Iqbal
It is all about fake sensibilities
and equally fake performances
 

Nagesh Kukunoor is a faker. This time he joins hands with the one and only one, the self-proclaimed showman Subhash Ghai, the master faker, who has been hunting for talent with a searchlight in his hands these days.

The fake film critics heap stars and tons of praise on this film. A cinematically illiterate and fake writer like Shobha De goes ga ga and puts Iqbal at par with Lagaan. Subhash K. Jha performs his usual ‘bhandgiri’ and declares the film a masterpiece.

We are passing through the era of fakery. We have fake politicians, social activists, economists, journalists, painters, technicians, judges, lawyers, actors, writers, terrorists, god men, sanyasins, singers, lovers, administrators, businessmen, socialites, teachers, students, filmmakers, film critics, etc., etc.

We also have fake cine-goers, the multiplex patrons, who read fake reviews, watch fake films, laugh at fake one-liners, and applaud fake performances.

Now, let me give you an example from the film to prove my point. The deaf and mute (DM) protagonist of the film finally manages to get a drunkard, a failed cricketer, as his bowling coach. One day the coach arrives at the hero’s house. There he meets the hero’s mother who does not even let him in and talks to him at the gate of the house. They have some interaction that ends in the mother giving the old cricketer a friendly warning, ‘Main aap ko maar daloongi’. Some guys in the cinema hall laugh at the friendly banter. This critic cringes because he finds this odd. It is obviously the Hindi translation of ‘I will kill you’, an expression Kuku must have picked up in LA or in some public school he has studied in. He puts it in the mouth of a Muslim village woman.

He repeats such stupidity all the time. It is not a mistake. It is his major limitation. Many filmmakers and writer-directors suffer from this acute personality flaw. They make films on subjects they have very little knowledge or experience of.  They are simply inspired by the subject's potential for quick commercial exploitation. Creative explorations to achieve cinematic excellence is far from their minds. And they make films like Iqbal using fake points of references picked up from the fake and senseless world around them.

The performance of Talpade is yet another example. He performs to win the sympathy of the camera and the audiences. He fakes the character instead of living it. Compare it with the ‘Bend It Like Beckham’ girl Parmindar Nagra, and you would know what I am talking about. Her performance contributes to the magical quality of the film, which is completely missing in Talpade’s work. Kuku’s useless script and direction anyway leave no room for betterment.

Why is it that our filmmakers are so easily inspired by background music scores of festival films but remain unaffected by their sweet and touching realism in terms of characterisations? Let us pit Iqbal against some benchmark films of this genre. ‘Dosti’, ‘Bend It Like Beckham’, and ‘Children of Heaven’ will easily score above eight on a scale of one to ten. Iqbal may get a measly score of one or two by these standards. Do you get the point now?

Iqbal is a badly written film. It is pretentious to the core. The relationships among different characters of the film are contrived. There is not a single sincere moment in it worth being cherished forever. The film does not move you in spite of its being a film about underdogs. What a fake of an underdog is Iqbal? In fact, he has all the support any young cricketer from a village may need. Though he is made to go through a contrived obstacle course, he overcomes all the hurdles easily with help coming forth from all quarters, including the dumb animals. He does not fail or falter. He is perfect.

As far as the subject of cricket coaching is concerned, the less said the better. The film showcases a bizarre coaching style. No talk of good length and short pitch deliveries. The hero is more excited about getting selected in the state team than learning various facets of the game. He is not even curious about how to bowl a late or reverse swing. He seems to know it all. What he does not know is how to get through the selection process and set up a batsman to get him out on the last ball of the game while letting him score boundaries over the first five. He learns it by looking at a piece of paper in his coach's junk box of cricket memorabilia.

And as usual you cannot really say much about the technical prowess of Kuku Noor. The guy refuses to grow as a filmmaker, comfortable in the cocoon of his mediocrity and blockheadedness. Grow man grow. We are all pigmies before the vast limitless canvas of creative arts. Why do we have to nurse egos and super egos and restrict our growth?  Be humble; get real; don't be a faker; go for important breakthroughs in your mind.

Those who are out with the searchlight to discover talent must change too. You don’t need searchlights to locate talent. Open the eyes of your mind and heart to discover shining gems strewn in front of you. You just have to be a true seeker and a passionate lover of cinema and not a faker to do this.

Remember! Money comes and goes. Good cinema endures and ennobles.

MS