Aladin’t or Euthanasia?
This post takes a lead from my last write-up. However, should have taken a while to write, had it not been for a “different” kind of discussion with one of the popular film-makers.
It was Friday late afternoon and, it so happened that one of the creative film-makers with quite a hitlist in his kitty (in varied capacities), posted a comment on one such public forum about the latest release – Aladin.
The one-word title of his post was quite amusing, intriguing and self-explanatory. Strange, we film-makers think we’ve already exhausted smaller titles for our films. Before his post, I had read and watched quite some reviews of the film (Aladin). It had already given me shockers and I was finding it hard to believe if Sujoy had once again underperformed with his much-hyped and much-awaited film. Yet, I wanted to watch it myself before actually believing in those reviews till I read his post.
The title of the post, very strangely, was ALADIN’T. Man, it was just Friday afternoon. The film had just released in theaters. The dear friend had probably watched it on the eve of the release itself and waited for the film to release to post his stuff publicly.
The reviews and everything had already given feelers that Aladin was not a film to look forward to. That the film had blundered and faltered on several junctures. That neither Bachchan could create the magic, nor did poor Riteish. Sanjay’s character was portrayed by many as a spoof. That the film, in all probability, would fail. We all knew from our direct experiences or through friends that the film may not perform well at box office.
But, I found the title ALADIN’T a bit too harsh for a film that was merely one show old. That it was being unkind to write off the film which was yet to be through with its first matinee show for the public in theaters. And that it was unfair to take this message to few thousands of followers on a forum that communicates faster than the speed of light.
My contention was critics are alright to write about any film on the very first, second or any nth day in its life. Good or bad. Whatever! If we feel happy or go on to thank them for writing good about films, they have all the rights to write if and why a film would not work. For that matter, they have always existed in their space and are the most respected of the species, other than Censor Board. At times, equally hated. But, you love it or hate it; they have a job and, mostly, are doing their job quite well. They have done more good to good films than bad to bad films. Good films with a good word-of-mouth are boosted like nothing else. A bad film is anyway destined to die early. A bad word-of-mouth only accelerates its death.
Taking a leaf from my last post and comments thereon, a good film will work against odds. It may falter for external factors. But, what is intrinsically designed to work, works. Similarly, a weak film will fail. Sometimes, positive external factors may help prolong its death, to the relief of people behind it. These days, however, most of the external factors generally go on to kill and hammer as many nails in its coffin as possible to make sure it is buried well. Forever.
We have so many of news channels – who are obsessed with sadism and would make animations, dramatized versions and cooked-up stories to sensationalize a non-story like a cat getting caught up on a terrace for hours. Any day, there are channels promoting exclusive stories like the road to heaven, commissioner’s dog going missing, a cat caught on a terrace, a man walking on water and so on. The same channels will dig as many scoops related to a film and its cast/crew to get the eyeballs. But, the moment it is believed to have failed, they’ll do their last bit to kill it. If the channel hasn’t earned a pie from the media budget of the film. It is like the treatment meted out with Indian Cricket team. One good match, they are heroes. Past one bad show, they are termed ‘paper tigers’ and glam-gods good for nothing. What they actually thrive on is the short public memory in a country of billion.
The news spreads like a wildfire in this age of Facebook, Orkut, Twitter, Blogs, SMSes and so much of social networking. The medium communicates at the speed of thought. And when somebody with thousands of following across such social media communicates negatively about a film so early, he may not be held wrong or unethical in any way. He is not at all wrong.
But, my plea was when we have found something good in a film to endorse it or spread a positive word-of-mouth, let’s go ahead any day. But, if we must speak out against a poor film, let’s at least take a little time. Let’s keep ourselves silent for a little while. Let the film be at least one weekend-old before we actually voice an opinion against it. Alright that the film is going to die. But, give it a breather if, when we cannot and should not speak “good” about it.
Should we kill a weak film – mind it, which is not slapstick and vulgar – just because it is limping? Should we say “death” because it is finding it difficult to survive?
I think, I am not going to watch this in a theater anymore. Is it because I got so much of gyan about this film so fast? Or, was I destined to not watch this anyway?
Tags: Aladin, Bad, bad cinema, Blue, Good, good cinema, kambakkht ishq, Review
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
People wouldn’t listen to reviews if the tickets weren’t so damn expensive, every time you go for a movie and the experience is less than good, you curse yourself for burning a hole in the pocket and coming out empty handed. Until distributors start selling tickets at single screen rates or introduce “get cash back if you don’t like” schemes(both highly improbable scenarios). The system ain’t gonna change.
While it’s true that you should not trust all reviewers, people generally find the ones whose choices align with theirs over time and that’s how the whole thing works.
Yes Vineet, you are absolutely right. The biggest spoiler for movie-buffs has arrived in the face of capitalization in moviedom, finally. What used to be a choice for cinegoers till few years back has gradually shaped into a compulsion. Earlier, you had the choice to watch a movie with luxury in a star-grade theater which also often doubled up as a city’s vintage heritage. At the same time, you had theaters that offered pretty decent experience well within 50 bucks. Times changed. With multiplexes came luxury. We loved the change. Standalone cinema-halls started vanishing one by one. We tolerated. Now, we are left with nothing but multiplexes in plenty. Loved neither by the consumers for their over-expensiveness, nor by movie-makers. The recent multiplex owners and cine-makers standoff has proved this fact more overtly than anything else. But, they’re here to stay for a while. Till the dynamic market finds a solution to this. I’d like to quote comment by another reader to my previous blog who also voices her concerns, referring to what you are alerting about:
“Deepak, I agree with your thoughts completely. I’m a story teller and would love to make short films out of good ‘ol stories but have no funds. What’s lacking in weekend movies is 2 things. The concept of recovery and making money in the 1st week and thats it and; the missing story line with proper characterization.
People are so used to watching complete crap on tv that its spilled over in movies but TV soaps is nearly free but not movies, they are hitting the sky with minimum spending of 500 bucks for a single movie & if thats crap, the others are not going to bother.” – Dhara Kothari
The gist of your post essentially is – if a film I look forward to happens to suck, please don’t publicly say so! Let’s just hope it magically works or better still lets cheat some poor sods of their money while they are still clueless as to what they are about to witness!!
I have not seen the film but from the looks and general report it appears to be just another grand experiment in mediocrity… Maybe its not … but in an industry where 9 out of every 10 films released make you wanna cut open your veins, its only reasonable to tread cautious! So any warning from the media or friends or anyone to save your money and 3 hours of your life should be thanked.. wouldn’t you think?
Dear Sanjana, you are right to some extent. But, only to some extent, as far the gist of my post is concerned.
My post doesn’t condemn anyone for writing anything against a film. We’re living in a democracy and, if constitutionally we are empowered to exercise a right, we are.
What I wanted to convey was that it is fine if reviewers publish their opinions in their space. People with liking for a review will themselves go and find out the review in that place. For people who want to tread cautious, of course, why shouldn’t anyone in this inflating economy? But, I think, to help our cautionary approach we have so many ways. We can actually delay watching a film by a week, if we just want to ensure that we do not land a bad experience. If a film if good, it’ll at least survive the first week.
Your opinion about the trend, experiments and hit:flop ratio – everything is perfectly fine. What I am advocating against is the new trend of “public bashing” anything for the sake of doing it, taking a little pride in pseudo intellectualization that it may give to the basher.
Aladin’t can mean that the movie didn’t work for that person, no? Why did you interpret it as Aladin’t work in the box office? In the first case the one-show-old is absolutely justifiable. And why this coyness in taking up names. Do you have an Editor with an axe on your neck? It is the internet, stupid!
Yes Ayush, the meaning was interpreted in exactly the same way as it was meant to be. Have given the context of my discussions with the concerned film-maker. And, to your question of why I didn’t mention the name, my simple point is that the purpose of my post probably wasn’t to convey who said what. Instead, I just wanted to present my viewpoint with which some may agree. Others may not. The purpose is served. Whatever that concerned film-maker commented has just become a context and can be taken as a ground/premise for any other poor film which is not vulgar or slapstick so that you write it off in the first place. Let’s use internet sensibly when people often look at it just as a tool for its speed, extent and anonymity.
i personally feel that ALL reviews should be halted till after a week of any films release. Sure, they have an important job, but i think the general public, and some critiques too, completely misunderstand this job. At the end of the day a critics reviews is one man’s opinion, no matter how unbiased it is supposed to be. But here, general people often seem to take reviews by their favorite critique as the final verdict. And some critiques seems adamant on shoving their opinion down the throats of thousands of people. Its not a goddamn political rally–we already have hundreds of idiots for that.
If reviews are banned from public viewing for a week then a film, any film, however good or bad, gets to affect the people on its own merits, in every way–and THAT includes the way it is promoted. Unfortunately instantaneous reviews have become a great tool for publicity or trashing of a film even before it has a chance to be seen by its audience. And that is not what a review should do.
Why just one weekend. The film should be given two weekends run, before any kind of discussion/reviews appears in portals or newspapers. After all the producer needs to recover the money so that it can be spent on another film
After all the producer needs to recover the money so that it can be spent on another film…I am agree with your point but what about audience, where from they could recover their hard earned money and time… These producers go for huge marketing and advertisement singing songs in the glory of their films and what we get is duds as it happend recently with Aladdin and a hole in pocket after spending minimum 300 bucks for a film…Ask them to reduce the price of tickets and make their product better…then only we can demand to delay the reviews by critics, friends, social networks etc… until then reviews are doing fine job..
Unless this happens to be a sarcastic view on the quality of films, this truly is a shocker of a statement.
Previous one
( Unless this happens to be a sarcastic view on the quality of films, this truly is a shocker of a statement.)
was directed at Mr. Vinay Joshi.
@ Aneesh and Akash, i think u guys missed the sarcasm in Vinay’s statement.
Hi Ratnakar – i did not miss it as pointed later on; i just mis-posted it!!!!!!
Dear Vinay, it is not at all recommended to stop reviews. Pl refer to the original post and subsequent comments. Any curb on reviews in the free space or any kind of constraints will be a brutality to the Constitution of world’s largest democracy. Its just a little point referring to celebrities, if they’d have still done this negative publicity if they were paid for endorsement, considering all the crap they endorse. Just in line with that, wouldn’t it be nice if they left the opinion-building in the initial bit on our friends and acquaintances to impact our opinions… just in the initial bit of a release… just till the first weekend, i.e. till first Sunday after a release!!!
I want to know how the Director of Aladdin feels about this. Want to hear his view-point. Is it possible to bring him on to PFC?
Dear Siva, Sujoy has directed the film and is also one of the PFC Club Bloggers. You can find him in the authors section.
And yes, these days – it’s a fashion to ridicule a film. I couldn’t believe when I got a mail from a website asking me to write a funny review about the worst Bollywood movie I’ve watched in recent years or so. I mean, why just cinema? Why are we targeted? As far as I see, I don’t see other art forms ridiculed like this.
Most of the blame should be held by the film industry for the gross Unprofessionalism they have displayed over years. Film industry must be run like any proper company. A movie must be considered as a product. Hire proper people, spend some time before taking up any project. It’s just mutual respect. You respect the audience by giving proper product, they respect you. If you take a movie just to clear off your black money, audience will give it back to you. Nice and proper. Like this.
Arrey the film board should issue an option to film makers wherein they can choose that the reviews can appear on the same friday or the next friday. THe producers will get some run to recover some money. The reviewer has nothing at stake and the only qualification is to have an opinion. Its ridiculous. Ek hafte baad jisko jitna ulti karneka hai karo
Good point and well-taken. I second your suggestion. Its a great idea if the film-makers were given the option to choose if they want the reviews to come in the same or subsequent week. Fair enough. The point is yes, you can put professional reviews on hold for some time.
The flipside is you can put professional reviewers at bay. But, won’t open markets for guerrilla reviewing by amateurs on unorganized platforms in this age of information technology? Won’t it more harm to the films than the professional ones? Ever heard, a foolish friend is more dangerous than a dreaded enemy??
Most importantly, your suggestion will imply two things:
1. Disregard for the Constitution of India by suppressing the right to expression.
2. DRASTICALLY, it’ll introduce yet another regulation/regulator in the process of reviews.
Opinions please?
Why sir? Am I not entitled to get an opinion on something that I am about to buy before going in and spending Rs400-500/head on it? Producer ka paisa paisa, mera paisa paani?
Yes Kic, consumer’s money is more important than the producers’. And, I have replied to Vinay’s suggestion from both the perspectives, along with the fear of two major implications that neither viewers nor film-makers would ever want.
Regulation of Reviews is INSANE, next step to Censorship. Yeah sure, we would want proper, balanced reviews, instead of just rants, but we live in a free world, free speech, and in that world, we have to handle the free shit that comes along with part of package. As a consumer, you have to make up your mind, and see the movie, period. Yeah i know it’s not easy, i was in that stage for some time, but that’s something you have to get over.
Yes Ratnakar, that’s what I have reiterated at 3-4 times in this blog itself that Reviewers have to practice self-restraint. It’s like Media vs Ethics. We should not even think of constraining, controlling or suppressing reviews.
Just copying what I said earlier:
Even if you “put professional reviewers at bay. But, won’t that open markets for guerrilla reviewing by amateurs on unorganized platforms in this age of information technology? Won’t it do more harm to the films than the professional ones? Ever heard, a foolish friend is more dangerous than a dreaded enemy??
Most importantly, your suggestion will imply two things:
1. Disregard for the Constitution of India by suppressing the right to expression.
2. DRASTICALLY, it’ll introduce yet another regulation/regulator in the process of reviews.”
Deepak, my post was directed at Vinay, not you. I read your reply (to him) before I replied & I agree with what you have said.
These issues of disregard for freedom of expression does not arrive, because I am not talking of REFUSING the opinion, only delaying it, so that a 2 bit reviewer should not decide the box-office fate of a film or the returns to the producer
…
FOr the same reason, there will be no need for any kind of regulation for reviews
…
Ethics in Media is never going to happen. They will fight tooth and nail for any relinquishment of power. The authorities need to realize and thumb them down.
…
Guerilla reviews on unorganized platforms dont matter, because blogs dont reach the millions, they barely reach hundreds and hence dont matter
Now I second your opinion Vinay. These points posted by you in entirety, this time more organized and told in context along with reasoning can be good for both sides. You may refer, I also said earlier that the cautious people can delay watching a movie by a week after they get the actual feedback on the first week. Let’s not regulate the reviews but, yes, a more disciplined approach to it can help both. The paradox is that we cannot enforce this. And, they would not practice themselves.
Hi Kic, my apologies for I couldn’t read into which way your comment was addressed at.
ASAP Reviews are good and should stay…till the time ticket rates are reduced and films are made with more maturity and with some amount of accountability towards audience…
The whole thing is about the high price of tickets. Well, that’s why I try to watch most of the movies in single screen theatres. In only 50 bucks I found a decent time-pass flick. But, spending 100 or more wouldn’t have been worth.
Yes. But, as said earlier, this is what market does to us… in steps before we realize. We like the new luxury, comfort, change and outlook taking over a dated system. But, by the time we are used to it, it starts unleashing most unpleasant things and circumstances. It’s like getting rid of your good “old” spouse who you are tired of, for your “hot” new heartthrob who makes you feel younger and wanted after all these years. However, having divorced the faithful companion for beautiful and scintillating person, you later realize you’re left only with an un-affordable, vulnerable, transient and fluid relationship whose beauty now frightens you for all other reasons you come to know later in time
If the older single-screen theaters were our old spouse and films like our kids from that spouse, the fault is only ours to miss the lovely kids (experience of watching affordable cinema) under infatuation of beauty in the beast (multiplexes).
@ Ayush, Vinay, Akash and Sivkumar: Yes, the reviews should have some defined space. I am not for the autocratic idea of banning any review across the platforms. But, with rapidly increasing penetration and complexity of media and platforms, nothing in the public eye today gets its space. Be it a celebrity individual, a new product or even a legal proceeding, the media speculation and their marketing interests often tend to alter the future for the individual, product or a proceeding. In this backdrop, what we need to differentiate between is when a right becomes a form of abuse.
After all, not everyone can handle independence and rights sensibly. My bid is not against reviews, critiques or individuals expressing their opinions.
Without all this, the world will become a banana republic. What must, however, be avoided is frivolity and the tendency to hero-bashing. We cannot yet say that the market forces and reviewers should all work to help the producers and investors recover their money.
Considering this is a free market and when anybody launching a product (taking films as a product, as it should be) likes the idea of spreading a good word of mouth and public opinion; why should have his eyebrows raised if the target audience starts bashing the same when it fails their expectations.
But, my plea is why we must only look for faults. And, if faults are more than evident, then is it necessary to essentially kill it because it is designed to face difficulties in surviving? It will definitely die without any overt attempt in this direction. With due apologies, an example from a real-life situation: just as we must respect the individuality and human rights of differently-abled people or, at least become indifferent if not helping; similarly, shouldn’t we allow a product its space. Let it succeed or fail entirely on its own merit.
It’s not about cheating or misleading people. Misleading people for the sake of recovering revenues for stakeholders is against ethics. But, what about killing it? Let’s maintain indifference for the initial bit. Can’t we?
THIS INDIFFERENCE, I’M NOT REQUESTING FROM PEOPLE IN GENERAL… NOT FROM WE, THE COMMON PEOPLE… But, of course, a celebrity putting in a bad or good word about it matters and affects the result. Let it fail if people hear a bad word of mouth from whom they know and trust, their acquaintances. But, let’s prevent a situation where people start abandoning a product because one of our CELEB ICONS spread a word against it. Just like we go on to use a particular toothpaste or pair of shoes, mobile connection or, DTH because our heroes endorsed it.
If celebrities get paid to endorse a product that they would otherwise even not allow their servants to use, why should they spread a negative word about something that is vulnerable?
Let the neutral but (considered) normal critiques or, our friends impact my opinion. I don’t mind as long as I don’t hear a celebrity who would mince his word if he gets paid to endorse the same thing s/he called “crap” just another day.
Brilliant post Deepak. I completely agree with your thoughts.
Personally and precisely, I never care to read the reviews of any movies which I am dead sure of watching. Lage raho Munnabhai for example, or others like Dhoom 2 or Race…or the oncoming 3 Idiots. MUST WATCH. To hell with the reviews.
I still remember the good ‘ol days when we had to wait till Sunday to catch up on Khalid Mohammed’s always scathing reviews. The movies had a Good Friday and Saturday to pull in their audience….before Khaild’s reviews made a dent and pulled them back from venturing in.
An Aamir Khan movie or even an Akshay Kumar mad-capper will find its audience and open big regardless of such early reviews. Such is the drawing power of these stars that they have a captive audience who cares two hoots about the reviews.
Mangal Pandey had one of the biggest openings ever…before finally dipping on the 5th day due to its own (de)merit i.e. bad content. Blue too had a bumper opening. Infact, these stars come with a built-in Quality or ISI tag. One exactly knows what he is venturing into before venturing out for an Aamir or Akshay flick.
On the corollary, a pseudo-intellectual dud like Kaminey manages to work because of similarly glowing reviews. People flock to the halls thinking it to be a classic, a masterpiece…and return back with rage and confusion.
So some films come in with guaranteed initial and some as guaranteed wash-outs (Neal-n-Nikki, Drona, most of Bobby deol movies like Chamku, Ek, and what was the recent Kangana starrer?)….all these regardless of good, bad or ugly reviews.
It are only the Iffy, in between movies like Aladin, Love Story 2050, What’s your Rashee that succumb to such early, deadly reviews.
I was 60% sure of going for Aladin and 80% for Acid Factory. But now, my chances have dropped to 20% for Aladin…and perhaps Acid Factory has already gone out of theaters. I will definitely catch both these on the tube…and perhaps even like them. But the reviews have made me much less inclined to spend 300 bucks on Aladin. Which, I would have most probably sans the reviews.
Now here’s is a very interesting observation – most of such in-between, mediocre movies that are badly dented by eager-to-crush reviews, do very well in their satellite or DVD runs. Perhaps, at times, on par with biggest blockbusters. It’s because people reserve such movies that couldn’t be caught in cinemas for their TV consumption.
Haseena Maan jaayegi is a bigger success in its satellite runs. Chocolate is a fine movie – agree many in their drawing rooms. Naqaab isn’t that bad. It’s always been fashionable to degrade Sunny’s movies as B-graders. But many people still find it tough to flip channels when movies like Hero or Indian come on the telly. Jaan-e-mann, the Diwali damp squib, finds many takers in its satellite telecast.
Fine movies. That died early. And were discovered much later as ‘not so bad, after all’ cases.
Hi Himanshu. Happy to see you back at my blog and reconnect. And, thanks for your appreciation
Buddy, we share this point that while we watch films that we are sure about, the impact of reviews and such opinions on forums is deadly when it comes to films about which we are unsure. I was also planning but unsure to watch Aladin. Don’t know something makes the fizz go out now. On the contrary, London Dreams happened to start with a good feedback but just other day somebody remarked about it – “Rock Yawn”… Man… in these fluid times, when film-makers do bad experimentation or get their matrix wrong, such reviews perform the final rituals (rites) for it.
Yet, my only point is that let common people spread a word about a film – good bad or ugly. Reviewers are also entitled. I have no comments against celebrities’ entitlement to speaking out against a film. But, they should refrain from doing so. For the simple reason that somebody who has the potential to endorse a product against payment, must not speak out against any product – physical or intellectual. You never know, they would have bugged us endorsing the same product, if they were paid for the same.
More importantly, let a film get its space.. little time before the larger media starts working against it. Let it fail because it was designed to fail and not because it was made to crumble.
I also get bewildered how every media is competing with its counterpart to “break” the review like a breaking news. I remember, a decade back, reviews used to come after a while… and not before Sunday.. Then it gradually became a trend to publish on Saturday. Of late, the latest fad is to serve it on Friday morning itself with tea, in newspapers. Before, TV channels could catch up with them with frowning or smiling public faces of the audiences coming out of the theater.
Dear Young Movie Maker,
Ever chanced upon Stephen Covey’s 7 habits of highly effective people? I guess, in his first habit he talks about being proactive and giving a damn to all the external factors.
Buddy, I appreciate your thought of barring ‘all crushing reviews’ in a movie’s initial run (how to define this ‘initial run’ is a different topic altogether). However, in his age of Tweets and Facebook – how practical do you think this idea is? The more you curb opinions, or ban them, suppress them…..the more people will find other avenues and medium to vent it out.
All this is good for a group discussion in your MBA entrance exams. But practicality – ZILCH. So why bother about things that you or I can’t change? ‘Get Well Soon’ ideas work very well in movies…but at ground level, ask Hansal Mehta.
Rather, let’s put our creativity to master the game. Like Aamir Khan. The master strategist. Rather than crying foul and talking about moralities, let’s be the smart thieve (as in Dhoom 2) and outdo the cops.
Think marketing. Think hype. Think visual grandeur. Think roller-coaster plots. Think Innovation. Think Foreign DVDs that could be Indianized ? ? ?
Yeah…It feels sad when decent efforts like Aladin and Love Story 2050 are almost sabotaged by inhuman reviews. But then, Move on!
It’s a great indication for anyone in movie making business today – MEDIOCRITY NEVER PREVAILS. And if your product and content aren’t superlative – better be superlative in your marketing, timing and positioning (remember, we’ve touched upon this before as well?)
Aladin landed in a no-man’s land. Kids today are not going to buy any Aladin, Drona or mumbo ‘Jumbo’. It’s Harry Potter – nothing else will do. Acid Factory suffered from a non-starter star cast.
What’s your Rashee had Televsion series written all over it!
On the other hand, Love Aaj Kal was mediocre to the core, but then it had awesome music and bang-on marketing. It was literally hammered down on us. Plus the timing – A breezy, romantic musical coming after ages…catering to both the young and the used-to-be-young. Had to Work!
Move on movie-maker. Tell us more about your forthcoming projects.
Dear Himanshu, haven’t read it yet :(
But, hey, if I conveyed it correctly, I said “I am not for authoritarian way” of stopping anybody from his/her right to expression. And, any attempt in that direction will make a banana republic out of our cherished largest democracy of the world, that nobody would want.
The extremely penetrative media, IT and new media tools of social networking, blogs, twitter, SMSes and all help in planning and sizing the buzz one would want. So, what the film-maker cherishes for helping him/her cannot and shouldn’t be cursed when it works to his/her disadvantage. Disadvantage not because the technology is at fault. But, because the film-maker went with mediocrity.
I clearly wrote that nobody can be held wrong for calling something bad, “bad”. More so, when the filmmakers go on to woo the same critiques and reviewers to any extent for getting a positive word.
But, reiterating what we already discussed in the previous comment, a bad word for a bad film with an average or below-average media buzz crushes it to hell. Yet, I said – reviews do more good to good films than then do bad to bad films.
So, the word is not to ban or even constrain such bad words about something which is bad or, at least, not good. If at all, I just advocated a self-driven restraint by celebrity-like personalities when a new product is just in its infancy. But yes, the market has always been fluid, witnessing some dampener or the other. And, that’s what gave us the theory of “Survival of the Fittest”, decades back. Market goes through several such convulsions at any point of time. Only that some aberrations are more pervasive and lethal. Internet and its byproducts have sped up the pace of such developments by many times.
Master strategists exploit it all to their benefit big time. Promoters of mediocrity land in vulnerable zones where nobody is willing to own them up. And, small scratches leave such big dents that we can only hope time to heal, with fillers like satellite runs and other petty income sources in the game. Then too, only small-budget formats can hope these fillers to come to their rescue. God save the big failures.
“MEDIOCRITY NEVER PREVAILS” – WRONG!!!
Man on which planet are you living? Not planet Earth. Because that statement so wrong as to be laughable. We are surrounded everywhere by prevailing mediocrity – education, politics, careers, movies, music, etc.
The truth is “MARKETING PREVAILS”.
Hey Lee,
Point well taken. It assures me of one thing – that people do read comments of 300 words or more, in case they are interesting and captivating enough. I thought this was a one-on-one dialogue between me and Deepak Singh…. however your comment comes as a very pleasant surprise.
Ok, so can I alter my blanket statement to – ‘Mediocrity never prevails for long’. A Himesh could get away with super mediocre Aap ka Surrooor because of its curiosity value, decent music and frugal costing. However, once all the curiosity about Himesh subsided, Karzzz crashed!
The Yash Chopra banner tried to get away with the same ‘ol Punjabi song-n-dance routine again and again. The same ‘ol references to their earlier hits like DDLJ and Dhoom. But hopefully, Dil Bole Hadippa was the end of their mediocrity.
Baghban was never a classic. But worked due to its sheer timing and for being ‘zara hatke’ (at that time). But Baabul pushed the mediocrity and failed.
So Lee, hope you are fine with this altered statement. People may buy your mediocrity a few times. A few times, you may be able to get away with it, fool your audience, con them. But then try stretching the mediocrity card (and this applies in any field)…and you’ll crash sooner than expected.
Subhash Ghai, RGV, Ashutosh – have all experienced this. Once in the big league, these guys started taking their brand very seriously. Their movies started following a template, a formula, a masala of all their earlier hits. That’s Mediocrity. Swades, Yuvraaj, Sarkaar Raaj are all brilliant examples of such templatized movie-making. As a result, this mediocrity couldn’t prevail for long.
Sanju and Sallu have been milking on their good ‘ol images since ages. Movie after movie, it’s the same bhai-type Sanju and the same uber cool and stylish Sallu. This mediocrity hasn’t done much to their stock in recent years.
On the other hand, Aamir, SRK (Chak De, Paheli, Swades, Veer Zaara, RNBDJ), Amitabh and Anil Kapoor are constantly pushing the envelope and innovating. And the results are for everyone to see.
Akshay Kumar is a phenomenon who has had a great run, despite doing nothing major out of the box. But how many more De Dana Dan or Hera Pheri would he be able to pull off? De Dana Dan looks like another smash hit…but if Akki doesn’t beyond this buffoonery, he may be headed for a dead-end pretty soon.
What say Lee? Eager to know your thoughts.
Dear Lee, I think Himanshu has explained it beautifully.
Hey Young Movie Maker,
Simply admire your intelligence, your well-flowing language, your clarity of thought….and the way you’re able to articulate yourself – without getting into the flashy or pompous mode like Raja Sen or Khalid. Your language looks like a genuine means to express rather than impress.
But you still need to get back on my previous query – What project are you currently working on?
You sound super-intelligent…But I have this major phobia of the super-intelligent folks. The end up making super-boring movies :-)). Creativity was never greatly correlated to Intelligence.
Please don’t treat this as a sarcasm or challenge or anything negative. But buddy, I would be majorly delighted if you manage to prove me wrong with you work i.e. intelligent guys make yawn-inducing stuff.
Mighty Impressed with your thought-process and an insightful and inquisitive mind. But the core-question – Mate, when do we see your bat do the talking?
Apart from these lovely write-ups, observations and debates – WHAT’S COMING UP?
Hey Himanshu, thank you so much for spending so much of good words on me. Buddy, I’m overwhelmed and not used to so many good stuff in one go
Whether it be writing or film-making, I am driven by a simple fundamental. I would like to write or make a film what I would have wanted to read or watch as a reader/viewer from the public. I am trying to break myself free from formulas as much as possible, when it comes to creativity. But, yes, for management affairs, am trying to be as strict to myself as possible. These are the 3 basic fundamentals I believe in.
So, coming to my projects, what I can assure at the moment is that I would not try to stuff morality or intellect in the audiences’ throats and minds. A film, in my visualization, is only as good as the audience is able to connect with. They must have the basic ingredients of a film, i.e. story, some message minus any gyan, and high entertainment value. Music, songs, stars, visuals are all value-add top ups, with a custom-designed combination of half of these top-ups to be brewed with the entire concept. For my kind of films, I’d like to give you an idea. Rang De Basanti was good for its excellent visualization, story, editing, craft and many more elements. Dil Chahta Hai and Rock On were outstanding as Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na also tried to match up. Chak De was another brilliant movie. Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikandar was another timeless classic. At the same time, I loved Darr. Virasat remains one of my all-time favourites. A closer look will tell you how all these films had the basic composition matching with the profiling I just mentioned. Virasat was a serious movie with a strong message. Recently, A Wednesday, Khosla Ka Ghosla, Bheja Fry etc have taken several such equations too far. Another strong dimension, except for Virasat and A Wednesday, all of these movies had outstanding humour element even though none of them belonged to a pure comedy genre. I hope, you got some idea.
So, you can probably hope what I may be coming with. Yet, it’s a mix of business plans and genres as per business modeling and several business-related factors that I have to comply. Unfortunately, cannot divulge much of information about my films on a public forum right now. But, can tell you more on a private space anyday and as allowable by my media agencies/experts. Have just broken in. There are couple of movies at respective stages of development and, in pre production phase right now. Working on planning some press meets and buzz designs in the near future. The first one has nearly one year to go pubic though
Regards
Deepak Singh
I have never seen a good film flop because of bad reviews. But i have seen plenty of bad films make big money even though critics tore them apart.
I wish people would stop making these blanket statements which are wrong – “I have never seen a good film flop because of bad reviews.”
Hell there are countless examples of good movies that have flopped because of bad reviews and later are considered classics or have a cult following.
Critics tend to have a herd mentality and it is the rare critic who will go against the grain and praise a movie that has been savaged by his fellow brethens. Then that critic’s sanity is questioned by the public and quietly by other critics.
Ok, alright. Can you name some? In fact many films flopped even though they received glowing reviews, because of other factors- no marketing budget, bad promotion. You all are attaching too much importance to reviews.
Masses, who decide whether a film is hit or miss, don’t go to PFC (or any other source for that matter) first and then decide whether to watch a film or not.
Hey A.Singh, you are right in saying that many bad films were massive hits in spite of bad reviews. To some extent, you are also right that many good films had dream runs in spite of bad reviews. You are definitely right when telling that people do not go to PFC or other such places to read reviews for deciding whether to watch or not.
Here, what we are actually discussing is that now when most of the films venture into ruthless marketing, promotions and innovative PR strategies, reviews have become a strong tool.
I’d like to differentiate here. While PR, promotions and marketing are essentially tools at work for the film-maker, REVIEW IS A TOOL FOR THE AUDIENCES. At least a sizable number of audiences now looks forward to reviews. I do. I’m sure, many others do so as well.
However, REVIEWS AS A TOOL can be a double-edged sword. A good review works for both. Both the film-maker as well audience loves it when a good film gets a good review. A bad review for a good film is a bane. Needless to say, a good review for a bad film is boon.
At times, we learn of sponsored reviews, which erode the audiences’ faith in reviews if the film is later found to be dud.
Also give some consideration to the reviewer, if i had to watch Blue and MAMK, one after another on the Weekend, just to write something, i would go insane.
Well said Ratnakar. So, kudos to reviewers who must watch a movie, frame by frame. Thankfully, others have the choice to leave halfway.
nice post vinnet..