camera obscura

You’d think that Sanjay Leela Bhansali would stick to what he got successful at — the extravagant, melodramatic, ultraromantic megadrama — but instead, he goes and makes a songless film about a deafblind girl and her teacher.


So, it seems, that Indian commercial cinema is going through another phase of diversification. The last time this happened (or at least perceived by the press to have happened) was in 2001, when films like Lagaan and Dil Chahta Hai redefined what exactly it was that made an Indian film. Frankly, though Jism and all its spawn gave people the impression that the whole scene had regressed (thanks in no small part to some big budget flops from established directors like Sooraj Barjatya and Subhash Ghai), the commerical revolution in Indian cinema continued unabated. Films like Agni Varsha, Jhankaar Beats and Meenaxi continued to poke holes in the hull, but were either total flops or dismissed as that very catchy new genre, the ‘Crossover’ film.

Today, however, it’s back to the heady feeling of 2001 and the promise of globally successful Indian commercial films (read: white people — specifically Americans — must watch and like it). Surprisingly, only one film is causing this renewed buzz, and that film is Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Black.

Back in the late 90s, Bhansali’s first film was the oddly titled Khamoshi: The Musical, which involved A deaf-mute couple, their child, and, of course, Salman Khan. I can’t tell you any more because I, like many, didn’t see the film, and while it did garner critical acclaim, it didn’t do much commercially. Bhansali went on to make the much more successful films, Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam and Devdas, and firmly established Bhansali’s style of opulent sets, opulent costumes, and — to me, at least — a lot of very melodramatic acting. Hum Dil… was a nice enough film, a bit too long and a bit too angsty, but being as it was firmly within the confines of traditional commercial cinema, it fared much better than Bhansali’s first film (and thankfully gave Anil Mehta a bunch of great films to photograph, some of them being Lagaan, Agni Varsha & Saathiya).

I tried to watch Devdas. I tried to watch it many times, but could never manage more than five minutes at a time. It was just a little too theatrical and melodramatic for me, but nevertheless it was a big hit.

You’d think that Sanjay Leela Bhansali would stick to what he got successful at — the extravagant, melodramatic, ultraromantic megadrama — but instead, he goes and makes a songless film about a deafblind girl and her teacher.

Opinion has been pretty divided about Black. There are people who absolutely love it, those who absolutely hate it, and both sides spend as much time as they can trying to convince the other party that they’re right. One Black fan went so far as to take out a full page ad in a city daily urging people to see the film. Unfortunately he made the mistake of bad-mouthing a lot of (perfectly good) commerical films, and he — and Bhansali and Black by proxy — got the ire of the industry for a few days.

With all this, for lack of a better term, noise in the air, I decided to just clear my head of any pre-conceptions and go and see the film for myself (hadn’t been too interested in the first place, because the trailers were downright terrible, plus I’m not the biggest fan of the Disabled Person Triumphs genre). I’m not going to tell you the story of Black because it’s pretty much exactly as you would expect from a film like this. How it’s approached is what would make or break the film for me.

On the technical side, the cinematography (by Dil Chahta Hai and Yuva lensman Ravi K. Chandran) is top-notch, as is Omung Kumar’s production design. The film is set in some unspecified time in the 1920s and 30s, and instead of being slavish to the period the film’s sets and locations are treated with an impressionistic flourish. Sometimes it looks like a theatrical play, and a good one, at that. Monty’s (no last name given) musical score is adequate but utterly unmemorable.

The film’s performances are where the real strengths of the film lie, with pretty much everyone putting in a solid turn. About the only problem I have is with Amitabh Bachchan’s god-awful English accent. At first I tried to dismiss it as just the character being drunk during his opening scene, but soon it became apparent that this was the way the character talks; it was forced and sometimes unintelligible, especially when the character starts shouting (when all you can hear are a series of sharp hissing sounds). It’s a bit of a let-down… I mean, this is Amitabh Bachchan we’re talking about.

The film also breaks the cardinal writing rule of Show, Don’t Tell. Everything in this movie is told to you. Every single moment of the film seems pre-scripted rather than captured, every line, every action, and it doesn’t help that once in a while the film’s structure twists in such a way that it just leaves you bored. For instance, a character we only get a glimpse of in the first half reappears later and, instead of actually showing us something about this character, we get this dinner scene where she spends 5 minutes telling us about stuff that we could have seen in 30 seconds in the first half.

And that’s about it.

If you think I’m being vague about Black, not delivering the hard-hitting, conclusive ‘Yes or No’ review, then you’re right, because I had the unfortunate experience of being utterly unaffected by the film. I didn’t think it was the greatest movie ever made, nor did I think it the worst. It’s a fine enough movie when you’re watching it — some of you may even love it — but once it was over I was just… numb. I picked up my empty popcorn packet, dropped it in a bin on the way out and just walked home, pausing only for a sugarcane juice. I can tell you how the sugarcane juice made me feel, but not Black.

A month or so ago I saw The Incredibles and had much the same experience (hence I didn’t write a review for it).

I will say that Black is different from commercial Indian cinema, but I must also say that it is very much a stereotypical movie. Only it’s a stereotypical American movie, the kind that’s released in the last two months of every year and is engineered to garner a ton of awards in the following months. It is, as they say, an Oscar Bait movie, which is why it’s being touted as potentially being well received by the West.

It may be in Hindi and English and set in India, but it never feels like an Indian movie (perhaps that’s why it left me cold), and seeing as I don’t like Oscar Bait movies, I didn’t particularly like Black (or feel the need to spend 80,000 rupees on a full page ad in Mid-Day)

If you like Oscar Bait movies, do go see Black. Or don’t.

I, for one, won’t be affected either way. That’s a horrible, horrible thing for a piece of entertainment to do to you.

Vishal

You’d think that Sanjay Leela Bhansali would stick to what he got successful at — the extravagant, melodramatic, ultraromantic megadrama — but instead, he goes and makes a songless film about a deafblind girl and her teacher.


So, it seems, that Indian commercial cinema is going through another phase of diversification. The last time this happened (or at least perceived by the press to have happened) was in 2001, when films like Lagaan and Dil Chahta Hai redefined what exactly it was that made an Indian film. Frankly, though Jism and all its spawn gave people the impression that the whole scene had regressed (thanks in no small part to some big budget flops from established directors like Sooraj Barjatya and Subhash Ghai), the commerical revolution in Indian cinema continued unabated. Films like Agni Varsha, Jhankaar Beats and Meenaxi continued to poke holes in the hull, but were either total flops or dismissed as that very catchy new genre, the ‘Crossover’ film.

Today, however, it’s back to the heady feeling of 2001 and the promise of globally successful Indian commercial films (read: white people — specifically Americans — must watch and like it). Surprisingly, only one film is causing this renewed buzz, and that film is Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Black.

Back in the late 90s, Bhansali’s first film was the oddly titled Khamoshi: The Musical, which involved A deaf-mute couple, their child, and, of course, Salman Khan. I can’t tell you any more because I, like many, didn’t see the film, and while it did garner critical acclaim, it didn’t do much commercially. Bhansali went on to make the much more successful films, Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam and Devdas, and firmly established Bhansali’s style of opulent sets, opulent costumes, and — to me, at least — a lot of very melodramatic acting. Hum Dil… was a nice enough film, a bit too long and a bit too angsty, but being as it was firmly within the confines of traditional commercial cinema, it fared much better than Bhansali’s first film (and thankfully gave Anil Mehta a bunch of great films to photograph, some of them being Lagaan, Agni Varsha & Saathiya).

I tried to watch Devdas. I tried to watch it many times, but could never manage more than five minutes at a time. It was just a little too theatrical and melodramatic for me, but nevertheless it was a big hit.

You’d think that Sanjay Leela Bhansali would stick to what he got successful at — the extravagant, melodramatic, ultraromantic megadrama — but instead, he goes and makes a songless film about a deafblind girl and her teacher.

Opinion has been pretty divided about Black. There are people who absolutely love it, those who absolutely hate it, and both sides spend as much time as they can trying to convince the other party that they’re right. One Black fan went so far as to take out a full page ad in a city daily urging people to see the film. Unfortunately he made the mistake of bad-mouthing a lot of (perfectly good) commerical films, and he — and Bhansali and Black by proxy — got the ire of the industry for a few days.

With all this, for lack of a better term, noise in the air, I decided to just clear my head of any pre-conceptions and go and see the film for myself (hadn’t been too interested in the first place, because the trailers were downright terrible, plus I’m not the biggest fan of the Disabled Person Triumphs genre). I’m not going to tell you the story of Black because it’s pretty much exactly as you would expect from a film like this. How it’s approached is what would make or break the film for me.

On the technical side, the cinematography (by Dil Chahta Hai and Yuva lensman Ravi K. Chandran) is top-notch, as is Omung Kumar’s production design. The film is set in some unspecified time in the 1920s and 30s, and instead of being slavish to the period the film’s sets and locations are treated with an impressionistic flourish. Sometimes it looks like a theatrical play, and a good one, at that. Monty’s (no last name given) musical score is adequate but utterly unmemorable.

The film’s performances are where the real strengths of the film lie, with pretty much everyone putting in a solid turn. About the only problem I have is with Amitabh Bachchan’s god-awful English accent. At first I tried to dismiss it as just the character being drunk during his opening scene, but soon it became apparent that this was the way the character talks; it was forced and sometimes unintelligible, especially when the character starts shouting (when all you can hear are a series of sharp hissing sounds). It’s a bit of a let-down… I mean, this is Amitabh Bachchan we’re talking about.

The film also breaks the cardinal writing rule of Show, Don’t Tell. Everything in this movie is told to you. Every single moment of the film seems pre-scripted rather than captured, every line, every action, and it doesn’t help that once in a while the film’s structure twists in such a way that it just leaves you bored. For instance, a character we only get a glimpse of in the first half reappears later and, instead of actually showing us something about this character, we get this dinner scene where she spends 5 minutes telling us about stuff that we could have seen in 30 seconds in the first half.

And that’s about it.

If you think I’m being vague about Black, not delivering the hard-hitting, conclusive ‘Yes or No’ review, then you’re right, because I had the unfortunate experience of being utterly unaffected by the film. I didn’t think it was the greatest movie ever made, nor did I think it the worst. It’s a fine enough movie when you’re watching it — some of you may even love it — but once it was over I was just… numb. I picked up my empty popcorn packet, dropped it in a bin on the way out and just walked home, pausing only for a sugarcane juice. I can tell you how the sugarcane juice made me feel, but not Black.

A month or so ago I saw The Incredibles and had much the same experience (hence I didn’t write a review for it).

I will say that Black is different from commercial Indian cinema, but I must also say that it is very much a stereotypical movie. Only it’s a stereotypical American movie, the kind that’s released in the last two months of every year and is engineered to garner a ton of awards in the following months. It is, as they say, an Oscar Bait movie, which is why it’s being touted as potentially being well received by the West.

It may be in Hindi and English and set in India, but it never feels like an Indian movie (perhaps that’s why it left me cold), and seeing as I don’t like Oscar Bait movies, I didn’t particularly like Black (or feel the need to spend 80,000 rupees on a full page ad in Mid-Day)

If you like Oscar Bait movies, do go see Black. Or don’t.

I, for one, won’t be affected either way. That’s a horrible, horrible thing for a piece of entertainment to do to you.

Vishal