Superboys of Malegaon Movie Review: A joyous film about the joy of making films
Superboys of Malegaon(4 / 5)
I was in Class 8 when Rock On!! released. I and a bunch of friends from our housing colony got revved up to make our own band. We only had one guitar between the four of us, that too an acoustic. So, we filched spatulas from the kitchens and plastic buckets from the bathrooms. Steel plates became our cymbals. The plan to fashion a bass guitar out of a hollow cricket bat and rubber bands of different thicknesses was ultimately, rightfully considered stupid. Our concert, however, prematurely ended when one of my friends went full Dave Grohl and smashed a hole in a bucket. A rising music sensation was violently escorted off the stage (actually a terrace) by an angry parent.
Directed by: Reema Kagti
Written by: Varun Grover
Starring: Adarsh Gourav, Vineet Kumar Singh, Shashank Goyal, Muskkaan Jaferi, Saqib Ayub and Anuj Singh Duhan
17 years later, watching Superboys of Malegaon (another Excel production) took me on a nostalgia ride to more such memories of pure creative impulse, innocence and naivety. The Reema Kagti directorial, penned poetically by Varun Grover, is such a sunshine film. It’s hopeful and carefree, dramatic and dreamy. It makes you believe again in the power and allure of cinema. A shot in the arm for an otherwise bleak Hindi film landscape.
Previously, the Maharashtrian city of Malegaon and its movie mania have been the subject of the 2012 documentary Supermen of Malegaon. Reema and Varun take a lens of fiction to look into the lives and desires of the underdogs who made the parodies.
In 1997, a young cinephile, Nasir Shaikh (Adarsh Gourav), is running a video parlour in Malegaon. He wants to improve the tastes of his audience but his Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin film screenings always have fewer takers than those theatres playing DDLJ (1995). His elder brother gives him an ultimatum: stop the boring world cinema, get the audience what they desire. While buying a pirated print for Raja Hindustani (1996), a VCR tape seller introduces him to the magic of film editing. It sparks an idea. He splices slapstick comedy sequences from Chaplin and Keaton films with Kung Fu action scenes and markets these films as a four-in-one bonanza. It’s a hoot.
Their joy, however, is short-lived. After an anti-piracy raid at the parlour, Nasir decides to take matters (and a camera) into his own hands. They are going to remake Sholay (1975), Malegaon-style. An out-of-work resident writer, Farogh (Vineet Kumar Singh) comes on board for the script, photo-studio owner Akram (Anuj Duhan) lends the camera, loom worker and aspiring actor Shafique (Shashank Arora) is the clapper boy, Gabbar Singh becomes Rubber Singh and Basanti is renamed Basmati. The film, made at a budget of Rs 30,000, makes Rs 3 lakh. A profit of 900 per cent. With big money, however, comes big egos and soon Nasir and friends part ways only to reunite to make a final film for a dying friend.
Superboys of Malegaon is a fascinating film about the making of films. Its beauty is garnished with the little details writer Varun Grover peppers in the screenplay. Trupti (Manjiri Pupala), a dancer who ultimately plays Basmati in the Sholay parody, puts a laddoo in her purse before she proceeds to take food at a wedding. It’s later revealed that she has a little kid back home. Her husband’s abuse is never spelt out, only shown via her limping foot as she comes for shoot one day. Not only depth, even irony lies in the details. Farogh accuses Nasir of being a sellout because he is putting an ad of a local matchbox brand in the film. He does so while smoking a cigarette.
Reema Kagti’s direction is tender and her frames are striking. Nasir, who works as a part-time wedding photographer, sees her ex-girlfriend get married and leave in a car. He doesn’t only capture her vidai but also his own grief in the camcorder. The scene has hues of yellow and red and is shot like a memory one might want to forget. Each character is given an interiority, a journey, an arc. Nasir and Farogh part ways but they understand each other once away. Farogh’s Mumbai chapter teaches him the value of Nasir. While away from Farogh, Nasir understands the importance of originality. This is a story of friendship, of growing together, of growing apart and coming back together.
Adarsh Gourav and Vineet Kumar Singh play the resourceful Nasir and the quixotic Farogh with flair. Adarsh embodies the excitement, while Vineet portrays the angst of every artist. The soul of the film, however, is Shashank’s meek Shafique. His character is the artist’s hope. When he flies as Superman in Nasir’s local spin on the Man of Steel, kids look, mouth gaping and eyes wide, their dreams also soaring with his cape.
More than anything, Reema and Varun get the sheer joy of creating something. They also portray it with beaming happiness. Filmmaking is all about finding cheap solutions to expensive problems, like making a dolly cam by sticking a camera to a bicycle. Maybe making a bass guitar out of rubber bands is not such a bad idea.