You Can’t Be A Passer ‘Bai’
The great comic genius Charlie Chaplin was asked to define what exactly is comedy and how it differs from tragedy..And he gave an example of a man walking by leisurely and slipping on a banana peel..To the onlookers it is a source of comedy but to the person just fallen and humbled it is a tragedy..and bigger the ego that is humbled the mirth and merry making for others is more and the humiliation for the fallen one is proportionately higher..
Similarly the great master Alfred Hitchcock was asked the difference between suspense and surprise..And he explained it with a wonderful example of an ice-cream seller riding his bike with his ice-cream box on the back of his bicycle carrier..He feels an urge to pee..Stops the bike..Puts it on a stand..And goes across to the bushes to take a leak..Meanwhile a guy comes surreptitiously and puts a time bomb in the ice-cream box and vanishes..Now the ice-cream seller starts his onward journey without knowing the bomb ticking inside the box..As the time goes by the tension builds up..Audience wonders..Whether it will explode before the ice-cream seller can find about it..The audience becomes restless or even numb and at times wants to shout to the ice-cream seller and warn him..Now this is an example of suspense…And if the bomb is placed inside the box without the knowledge of the ice-cream seller and the audience and it explodes..Woof!..That will be surprise..
I think the same could apply to the banana peel instance also..If it is placed at the roadside, taking audience into confidence and without the victim’s knowledge, it is a ploy in the hands of a skillful director how to heighten the suspense of whether the passer by will slip on the banana peel and when!..But if he just slips on it without even audience being aware, it could be a surprise!
Now that is cinema..And you might be wondering what I am doing giving a spiel about what is already in the realms and reams of cinematic literature and folklore..Well I have this twisted sense of associating events and incidents—a kind of lateral shift to my thought process..
Recent incident of an actor being arrested for not molesting but raping his ‘bai’(domestic help) has aroused varied reactions from across the film fraternity..And most of it comes in the domain of surprise (to put it mildly)..and of shock if one loves his melodramas..
I am not here to cast aspersions on the veracity of the incident just on the basis of the media reports and police statements as peddled by the media..I wonder!
The incident has happened..The law and justice system will take its own course..What else one wants!..No the voyeur, the self-rigteous,the virtuous and the vulture ( as great late Vijay Tendulkar used to say) , in us is wanting to react somewhat differently than with shock and surprise..What else was expected out of such an unfortunate incident..A suspense drama!..Of course boss, it had to be surprise and shock..Period..But no..The drawing room crowd does not seem to be satisfied with that..It wants more!
And that reminds me Christ’s exhortation of casting first stone by the one who has not sinned ever!..To me it is not that bai (domestic help) has had a crush on the star..That is one side of the story and in the domain of popular belief..But lets be honest..Many a celebrity have nurtured these passionate and lustful feelings for their bais(domestic helps, maid servants, nanny’s)..Maharajas and Nawabs in times gone by had special inclination towards this whimsical phenomena..Maybe it is the easy availability, or absence of any reining influence, or a thrill of crossing to the other side of the class barrier, or reaffirming one’s superiority, or riding one’s power trip, or taking it as the granted perk of a feudal mindset, or sheer sense of conquest, or libido on the go, or simply the girl being too desirable and sensuous than even a film actress ( and pardon my excess, but it can be possible ), or combination of all..who knows! But the syndrome exists hidden behind the glare and glitter..And it may be convenient not to admit it, but to dismiss its existence will be sheer hypocrisy!..Maybe we all believe that we are not criminals till we are caught..But it is not the act but the very thought about the act that is important..And at that subtle level most of us would fall short of the law!What you say?
And this incident is a ready material for a film script!(The so called real life inspiration—though at the cost of someone’s discomfiture)..And I hope all these issues are somehow considered while writing of it ( If not then take me as a consultant)..
Meanwhile just keep in mind that whether Dubai or Mumbai, human nature is the same.. In the prevailing times of five minutes of fame the 24×7 media is snooping for scoops..if you are going shopping, just watch out..‘Bai one, get behind bars free!.. the law has not only got long arms but of late has acquired shark like teeth too..You just can’t pass it bai’!
Tags: Alfred Hitchcock, charlie chaplin, Vijay Tendulkar
Anurag Kashyap
Abhay Deol
Dibakar Banerjee
Hansal Mehta
Khalid Mohamed
Kundan Shah
Anish Kuruvilla
Jaideep Verma
Manish Gupta
Navdeep Singh
Bhavani Iyer
D. Santosh
Onir
Ashvin Kumar
Ramu Ramanathan
Sudhir Mishra
Pankaj Advani
Revathy
Saurabh Shukla
Shilpa Shukla
Sujoy Ghosh
Suparn Verma
Santosh Sivan
Shashank Ghosh
Shivajee
Pavan Kaul
Partho Sen-Gupta
Prroshant Naryannan
Sam Langoria
Satish Kasetty
Hey..Krysh..
The story is already enacted in cinema..well almost.
In 1986,Basu Chatterji made a movie called Sheesha(http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0158215/) with Mithun, Mallika sarabhai and MoonMoon Sen.
Its story has striking similarity with the shiney incident(Manager attempting on an employee and wife trying to save him).
when I first saw the news in net, I hd a sense of De javu.
It was a very good movie that I watched in DD in my childhood.
Made 23 yrs ago, that movie is much more relevent today.
The thought behind the act! Why is it so important? We all know that the reasons stated by you are very apt. The meek stop short of thinking or shaggin in the bathroom. The bold make a pass and if they succeed, everyone’s happy. Its those people who arent bothered by rules, regulations, conditioning, right/wrong, who are a nuisance. True thats the way life should be led. But your life should not be a nuisance or troublesome to others.