.

And yes, the soundtrack. With the exception of the two aforementioned songs, it is a gem. Roop Kumar Rathod has sung a memorable "Maula Mere Maula" in the highest traditions of Sufi music. The song itself is picturised in a brilliant way and all that is good and beautiful about Lucknow comes forcefully to haunt you during the time the song plays. Ra, if you're reading this and you come to see this movie, you will clearly be able to spot the Ambedkar stadium in the song where we spent that scorching afternoon in the 43 degree hot sun. You will also see the places we went to in Old Lucknow when we visited Zebi, the old Imambara, the old homes that many people in Lucknow still live in, the dirty and green/black-with-moss/sludge Gomti and the many minars and ruins that are interspersed, so to say, throughout the timeline of the movie.

The song sounds particularly wonderful to my ears because probably it reminds me of the brilliant trip to Nainitaal that Himanshu and I made during summer '07 where I first heard the song.

I am providing a link to the movie. You can view it online on Google videos. The song "Maula Mere Maula" lasts from the 43rd minute to the 49th minute (for those who want to see the brilliant song/video). Here it is.

Basically this movie is another in what is now a rather long list of movies, mainly by young Turks of the Hindi Film Industry. Examples that come to mind are "Main Madhuri Dikshit Ban_na Chahti Hoon", "Main, Meri Patni aur Woh" (both by Chandan Arora), "Iqbal", "Dor" (both by Nagesh Kukunoor), "Bunty aur Babli" (maybe...(Shaad Ali), "Omkara" (Vishal Bharadwaj) "Haasil" (I forget the name of the Director here but the first half of the movie was brilliant and Irfan Khan as the Student Leader of Allahabad University kicked ass!) etc. All these movies have given the Hindi Film Industry a strong boost by making use of creativity and showing the viewers some artful, artsy yet quintessentially commercial cinema. Cheers to the new face of Bollywood.