Trophy lives

It’s the time of year where filmi types all over the world get together and give each other statuettes and air kisses. It’s awards season.

A couple of nights ago, India time, the Oscar awards were given out. There was the usual guff about who was wearing what and who designed which jewels for whom, but under the frivolity there was the reality of a situation that has been, in a way, mirrored here, too. The films that won were not the usual pulp fare, the commercial formulae guaranteed to succeed, but the movies that were unusual, made a strong statement, may not have found box-office bonanzas, but took home the bacon the form of critical applause. Which about what happened here, with a little concession to the usual round of popular and populist principle of appeasement.

I watched some of the Indian awards ceremonies on television, the ones that have been held, like Star Screen and Filmfare. And when I was part of the Times of India group, I even watched the Filmfare Awards live, standing right in front near the stage and bopping along with the music, loud, crass and tremendously appealing as it was. And the memories come flooding back every time I watch any vignettes of the occasion on TV. It was a formative time in my life, when I learned that not everything Bollywood is nasty, most of it is great fun and infectious in its appeal. And I found that the space in my head that is ready and willing to absorb has pulled in everything I have read and seen about the Hindi film industry with an osmotic pressure that has been, to me, not just revealing, but startling as well.

I rarely watch a movie in a theatre. In fact, I cannot even remember when I last went to a movie house – I do not like the noise levels, the cold and the proximity to other creatures, human and insect, that a theatre mandates. So I wait until the film is either available on DVD or on cable, and watch it at my own comfort levels, my feet curled up under me on the couch, Father within yelling distance if something scary happens and Small Cat muttering and rolling about on the carpet. I can switch off when I get sleepy, knowing full well that the same film will be broadcast endlessly and I can have seen all of it, albeit in parts, and put it all together somewhat like a jigsaw puzzle without a ‘finished’ picture as a template.

Perhaps the first movie I saw that way was Amar Akbar Anthony, with Vinod Khanna, Rishi Kapoor and Amitach Bachchan. It was a giggle-fest, with slapstick comedy punctuated with family drama, fights, songs and bimbo-heroine love stories. Great fun, even seen in choppy bits, and memorable indeed. Another favourite is the Aamir Khan-Juhi Chawla starrer, Hum Hain Rahi Pyar Ke, where chaos and confusion are dotted with completely OTT fun and games that are not in the least bit credible, but hilarious any which way. And, of course, more recently there have been the Karan Johar potboilers, with Shah Rukh Khan dominating the proceedings, all glitz, glamour and glycerine. Those are rather easier to watch, since the fashion dominates the plot and everyone is so busy looking gorgeous that nothing much really happens that you cannot catch up with in whatever little you do see.

But this time a lot of smaller films have been part of the marquee for the awards – Bheja Fry, Life in a Metro, Cheeni Kum…all part of a line-up that dares to be hatke and manages to do so without losing kudos. Of course, the big winners were the big tickets: Om Shanti Om, Kareena Kapoor, Shah Rukh Khan, Taare Zameen Par and more. But that was expected…and accepted.