The Dual Element Proposition | Ram Gopal Varma And Anurag Kashyap Special Edition

The Dual Element Proposition | Ram Gopal Varma And Anurag Kashyap | Editor's Pen

Filmmaking went into its shell in eighties and nothing progressive was happening in Mainstream cinema. Parallel cinema on the other hand was able to retain its dignity but their reach was scant. While cinema across the world was evolving different ways to narration, story telling, special effects and characterisation, Bollywood was feasting on cliched formulas. Worst thing was that this was wrongly portrayed as personality of Bollywood.

In last 15 years, many movies came and brought in influences of European and American cinema, dumped the cliches and stressed on innovations. Bollywood started learning. Realism evolved in Mainstream Cinema. Characters were no longer extra-ordinary human beings, they were one among us, simple and fragile. Though mass movie kept on raking gold, new/alternate/parallel/indie cinema started getting its due. Among many faces, two people made themselves pretty recognisable - Ram Gopal Varma and Anurag Kashyap.

In this Director Special Edition, we decided to talk about these two goodfellas who influenced Indian cinema in last two decades more than any one. Waiting for your comments...

Greetings,

Sujoy Ghosh

Rangeela | RGV Arrival To Mainstream Cinema | The Critique

'Rangeela Re' was easily the most popular track of 1995. It marked the arrival of A.R. Rahman in Bollywood. The movie not only did good business, it established Urmila as an actress and Ram Gopal Varma as a Director. His acumen was never doubted, his ability in popular cinema was subject to speculations. Rangeela brought him in mainstream cinema's big league.

Munna, a tapori, loves his childhood friend Mili. Mili wants to be an actress and is infatuated with persona of Raj, a superstar. She gets a movie with him and Munna realises that differences between him and her have grown beyond repair. He decides to let his love go because he doesn’t know if she loves him the way he does and he believes that Raj can offer her a better future. Characters are very simple. In Munna one can see the influence of Anil Kapoor's mannerism. Mili is a dreamer and varies from spontaneous to shy. She is a little tomboyish adding to the effect. Raj is very suave. In short, it’s a clichéd story with clichéd characterization which works due to smart dialogues, good performances and music by Mozart of Madras.

Performances are good. Jackie and Urmila played their characters very well. However, Aamir playing Munna steals the show. His screen presence is awesome. Camera work is pretty decent. Editing is crisp. Scenes don’t drag unnecessarily. Direction is good. Nothing extraordinary still with a fresh feel. RGV's approach to direction and storytelling in Rangeela was short of movies he made later, though way better than some of the contemporary money spinners.

Written By: Sujoy Ghosh

Satya | Anurag Kashyap Meets RGV | The Critique

Satya was perhaps first realistic take on Mumbai mafia in mainstream cinema and was beginning of a great partnership between Anurag Kashyap and Ram Gopal Varma who together made a few movies Indian Cinema can be proud of. Satya also marked advent of Manoj Bajpayee - a maverick in his own right. But the most important thing, some movies are important because of the timeline on which they exists, Satya is one of them. While Mumbai mafia was trying to take Mumbai by ransom and post '92 bomb blasts, a feel of uncertainty was there, Satya showed how exactly mafia looks from the inside. In a way similar to Scorsese's Goodfellas.

Satya (JD) is an immigrant who is wrongly framed in a false case. In jail, he becomes friend of Bheeku (Manoj) who is a part of mafia. With Bheeku, Satya's tryst with mafia happens. From this point their ascent in mafia happens only to fall with an end conforming to Bollywood norm where crime never pays. The relationship between Bheeku and Satya are the highlight of this movie. The parallel plot of Satya's love life adds immense value because it shows the human side of people working for mafia. For them crime is their job. They don't want to mix it with their personal life.

As Satya, JD delivers a fine performance. A de-glam Urmila is convincing. Saurabh Shukla and Shefali Shah are usual self playing on their merits and well within their limitations. The show stealer is Manoj Bajpayee who simply overtakes each and every scene he is present in. His screen presence is good, dialogue delivery is good and intensity is simply mind-blowing. However, the movie doesn't work just due to incredible performances. Both script and direction are class. There is an in-depth understanding of lives in low rungs where glam of Bollywood seldom ventures. Anurag Kashyap, Saurabh Shukla and Ram Gopal Varma made Satya as close to reality as possible. The imagination of these three people set the cast for this cult movie.

Post Satya, the perception towards Mafia changed. Everyone started looking it from RGV's lenses. As for RGV, this was beginning of his trilogy about Indian Gangsters - Satya, Company and D.

Written By: Sujoy Ghosh

Three Movies | Satya, Shool And Kaun | Under Lens

In a comparatively short span, Bollywood witnessed three path breaking movies from duo Ram Gopal Varma and Anurag Kashyap. When they first collaborated for Satya, RGV was an established name and Anurag was yet to settle in industry. Infact, RGV didn't trusted Anurag for dialogues of Satya and roped in Saurabh Shukla, a veteran who later played an important role in the movie. Satya is perhaps one of most realistic take on underworld till date. This was attested by many people from mafia. Success of Satya led to foundation of many gangster based movies to follow up including cult Company, D and their innumerous cousins.

This Director Actor duo brought a new concept to Indian cinema by making Kaun. With just three characters, Anurag created a story set in a bungalow with numerous twists and turns. It had that Alfred Hitchcock feel. However, not every good movie is well received. Despite of critical acclaim, Kaun failed to achieve huge BO success and did an average business. Ability of Anurag as a storyteller came to fore. The style was hailed by critics and film students. It also heralded a new beginning of suspense and thriller genre in Bollywood.

Between 1997-99, Ram Gopal Varma and Anurag Kashyap explored places Bollywood conviniently ignored. Along with E. Nivas, RGV and AK worked on Shool. Shool was a blunt take on politician-criminal nexus. An honest cop Samar, who follows law in letter and spirit, takes on a criminal turned politician Bachhu Yadav. One can see influences of movies from 80s and hard hitting parallel cinema. Having said that, Shool attained cult following for hard hitting dialogues, realistic cinematography and small town sensibilities. Shool influenced many movies which followed making Bihar as subject. Shool was perhaps Anurag's nursery for Gangs Of Wasseypur.

Interesting trivia is that in all these three movie, Manoj Bajpai plays an important role. Maybe he is not the most successful actor around, but is definitely one of the best thing happened to Hindi Cinema in 90s.

Written By: Sujoy Ghosh  

Company, Bhoot And Sarkar | Pinnacle Of RGV | Under Lens

Satya and couple of movies that followed it were impressive enough to mark Ram Gopal Varma as a promising director. It was Company which actually established him as a king maker. Between Satya and Company, he made movie which were good, received favorable comments from critics and established his name but they were just a notch less than Satya and he needed something at par. Company was that movie.

Loosely based on lives of Dawood Ibrahim and Chota Rajan, this Ajay Devgan - Vivek Oberoi starrer gave goose bumps to people associated with Mumbai underworld. This was commercialised realistic cinema - realism and gloss of glamour in true colors. Company showed how the underworld works. It was an extension of Satya in a sense that Satya talked about the grass root level underworld and Company showed the organized face of underworld at a higher level in hierarchy. The narrative style of company still remains a benchmark for cinebuffs. The way Jaideep Sahni blended narration into the story to give it a gripping docudrama feel was impressive. Company was a box office success as well.

Bollywood has always been short of good quality horror movies. Bhoot filled that void. Ajay Devgan-Urmila starrer Bhoot was a huge commercial success. Instead of relying on makeup and prosthetics, RGV focusses on his script and cinematography. It worked. Influences of world cinema was pretty evident. Use of background score was path breaking. Bhoot gave RGV everything- acclaim, money and awards.

Sarkar was an adaptation of The Godfather. RGV spiced it up by adding politics and while doing so, story seemed to have inspirations drawn from life of Balasaheb. It was controversial enough to give an initial mileage to the movie. The story of Sarkar was parallel to fading line of difference between politics and crime. Sarkar Subhash Nagre is a political Godfather who doesn't hesitate taking law in hand to ensure justice for people. Though Sarkar lacked the depth of The Godfather, it was a very decent effort. Like company, Sarkar got appreciation from both audience and critics.

Company, Bhoot and Sarkar were three movies which made RGV a big brand. Almost an outsider, he was perhaps the first person to create a camp for himself in last 15 years. He broke into monopoly of already established big names and made Factory as new nursery for talent. Shimit Amin and Sriram Raghavan were brought into limelight by RGV in this period. As they say, everything at a height is bound to fall... these three movies were that height.

Written By: Sujoy Ghosh

2007 | No Smoking And RGV Ki Aag | Under Lens

No Smoking was based on Stephen King's short story Quitters, Inc. Considered as one of the most abstract movies in Hindi Cinema, No Smoking failed to click with the audience especially the intended ones. Definitely it was for the youth and as the title suggest, it had the element of preach which usually doesn't go well with Indian audience. The movie bombed.

The very year, a sense of mock was in air when Ram Gopal Varma came out with his version of Sholay titled 'Aag' (RGV Ki Aag). Remaking a cult classic can be a good idea when done in Hollywood. In India, people don't like them to be remade unless it stars a certain Shahrukh Khan. Aag went on break records of all wrong sorts. The Box Office collections were pathetic and Sippy's had the last laugh.

Why these two movie failed?

Any abstract movie needs to connect with the audience. However, sensibilities of Indian youth was perhaps not that open to ideas as they are today. The unusual screenplay leaving a lot to audience's grey matter was a liitle too much to ask for. On the other hand, John was not half the BO magnet he is today. Anyways, over five years, No Smoking has earned some respect and people rate it as one of best by Anurag Kashyap.

Aag was a blunder when it was conceived. Sippy's opposition, casting of Nisha/Priyanka as Basanti V2.0, Amitabh Bachchan as Gabbar V2.0 and Ajay Devgan as Veeru V2.0, RGV's recent BO performances added all the negativity available on block. Reinventing characters and misinterpreting them are two different things. RGV somehow missed this basic point. So-called reinvention of 32 seasons old iconic characters didn't go well with audience and movie was grounded.

Anurag made a good movie which didn't work. RGV made a bad movie which didn't work. Over years we can see that Anurag learnt his lesson but...

Written By: Sujoy Ghosh

GOW and Department | Circa 2012 | Under Lens

2012 saw release of Gangs of Wasseypur and Department. It sharply demonstrates where two masters are today.

Anurag on one hand has just showcased Gangs…  at Cannes Film Festival to standing ovation. RGV on the other has just showcased Department which has caricatures for characters and sole purpose being to demonstrate how unconventional cameras can be used to make film. Yes its made in good intention to help fellow film makers, but what about the audience? What about connecting to them?

Anurag’s future projects are collaboration with Oscar winner Danny Boyle and Nolan-ish take on India’s first comic based Superhero-Doga. Ramu on the other hand is doing Ab Tak Chappan-2. RGV has run out of ideas. Only redeeming direction he can take is let his ego go and hire good script writers and work on fresh ideas. Or produce films for genuine talents. He can spot talents.

Here’s hoping RGV gets back his lost mojo. Or better still maybe in future Anurag and RGV can team up again and give us more gems like Satya. Here’s to the hope!

Written by- Ali Naqvi

Brand Ram Gopal Verma | Statesmen

Ram Gopal Verma, this name today invites groans and anxiety from viewers across India. About 7-8 years ago, it was the other way round. Mention of RGV (as Ram  Gopal Verma is fondly referred to) triggered anticipation in most film buffs. Most of his earlier films were critically acclaimed and moderately to highly successful.

He entered public imagination with his hit Rangeela. It was different from formulaic films love stories being made at the time. It had characters that were different than the stock movie characters of that time. It had a story of a superstar, a starlet and a roadside romeo.

This followed with the crime drama Satya. Like Hum Aapke Hain Kaun, which started trend of big family films, Satya started a trend of realistic gangster movies. In this series of movies came Company, which was near perfect in all respects and is infact one of my all time favourite movies.

Then Verma turned attention towards Horror films. He made classic Bhoot and continued making more horror film. This point on it was big spiral downwards in terms of quality. Critics and audiences started disliking RGV’s films. This triggered what seems like an adamant streak in Varma in which he stopped caring for what others had to say. He has famously said,’I make movies for myself’.

RGV ki Aag became his biggest undoing. Lately he has been dabbling in experiments.Department recently was shot with non-professional cameras. As Anurag Kashyap recently said about RGV that  he is like child with toys. He has lost direction, doing experiments with other people’s money. If he doesn’t make a decent movie soon, people might start asking same question as they did for Dev Anand, ‘Who pays for him to making movies?’

Written By Ali Naqvi.

Rakhtcharitra movie review | Critique | Fresh

Alright, picture this. Abhimanyu Singh, who plays the bad guy Bukka, is busy bashing up a poor guy's kneecaps with the butt of a rifle. A woman walks by, presumably some relative of his. She stops and asks Abhimanyu solemnly, "Satyanarayan ki puja hai. Chalega kya?" To which, our bad guy replies, even more solemnly, "Nahin." You see, at this point, even the bit players such as that woman were bored to death, wondering what is going on in this movie. Rakhtcharitra, that is.

The man behind this movie is Ram Gopal Varma who gave us our gangster-genre redefinition in Satya and Company. Well, in Sarkar too, to an extent. Of late though, his signature style - realism has been substituted by bizarre camera angles, loud, jarring background scores and characters that are so completely over-the-top that you have to crane your neck in order to see who's outdoing whom in the bad acting department. The very same RGV who took us through a splendid cinematic journey with terrific films such as Shiva, Rangeela, Kaun, Jungle. And it is indeed heart-breaking to see the man churn out one bad movie after another. 

If you want to get to the story in this movie, I am sorry to say that I didn't find one. It is nothing but an endless montage of gruesome killings that are done so tastelessly that they make the Ramsay horror films look subtle by comparison. Ok, might be I'm exaggerating. But really, there IS NO story, so to speak. The clash between two political aides and their attempts to wipe off each other is what this film is about. When the netas end up in hell, their kids take it over and continue the fight. THAT IS IT. One murder after another and then another and your patience takes a flight.

Movies in this genre are particularly driven by a conscience. Be it The Godfather or Goodfellas, Satya or Company, there always is a conscience....some sort of motivation for the characters. In short, there is a soul in these films. But, in Rakhtcharitra, there is none. All you get are stereotypes -  jealous politicians,. backstabs, blood thirsty relatives, angry-looking mob men and what have you. There is nothing in this movie that you haven't seen already, nothing that you can't predict with your eyes closed...absolutely nothing.

I know, I am being unfair in judging this movie with the others in the crime/gangster genre. But RGV's new outing begs to be compared. There was a time when realism was considered to be the forte of few directors such as Ratnam and Varma. Particularly, in Satya, the camera became a character when it captured the muddy lives of the gangsters in such a captivating manner. No slo-mo shots, no overused background score. In Rakhtcharitra, however, we aren't spared the agony of watching EVERY character mumble, turn around very slowly, walk about very slowly...even if it isn't a slo-mo shot. Too restrained, shall we say. And to compliment those, RGV uses his actors in a completely over-the-top manner. They look at you with large eyes and you begin to worry that they might pop out. Vivek Oberoi has a set of 2 expressions and he uses them adequately. He scowls, looks angry and you start your tsk-tsk wondering where this lad's acting talents ran away. Abhimanyu Singh is wasted in the role of a lecherous, masochistic gangster and it is a pity to see him get a caricaturish role to play after his excellent portrayal as Rananjay Singh 'Ransa' in Gulaal. And then, there is Shatrughan Sinha, who plays a Marathi actor-turned-politician. But, will anyone please explain to me why on earth does he have a Southern accent? He  has precisely two dialogues in this movie. Either say "brother" or "topic is over". Sigh. So much for being a senior and respected actor.

Varma commits another unforgivable sin. Whilst in Satya and Company, he held on to the subtle, underlined message that crime doesn't pay, he does the opposite here. He glorifies three things - crime, atrocities committed against women and bad cinema. Women are raped, hit like anything and you cringe in your seat when people clap at those scenes. People are slashed, diced and chopped and you turn your face in disgust only to see the audience cheering. If this is not glorification of violence, I honestly don't know what is.

The only hint of the Varma, whom we have come to love and adore, is seen in the film's climactic fight when a character runs after Abhimanyu Singh's character in order to put an end to his life. The only scene that gives you a vague sense of excitement. 

There is a sequel which will be released on 19th November 2010. I have nothing much to expect. It is only in one man's hand to make up for the mistakes that he has committed. And that is Varma himself. Like all hopeful souls, we must wait and we must pray. But, something tells me that this wait is going to be pretty long. Maybe, the cynic in me has taken over. For I have seen Rakhtcharitra and all I have to say is -- "Oh, the horror, the horror !" 

Ratings: * (1 out of 5)

Written By: Gyandeep Pattnayak

Dawood | Criminals In Cinema - Part 1 | Under Lens

He is one of the most wanted terrorists with obscene bounties on his head. CIA, FBI, Interpol and Indian Police chasing him like anything without much success. Well, for Bollywood; he is a big Formula.

Company is a movie that has attained a cult status amongst movie lovers. It was appreciated by both critics and masses. In this movie, Ajay Devgan portrayed character Mallik which was heavily based on Dawood. The movie told the story of Dawood and Chota Rajan- friendship and differences. Company Boasts of exceptional performances and superb direction. But the charmer was the way of narration that was very un-Bollywoodish.

The same style was carried in a movie treated a s prequel of Company. Yes... D. D was story of Desu who takes overtakes the Mumbai as a sharp criminal. A newcomer Randeep Hooda played the lead role and did a nice job. However, it flopped badly.

Once Upon A Time In Mumbaai; another movie based on Dawood. OUATIM was based on Dawood and Hajio Mastan; another ruler of Mumbaai. In this movie, Imraan Hashmi came out of his serial-kisser stereotype and played a role that will be remembered for some good time. Interestingly, the cast of this movie boasts of two other Dawoods... Ajay Devgan and Randeep Hooda. Thats what we call... circle of life.

Written By: Sujoy Ghosh