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Shubhra Gupta

Indian films have failed to click at the Oscars this year too... Why?

A still from the film `Shwaas'.

Another round of Oscars, another no-show... What is it with Indian films? Why don't we make the cut? Sandeep Sawant's Shwaas was an aspirant to the last five in the feature film category, which the Oscar committee is careful to term `foreign'.' Shwaas, which has been making waves both at Indian festivals and showings abroad, was being spoken of as a better bet than Lagaan. It is the story of a little boy and his grandfather, and how they overcome tremendous odds to survive. It is also the latest in the line of Marathi films which have revived the dwindling industry. For years, Marathi films have been battling big brother Bollywood, in terms of space and talent. The trouble with Shwaas, like other Indian hopefuls who want to hack the Oscars, is not that it is sentimental and schmaltzy. Decades of watching what wins the sweepstakes tell us that the bigger, splashier movies have bested those that are smaller and sparser. But when it comes down to it, Americans prefer their own schmaltz: they are uncomfortable with other forms and idioms of filmmaking.

So something like a Lagaan, suffused with colour and song, becomes a weak contender to the top slot. And something like a Shwaas, which is as upbeat about the human spirit and the will to endure, doesn't make it to the last five: both are too foreign even in the `foreign film' category.

A non-feature short that did make the last five, Ashvin Kumar's The Little Terrorist, lost out to another film which had an Indian connection (Born Into Brothels by Zana Briski is a documentary about the children of sex-workers in Sonagachi, Kolkata). Kumar's film, about a little Pakistani boy who strays across the border only to find love and compassion, is both timely and politically correct. It pushes for peace between warring neighbours, when conciliatory moves are afoot, a feel-good film, which can make award committees feel very worthy.

The Little Terrorist has the right intentions, but it doesn't quite have the sweep and the scope that give films lasting depth. It would be interesting to see how the 20-something Kumar develops as a filmmaker. At a showing in New Delhi, just before he flew off to Oscar night, he declared that he wanted to make films that would be `international'.

Bhandarkar scores again

Madhur Bhandarkar's Page 3, a look at high-society hi-jinks, has become the biggest hit of the year. Starring Konkona Sen Sharma as the voice of conscience (she plays the middle-class girl, who reports on events deemed worthy of gracing page 3), and Boman Irani as her editor who can see the soullessness of the whole page 3 culture, but who also has to follow the dictates of his publisher, the film is a smart combination of what it takes to make a film successful.

It has hooked both the masses and the classes. For the former, it's almost as if Bhandarkar has provided a ringside seat at things they have only been catching on television, and reading about on `Page 3' of their newspapers; for the latter, it's a guessing-game of who's playing whom.

Made at a modest Rs 2.5 crore, Page 3 recovered its investment in the first three days itself.

A New Delhi exhibitor who doesn't wish to be named recounted an amusing story about the distributor of the film's Delhi-Uttar Pradesh territory. It seems the man was so desperate for more screens (the prestigious South Delhi theatre was running it in two shows), that he was willing to do anything to make that happen; after the weekend, the same man turned pricey, and started asking for an exorbitant hike!

The vagaries of the movie business is beyond even the wisest pundit.But it is becoming abundantly clear that a film, made at the right price, and targeted very sharply at its audience, which also connects with the lives of the people who watch, has more chances of succeeding, than not.

In many patches, when Bhandarkar trails from one party to another, catching the same set in the same postures, Page 3 seems like an endless party-hop, a vacuous take on vacuous people. But the film has succeeded perhaps despite itself, because of its subject. Targeting, marketing and promoting, these are aspects to the movie business which now have the power of making or breaking a movie. Last week's release, White Noise, directed by Vinta Nanda, has a much more niche appeal, mainly because its language of discourse is English (there's some Hindi, but it is incidental to the scheme of things). Its subject, the murky goings on in the world of the television industry (Nanda is an old TV hand, having directed, among others, the path-breaking serial Tara), is not as fascinating as the shenanigans of the champagne set.

It also slipped in practically unnoticed into the theatres. Clearly, not too much thought or money had been expended in getting White Noise into public perception. Something that the director and the producer, also a first-timer, need thinking of, if they are planning another collaboration.

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