Movies that made me believe,
“Life is Beautiful”
I can’t forget the day when I saw movie “Lagaan”. It was
probably the best movie I had ever seen. Everything was so good about it.Lagaan
actually changed the trend of Indian Cinema. It proved that, love story,
rivalary, comedy are not the only criteria to make good movies. It’s also
not necessary that , only
established stars can give successful movies. A good story with an excellent
script & then supported by “ made for the
character ” acting can give commercially &critically
successful movie. Lagaan changed thinking of film makers in many ways. One of
them is, some filmmakers realized that songs are not made just to give relaxing
brake to audience. Songs can be an inseparable part of the story which helps in
taking the story ahead. A R Rahman’s music in this film was awesome. It was a
perfect application of Indian Classical Music. Lagaan’s theme had a struggle,
love story, thrill etc.But none of these things were pasted just to increase
the length of the film.Every aspect came as an integral part of story.Maybe
this was the reason that audience happily enjoyed a 3Hrs. 30 min long story. And
this became the speciality of all Ashutosh Gowarikar’s movies. Ashutosh’s every character speaks with the
audience. Lagaan brought back the concept of “Director’s movie” which was lost
somewhere after 1970’s movies.
This was just the beginning. The first decade of 21st
century was flooded with good movies. Shortly after Lagaan, Dil Chahta Hain was released. A Story of 3 friends, finding ways of their
life. Till today, this movie has great impact not only on me, but on my entire
generation. You can ask any guy of my generation, one of his favorite movies
has to be Dil Chahta Hain ! People do appreciate
an average story if it is told in an interesting way. This was the high point of
“DCH”. Just about same time, a wave of Bhagat Sing movies thundered on Box
Office. Approx 5 movies on Bhagat Sing released on same day. One of them was The
Legend of Bhagat Singh! I think this was
the only movie which actually focused on Ideology of a Great man called Bhagat
Sing. All other Bhagat Sing movies including old ones always portrayed only a
loud character of Bhagat Sing. This movie showed that, all the freedom fighting
activities done by Bhagat Sing & his friends were not just the deeds out of
anger. His deeds were supported by a justified thought process. Bhagat Sing was
not a guy who just got carried away by freedom fighting movements. He had a
vision for his country. He not only lived for his vision, but happily died for
it. All these above points were distinctly pointed out in that movie. Off
course it wouldn’t have been possible without unbelievable screen presence of
Ajay Devgan & all his costars.
Then came a movie which was a milestone in real sense.
Sanjay Leela Bhansali introduced the term “Darkness” in a way which no one ever
imagined. One of the film critics rightly said that ‘Black’ is a cinematic Gem which should be seen at least twice to
understand its emotional depth.
Maybe in addition to its theme it was the performances given by Rani Mukherji & Amitabh Bacchhan which added more gravity in
those emotions. But those emotions were really painful. So it can’t be said
that it was a treat to watch Black, which was the biggest achievement of this
movie. But yes, it was truly a masterpiece from Sanjay Leela Bhansali.
After
Lagaan, everyone was asking Ashutosh Gowarikar , What Next ? Ashutosh came with
a movie which can be called as his best work till date. The movie was “ Swades”.
I feel, whenever a discussion regarding best hindi movies ever is going on , some
movies like Pyasa, Anand ,Black or Swades
should be kept in a different bracket.. And then we can rate the other
movies.Swades portrayed journey of a man from urban life to rural or the real
life. A Nasa scientist comes to India to meet his childhood caretaker.During
his stay in India, he realizes the importance of motherland. He gets
disturbedby unethical traditions & level of poverty in the country. He also
observes the brighter side of his country which lies in its strong relationship
values. He finally decides to come back to India leaving his comfortable life in
US. Every scene in the movie was expressing something. As a Writer &
Director of the movie, Ashutosh rightly commented on many aspects of Indian
culture.Also after the likes of Kuchh kuchh hota hain, Kal Ho naa ho & Main
hoo nnaa & what not, film industry had got a Superstar Shah Rukh Khan but
audiences had lost an actor Shah Rukh Khan. But Ashutosh found that actor. Shah
Rukh actually lived the character of Mohan Bhargav. As a SRK fan, I can
distinctly point out this as a career defining role of SRK.
I remember Munnabhai MBBS movie as
the first movie I saw with my new college friends in first year. This movie not
only introduced a new version of Sanjay Dutt but also gave birth to a “common
man” Director Raju Hirani. He has a distinct ability to comment on everything
in common man’s language. He found a potential comedian in Arshad Warsi. And
truly Munnabhai is incomplete without Circuit! Though based on a comic theme, this
movie succeeded to highlight some neglected but important aspects of human
life. It highlighted the importance of Love & care in human life.Munnabhai
in his unique style speaks on the “once upon a time” nobel profession of
medical science which unfortunately has now become an emotionless or more
importantly a passionless profession. Yes, there were funny dialogues &
instances but everytime there were some messages given to the society.Munnabhai
was a trendsetter movie in terms of situational comedy. Second film in the
series was “Lage Raho Munnabhai”. This time Raju Hirani gently took out Mahatma
Gandhi from his every photo frame in the country and placed him directly into
the heart of audience. No one has ever looked at Gandhian Philosophy in such a way. This movie
made us believe that Gandhian Philosophy is timeless! This movie lived to the expectations
or even exceeded them.
There are several things that made
‘Lakshya’, a distinguished movie. Not many times we see introduction of a hero
as a loser. And a kind of loser who doesn’t even know that he is lost. Lakshya
portrayed a journey of a aimless boy Karan towards a matured person. And
Hrithik Roshan’s astonishing performance underlined the difference between the
two phases of Karan’s life. As a Director, Farhan Akhtar impeccably showed his
touch. Boman Irani played a father who never really believed his son’s ability.
But when his son calls him from warfront, father breaks into tears. This scene
showed perfect father-son relationship which exists in every Indian family.
Though the
theme was focused on Karan’s life, and his journey in Indian army was just used
as platform, Farhan used that platform to show life of soldiers in army. Some
action scenes during the war were really brilliantly filmed. It showed a true story
of a breathtaking war operation done by Indian soldiers during Kargil war.
Om Puri speaks about a soldier’s thinking
about war,
“ sab
log hum faujiyo se kehte hain ki jung bahut buri hoti hai…main kehta hu ke ye
baat ek fauji se badhakar kaun samaz sakta hain…..par kya kare….Uparwale ne to
ek hi dharti banayi thi. Magar insaan ke
laalach ne uspe lakeere kheech di. Ye tera…ye mera…Main to shukar karta hoon ke
chand aasman me hain…warna insaan uske bhi tukde kar deta”
Filmmakers were really attempting different subjects now. A movie like’
Rang de Basanti’ is a classic example
of this. This movie directly connected current Indian youth to the youth before
independence. Movie speaks about mentality of today’s youth. It warned the
society that if this youth is not given its due Rights ,it can turn into
violence. The movie in a way didn’t
support any violence but it rightly showed the glimpses of it. The movie
pointed out the exponentially increasing gap between Politicians & youth.
This movie created an everlasting impact on Indian youth.
Aamir Khan’s
first Directorial venture “Taare Zameen Par” released as a much awaited movie.
I will term this movie not as a milestone but as a Landmark of matured Hindi
cinema. This film was a need of a time. “Every child is special” is not just a
thought, it’s actually a learning for the society. The film commented on how we
are killing every child’s childhood by pushing him into the unnecessary competition.
The character “Ishan” in the film resembled with every child in our society. As
a writer, Amol Gupte spoke about children psychology in a different way. Ishan
is a innocent dreamy boy who couldn’t cope up with this materialistic world.
Slowly he transforms into a confident boy who may not cope with the world but
at least can stand distinctly in this world. If we talk about performances in the movie it
was again “made for the character” acting by everyone. I am really short of
words to describe Aamir’s acting in this movie. I can say, a point where all
actors stop acting, Aamir started his acting from that point & reached to
the level of sky. Maybe a Marathi word can describe it , “Sarvang Sunder Abhinay”!!
Hindi movies never really concentrated
on sports as a subject. But in late 2007’ Chak De India’ released . Though a
theme was about hockey, movie succeeded to highlight the lacunas of entire
sports culture of India. It also showed the way to improve this sports culture.
Movie was a perfect example of team building. I heard, many corporate companies
in India, arranged the special shows of this movie for their employees. The
reason was, movie showcased a perfect display of the term “Teamwork”.
The movie
was filmed exceptionally well in every aspect. Maybe it was the strength of
Yashraj Banner that could create a Hockey World Cup event in its real sense. Apart
from all this, movie knowingly or unknowinglly commented on unreasonable
expectations of all of us from our so called Idols. We all are extremely
impatient when it comes to a failure of our Idols. Sometimes we love hating our
own heroes for their momentary failure. We as a society should also learn sportsmanship
spirit. This movie was a great learning & watching experience. Off course, once again SRK proved his metal
as an actor.
While
writing this article, I mainly focused on movies between 2001 to 2008. There
were lot of other movies which also made this era very special. India’s first
ever science fiction movie Koi Mil Gaya followed by Superhero Krishh were
really entertaining movies.Ram Gopal Verma showed his class by Sarkar & Sarkar
Raj. Sanjay Leela Bhasali’s adaptation of Devdas was a good attempt, though not
of Bhansali’s class. Some nice love stories from Yashraj like Veer-Zara,
Hum-Tum kept love alive within us.
After Legend
of Bhagat Sing, Raj Kumar Santoshi returned with “Khaki” which was a unique
thriller movie. Madhur Bhandarkar showed his unbelievable sense about off the
track subjects through Page 3 & Fashion. Nagesh Kuknoor’s “Iqbal” was a
touching experience. Mani Ratnam’s Guru was a his best work till date.
I know that
there are “n” numbers of movies before & after this period which were
brilliant in their own ways. But these are some movies which impressed me &
helped me in changing the way of looking towards life. I thank each one who was
involved in making of these films.
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