Of the billions of film scripts that have been written and
then executed, both in Hollywood and in the Hindi film industry, only a handful
have been truly landmark, game changing films. Films that have stood apart from
the rest of the crowd because they have been unlike anything seen till then.
A recent internet poll threw up Shawshank Redemption as the
greatest film of all times – and while it certainly deserves that accolade, is
it a game-changing script? Well, that depends on what defines a game-changing
script?
There can be many parameters – great direction, good music
score, gripping plotline among others that all contribute towards a great film.
But these parameters are all subjective to differing preferences and tastes.
The only standard to which a game-changing film script must conform to is
simply this: Was the film unlike anything else seen before it was made?
When a question like this is posed to the body of film history
that is acknowledged as great, then the number of films that can be called game
changing immediately is reduced from hundreds of really good films to that mere
handful of landmark films.
Movies like Psycho by Alfred Hitchcock, 2001: A Space Odyssey by
Stanley Kubrick and Jaws by Steven Spielberg are among the few films that in
their times had boldly gone where no film director had gone before…they had
opened up genres of filmmaking that had simply not existed in their times. The
cinematic merits of each of these films may be debated on, but there is no
denying the impact these films had on society, besides of course the business
of film making.
In India too, there have been a handful of game-changing films
that left the audience completely gob smacked with their cinematic panache. One
might be tempted to put Sholay on the list, and it certainly breathed a new
life and direction into our movies. But movies based on dacoits or male bonding
had been done many times before…and Sholay did it many times better. But that
does not confer on it the status of being a game-changing film.
In recent times there have been only two films that confirm to
my benchmark set deliberately high for qualifying to this club. The first is
the Ashutosh Gowatirkar directed, “Lagaan” which redefined both sports and the
period drama in one stroke. The second is Dibakar Bannerjee’s “Love, Sex Aur Dhoka”
that told three interconnected stories with the cinematic device of “found
footage.”
And then, there is yet another movie script that comes to mind
that qualifies towards being a game changing film of its times. It was a film
made in the fifties, but which stands the test of time even today. The background
to how this film became a piece of celluloid gold is just as interesting as the
many other legends that are associated with it.
The writer of this film script, Mr Akhtar Mirza, had long given up
on it. After he'd written it, he had shared it with several filmmakers.
Notable among them were Subodh Mukherjee, Mehboob Khan and Raj Kapoor among
others. All of them had refused to take it up under their banner, some calling
it box-office poison and others saying that the film was virtually impossible
to shoot.
A couple of years had passed since this script was buried. Akhtar
Mirza had moved onto other film scripts and ideas and now with a brand new
script idea in his file, he sat across the table from B R Chopra who was
looking for a film subject. After pleasantries and small talk, Akhtar Mirza
proceeded to narrate his brand new film idea to B R Chopra over tea and
biscuits.
B R Chopra loved the idea a lot. He told Akhtar Mirza that he
would make the film and wrote out a cheque of Rs 25,000/- as an advance for
writing out its detailed script. Akhtar Mirza was happy, he had sealed the deal
with his idea…now all he had to do was deliver the script. As they got up to
leave, B R Chopra asked Akhtar Mirza if he could drop him anywhere in his car.
When he confirmed that they could travel some way together, both of them waited
for B R Chopra’s driver who went to fetch the car.
Now Akhtar Mirza mentioned this other script he had written,
one that he felt also had great potential, but had remained unsold. Since they
were still waiting, he used the time to narrate the script idea to B R Chopra.
He noticed that unlike the other script, where B R Chopra had interjected with
a lot of questions, he was unnervingly quiet during this particular story.
When he finished, there was a long, uncomfortable silence
between the two men. Akhtar Mirza had no way of knowing what was running through B R
Chopra’s mind.
Finally when Mr Chopra did speak, he shocked Akhtar Mirza
completely when he said, “I’m sorry, Mr Mirza, I will not be able to make the
film that we just agreed to do. I request you to not develop the film script.”
Akhtar Mirza was dumbfounded, wondering whether the jinxed
film script he narrated had somehow torpedoed the one he had managed to sell.
As he was spluttering his confused “but why,” B R Chopra clarified.
He wanted Akhtar Mirza to keep the advance cheque…for he
wanted him to write the script of the second story idea, not the first. He had
been wowed by its concept of man v/s machine, and even if it was an untouchable
in the industry, he would make it happen.
That film was “Naya Daur” which released in 1957. It starred
Dilip Kumar in the role of a young tangawallah, who fights for his livelihood
when a newly launched bus service threatens to drive him and the other tangewallahs
out of business. The highlight of the film, beside its dramatic performances was
an gruelling race between a bus and a horse cart shot in a bleak and oppressive
landscape.
Naya
Daur was undoubtedly the coming-of-age movie in Indian cinema – a real
gamechanger in the truest sense of the word.
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