Monojit Lahiri reports on how India’s only major award platform, mandated to unconditionally salute cinematic excellence across the land, returns to its old fair and fearless ways, undeterred by the distracting glitz n’ glamour of mainstream fare.
Once upon a time, the National Awards was indeed a big deal! It celebrated a cinema steeped in liberal-humanitarian values embracing progressive solutions to urgent problems; a sensitivity to the plight of the dis-enfranchised & marginalized, poor & oppressed and a faith in the movement of man towards change. A cinema of social significance and artistic sincerity presenting a modern humanist perspective, way more durable, relevant & significant than the pot-boilers defining the mindless masala for the culturally underprivileged and brain dead! For an entire decade, [starting with Shyam Benegal’s Ankur in the early seventies] an alternative cinema to the Bollywood mainstream thrived, showcasing a spectacular range of films, actors, themes, subjects and treatment that took one’s breath away. Shot with low-budgets, on real locations with new actors & technicians, these films attempted to re-examine an entire value system while fashioning a new path and direction.
The National Awards saluted and celebrated these efforts, bringing national & international honour, prestige & recognition to worthy artistes – across all categories – with a large media and enthusiastic audience, in attendance. Also the LOC with mainstream commercial was clearly demarcated so there was no confusion. The slow fade-out of this art-house [New] Cinema in the 80’s, coinciding with the rise of the 3 Khans, sounded the death knell of this movement. The National Awards too, despite its agenda of celebrating quality cinema, was slowly losing ground, both in terms of popularity & quality fare. Sure, there were a clutch of fine efforts by the gifted exponents of small cinema, but somehow it wasn’t the same. With time, this annual one-off event was reduced to a here-today, gone-tomorrow affair, a consumer perishable in a glamour and star-driven space. Sniggered a critic caustically, “No one was interested any more in going to an event without any semblance of glamour where vague regional films & unknown actors were awarded & sarkari types lagaoed long speeches about Cinema as an instrument of national integration … how boring!” Film Historian & Scholar Rauf Ahmed however begs to differ. “How can you even compare the National Awards with the zillion B-town awards beamed across TV channels every other day? These are tamashas – media-house-driven shows, mass entertainment vehicles with a definite ROI in place. The National Awards, for its turn, genuinely tries to celebrate quality – not popular or successful – cinema. There’s a world of difference!”
In keeping with the consumerist times & rampaging juggernaut of Bollywood, the National Awards slowly paled into insignificance, a token event associated with ‘good’ cinema with lip-service and the right media bytes [about honour & prestige] in place, forgotten the moment the next B-town award seduced the small screen! Critics & purists were also alarmed at the increasing Bollywood presence “sneaking into the national awards, at the cost of many worthy films/actors/technicians from unsung small/regional cinema!”
Just when the true-blue fans of the National Awards were about to get into heavy duty mourning mode and remember these awards as yet another template devoured by the compulsions of market-forces – Rs.100 crore club? - comes the 2013 edition and yanks them out of this depression to fill them with hope and renewed faith in god! A huge salaam to quality cinema that offered solid value proposition in terms of content, theme, treatment and focus, provided a fresh, different [even quirky & unconventional] take that was relatable in an entertaining & enriching fashion and categorically prove that even in these Dabangg & Ek Tha Tiger–driven times, small films indeed do have a contribution to make, the National Awards 2013 roster confirmed the almost forgotten, ignored, neglected & overlooked commandment that defined their existence – small is big! Be it the splendid biopic Pan Singh Tomar [Best Film] Vicky Donor [Best Film in Wholesome Entertainment] Irfan Khan [Best Actor] Best Original Screenplay [Kahaani] Best Supporting Actor & Actress [Anu Kapoor & Dolly Ahluwalia, Vicky Donor] Usha Jadhav [Best Actress, Marathi film Dhaag], these small films solidly swept the polls!
To followers of this new, new-wave, it brought renewed joy, hope and confidence. For some time now, a bold, new & exciting breed of film-makers – passionate, determined, committed & gifted – has been serving notice by demonstrating their intent in no uncertain terms. Led by the irrepressible Anurag Kashyap [whose path-breaking Gangs of Wasseypur provided a cathartic & chilling narrative on life & times of the Coal mafia], Dipakar Banerjee [Shanghai] Anurag Basu [Barfi] Sujoy Ghosh [Kahaani] Shoojit Sarkar [Vicky Donor] & Tigmanshu Dhulia [Saheb, Bibi aur Gangster, Pan Singh Tomar] this lot believed that non-formulaic, alternative cinema is a brand whose time has come! While the unknown Dolly Ahluwalia is convinced that her award proves “that there is a definite demand and appreciation for good cinema”. Director Shoojit Sarkar is “delightfully stunned” that a film that celebrated sperm donation could actually win such accolades! Director Dhulia goes a step further to insist “that off-beat cinema is an economic necessity”. He believes that multiplexes in the small metros have played a huge part in getting back the intelligentsia and lovers of good cinema to the halls “because this lot stayed away due to both crappy movies and awful movie theatres!”
Whatever be the case, these awards augur well for this new parallel cinema. The subjects may not be as raw and rooted in social realities defining the human condition as the earlier wave pioneered by Benegal, Nihalini & gang of the early seventies, but then isn’t change the only constant? Besides, this is a new generation, rooted in a different milieu with different sensibilities and responding to the times with their very own special vision of reality, pitched to a totally different audience-base, whose only commonality with the earlier generation is an appreciation of anything fresh, different & real. Each one of these award-winning films [along with several other glorious examples across all regions] has only re-affirmed this fact with passion and purpose. For lovers of this genre what is specially satisfying is that most of the films mentioned also remains financially profitable, making them both artistic and commercial successes. Veteran Shyam Benegal wraps up the debate as only he can. He reminds us that the National Awards “were not established to celebrate glamour or success but recognise, popular and honour quality cinema. These awards – like the films – will always remain niche events focusing on artistic worth not mass-connect. It must be understood that everything on earth is not – and should not – be targeted for public consumption. The evolved and informed minority count!”
So, at the end of the day is the National Award – seemingly ignored and forgotten in the blitz of the glamour n’ glitz – finally staging a comeback, responding to the times and its hallowed principles of saluting quality cinema and re-inventing itself to the relevant? Recognising that good, meaningful cinema [blending art with entertainment; engagement with human insight undistracted by big stars & Rs.100 crore club] is what they are committed to champion, promote and celebrate, without fear or favour? If year 2013 is any indication [thanks in no small measure to its chairperson Basu Chatterjee and a fine set of cinema-literate jury members], the answer must be a thumping affirmative! May this be a resurrection of the importance of the nation’s most treasured award relating to good cinema and inspire the movement to propel ahead.
Into the future with confidence!
NATIONAL AWARDS … WITH ZERO REWARDS.
It is savage irony that once the National Award announcements were made, congratulations and laddoos passed around, excitement, flashbulbs, interviews and shabashi from the high n’ mighty done, there was chilling and deafening silence! It appeared to be a surreal and scary scene residing between obscurity and oblivion, with a little bit of stardust flung in between…
Once upon a time, the National Awards was indeed a big deal! It celebrated a cinema steeped in liberal-humanitarian values embracing progressive solutions to urgent problems; a sensitivity to the plight of the dis-enfranchised & marginalized, poor & oppressed and a faith in the movement of man towards change. A cinema of social significance and artistic sincerity presenting a modern humanist perspective, way more durable, relevant & significant than the pot-boilers defining the mindless masala for the culturally underprivileged and brain dead! For an entire decade, [starting with Shyam Benegal’s Ankur in the early seventies] an alternative cinema to the Bollywood mainstream thrived, showcasing a spectacular range of films, actors, themes, subjects and treatment that took one’s breath away. Shot with low-budgets, on real locations with new actors & technicians, these films attempted to re-examine an entire value system while fashioning a new path and direction.
The National Awards saluted and celebrated these efforts, bringing national & international honour, prestige & recognition to worthy artistes – across all categories – with a large media and enthusiastic audience, in attendance. Also the LOC with mainstream commercial was clearly demarcated so there was no confusion. The slow fade-out of this art-house [New] Cinema in the 80’s, coinciding with the rise of the 3 Khans, sounded the death knell of this movement. The National Awards too, despite its agenda of celebrating quality cinema, was slowly losing ground, both in terms of popularity & quality fare. Sure, there were a clutch of fine efforts by the gifted exponents of small cinema, but somehow it wasn’t the same. With time, this annual one-off event was reduced to a here-today, gone-tomorrow affair, a consumer perishable in a glamour and star-driven space. Sniggered a critic caustically, “No one was interested any more in going to an event without any semblance of glamour where vague regional films & unknown actors were awarded & sarkari types lagaoed long speeches about Cinema as an instrument of national integration … how boring!” Film Historian & Scholar Rauf Ahmed however begs to differ. “How can you even compare the National Awards with the zillion B-town awards beamed across TV channels every other day? These are tamashas – media-house-driven shows, mass entertainment vehicles with a definite ROI in place. The National Awards, for its turn, genuinely tries to celebrate quality – not popular or successful – cinema. There’s a world of difference!”
In keeping with the consumerist times & rampaging juggernaut of Bollywood, the National Awards slowly paled into insignificance, a token event associated with ‘good’ cinema with lip-service and the right media bytes [about honour & prestige] in place, forgotten the moment the next B-town award seduced the small screen! Critics & purists were also alarmed at the increasing Bollywood presence “sneaking into the national awards, at the cost of many worthy films/actors/technicians from unsung small/regional cinema!”
Just when the true-blue fans of the National Awards were about to get into heavy duty mourning mode and remember these awards as yet another template devoured by the compulsions of market-forces – Rs.100 crore club? - comes the 2013 edition and yanks them out of this depression to fill them with hope and renewed faith in god! A huge salaam to quality cinema that offered solid value proposition in terms of content, theme, treatment and focus, provided a fresh, different [even quirky & unconventional] take that was relatable in an entertaining & enriching fashion and categorically prove that even in these Dabangg & Ek Tha Tiger–driven times, small films indeed do have a contribution to make, the National Awards 2013 roster confirmed the almost forgotten, ignored, neglected & overlooked commandment that defined their existence – small is big! Be it the splendid biopic Pan Singh Tomar [Best Film] Vicky Donor [Best Film in Wholesome Entertainment] Irfan Khan [Best Actor] Best Original Screenplay [Kahaani] Best Supporting Actor & Actress [Anu Kapoor & Dolly Ahluwalia, Vicky Donor] Usha Jadhav [Best Actress, Marathi film Dhaag], these small films solidly swept the polls!
To followers of this new, new-wave, it brought renewed joy, hope and confidence. For some time now, a bold, new & exciting breed of film-makers – passionate, determined, committed & gifted – has been serving notice by demonstrating their intent in no uncertain terms. Led by the irrepressible Anurag Kashyap [whose path-breaking Gangs of Wasseypur provided a cathartic & chilling narrative on life & times of the Coal mafia], Dipakar Banerjee [Shanghai] Anurag Basu [Barfi] Sujoy Ghosh [Kahaani] Shoojit Sarkar [Vicky Donor] & Tigmanshu Dhulia [Saheb, Bibi aur Gangster, Pan Singh Tomar] this lot believed that non-formulaic, alternative cinema is a brand whose time has come! While the unknown Dolly Ahluwalia is convinced that her award proves “that there is a definite demand and appreciation for good cinema”. Director Shoojit Sarkar is “delightfully stunned” that a film that celebrated sperm donation could actually win such accolades! Director Dhulia goes a step further to insist “that off-beat cinema is an economic necessity”. He believes that multiplexes in the small metros have played a huge part in getting back the intelligentsia and lovers of good cinema to the halls “because this lot stayed away due to both crappy movies and awful movie theatres!”
Whatever be the case, these awards augur well for this new parallel cinema. The subjects may not be as raw and rooted in social realities defining the human condition as the earlier wave pioneered by Benegal, Nihalini & gang of the early seventies, but then isn’t change the only constant? Besides, this is a new generation, rooted in a different milieu with different sensibilities and responding to the times with their very own special vision of reality, pitched to a totally different audience-base, whose only commonality with the earlier generation is an appreciation of anything fresh, different & real. Each one of these award-winning films [along with several other glorious examples across all regions] has only re-affirmed this fact with passion and purpose. For lovers of this genre what is specially satisfying is that most of the films mentioned also remains financially profitable, making them both artistic and commercial successes. Veteran Shyam Benegal wraps up the debate as only he can. He reminds us that the National Awards “were not established to celebrate glamour or success but recognise, popular and honour quality cinema. These awards – like the films – will always remain niche events focusing on artistic worth not mass-connect. It must be understood that everything on earth is not – and should not – be targeted for public consumption. The evolved and informed minority count!”
So, at the end of the day is the National Award – seemingly ignored and forgotten in the blitz of the glamour n’ glitz – finally staging a comeback, responding to the times and its hallowed principles of saluting quality cinema and re-inventing itself to the relevant? Recognising that good, meaningful cinema [blending art with entertainment; engagement with human insight undistracted by big stars & Rs.100 crore club] is what they are committed to champion, promote and celebrate, without fear or favour? If year 2013 is any indication [thanks in no small measure to its chairperson Basu Chatterjee and a fine set of cinema-literate jury members], the answer must be a thumping affirmative! May this be a resurrection of the importance of the nation’s most treasured award relating to good cinema and inspire the movement to propel ahead.
Into the future with confidence!
NATIONAL AWARDS … WITH ZERO REWARDS.
It is savage irony that once the National Award announcements were made, congratulations and laddoos passed around, excitement, flashbulbs, interviews and shabashi from the high n’ mighty done, there was chilling and deafening silence! It appeared to be a surreal and scary scene residing between obscurity and oblivion, with a little bit of stardust flung in between…
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