Barah Aana Review – Aamir Khan Recommends It, and So Do I ;)
“Eh?” you ask. “Aamir Khan recommends it – that’s okay. Who the hell are YOU?” All right all right, I’m still not significant enough for my opinion to carry a ton of weight. It’s just that I believe in catchy titles. For the C grade movie tribute I’ll direct someday, I have in mind titles like Chiffon Sari Baarish Jaari, Girls Hostel Ka Jawan Guard, Jawani Ki Jwalamukhi – The Volcano etc. The full list is here.
The last movie that I know carried Aamir Khan’s official recommendation was Let’s Talk, which has become one of my all-time favourites and which I always recommend to any actor for Boman Irani’s range of acting.
Barah Aana (trailer here) has three protagonists – Vijay Raaz is a watchman, Naseeruddin Shah a taxi driver, and Arjun Mathur a waiter. What’s the story? Does it matter? What matters is that the 30-odd people in the theater with me had a good time and walked out feeling satisfied. More importantly, I think Barah Aana succeeds tremendously in what it sets out to do, which is to give people a view of the other side. What other side, one asks?
Well, Lakshmi Bai, who cleans our flat, makes 400 bucks a month from our household. I haven’t asked her how many houses she goes to, but if I assume 10 in a day, it means she probably makes around 4000 a month. I don’t know how much her husband earns, but they, smart couple, have just two children and both go to school. How many of us could even think of how we’d manage with 4000 bucks a month in a metro like Mumbai? So why do we begrudge our bais, our waiters, our watchmen, our drivers at least a little human dignity? Why the hypocrisy and double standards? We crib when the bai skips a day but we also bitch about our bosses when they refuse to give us leave. For us, 150 bucks is a multiplex ticket, or two or three auto rides. For them, 150 bucks is the fruit of 7-10 days of sweeping and scrubbing someone’s house. It’s a lot.
Why do we treat waiters as if they’re our slaves? How would we feel to be addressed as “Ay!” or snapped at? Many of us tend to take the adage ‘Customer is king’ too literally. Is it that we have so little self-worth that we need to boss over whoever else we can to feel a sense of power?
I think one of the reasons I really liked Barah Aana is that its themes are things I frequently think about. I find it very demeaning to address anybody by a generic ‘watchman’ or ‘driver’ or ‘waiter.’ I always try to use their names. I might have been in their shoes if the birth lottery had played out a little differently.
I’ve mentioned this somewhere else: during the Jet Airways employee termination crisis, some girl on the street, not one of the staff, was being interviewed. She said that for her, air hostesses were nothing more than waitresses. What attitude! Are waitresses not supposed to be human beings? How would this same girl feel in her next birth if she’s reborn in a slum with no toilets and one tap for sixty households?
I debated a lot whether I should mention this or not, and I’ve decided to go ahead with it. I’d made a small donation a few months ago to an organisation which funds the education of underprivileged girls. It sends the donor a picture, profile and progress report of the recipient girl. I received these yesterday. Namita, the girl whose schooling my donation has sponsored for one year, lives in a slum in Kandivali. Her father has a drinking problem and her mother works as a maid in people’s houses. Their home doesn’t have a toilet and water supply is irregular. Yet, Namita has managed 57% in her exams. I got pretty emotional on reading the report. The amount I’d donated is something I usually spend in just two household shopping occasions, but to her, it was worth one whole year of a school education.
Why do I mention this? To show myself off as a good hearted samaritan? HELL NO! I’m a selfish egotistical clod and I made that donation mostly to erase my sense of guilt that I have a decent life while there are others who don’t have a place to crap in peace in the morning! To erase my guilt for not participating in the Teach India initiative!
Education is the only way out for the mess in our country. We need to get people to think for themselves instead of becoming pawns, footsoldiers and cannon fodder for politicians who’ll bombard them with casteist and communal poison.
Slumdog Millionaire, The White Tiger, Thanks Maa, Barah Aana – all these pick up the carpet, grab our collars and force us to look – there exists a world beyond our malls and multiplexes and pubs! We may love these movies and books, we may hate them, that’s all okay. What’s NOT okay is denying that underprivileged children like Namita exist! What’s NOT okay is living out our hedonistic lives with a cool cynical attitude ke is desh ka kuchh nahi ho sakta.
What about the movie? Oh sorry, I got carried away. Independent movies can either be self-indulgent pieces of basket weaving (is this one of dabba’s patented phrases?) or they can be entertaining and thought-provoking. Barah Aana falls into the latter category. Even if you don’t think too much about it and watch it just as a comedy, it still delivers the laughs. It reminded me a bit of another fabulous indie, Big Nothing, starring my favourite actor-writer Simon Pegg, and David Schwimmer.
And wah! Kya acting hai! A movie where we don’t hear Naseer Saab’s one-in-a-million voice till the last 20 minutes! Yet he’s spellbinding as always. And Vijay Raaz. Oh man! I’d watch Delhi 6 again just for him, and I’d watch Barah Aana again just for him. What contrast between the two characters in these two movies! Everything is so markedly different – the body language, the accent, the attitude – THIS is called acting! Fans of Vijay Raaz, do not miss this. I’ve been a fan right since Monsoon Wedding and Raghu Romeo. Of the ladies, Violante Placido is indeed very pretty and a competent actress, but I personally liked Tannishtha Chatterjee more.
Does the movie have any negatives? I don’t know…Lack of item numbers? (I’m being sarcastic, by the way.)
Cheers to good indie movies!
Let’s end with a quote from Bon Jovi’s I Believe:
I believe
With every breath that I breath
You and me
Could turn a whisper to a scream
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
tempting. and for once, i hope ur recco carries equal weight (if not more) than that of Aamir Khan, at least on PFC.
sold out sirjee. watching it tonight. im sure tickets wud b available, i just know it…
Kenny- that was heartwarming.After Shivajee’s initiative & now your write-up it definitely makes me want to see the movie.And yes I am with you on feeling that every human has his/her dignity & I cringe to see people who shower lots of love & money on their pets but behave so badly with their drivers, servants, cooks etc.Its time that people slowly realised & changed… for the better!!!
totally loved the post kenny. reminded me of my days with filmi strugglers, at an apptt in yaari road. now these filmi strugglers were perenially broke & they had a house help, an old lady whom we all fondly used to call ‘Usha Darling’ and truly she was one helluva darling. The filmis used to practice with her before going for auditions & she used to be a total sport & react in her fisherman accent. Damn & she was so generous, she used to bring fish that her husband used to catch, for the strugglers. She would cook that at the apptt & we all would eat it with relish. Aah nostalgia… thanks bro!
Where did you find a maid who does the cleaning for 400??
Fans of Naseer saab can check out one of his wonderful interviews here. He doesn’t spare anybody. In some interview he’s called Hindi film awards “pan masala and talcum powder awards” :D
These links were provided by RK saab
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BoQ9CVINjCo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6PyqtoZ2HzY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YwCSxN3rj8
Kenny…kya likhta hai yaar. Raja Menon will be very happy to read this.
The other part of your post…well I still remember my first maid in Mumbai. Her husband had a drinking problem. He use to lock her out of the house in night. She use to cry in front of me. Her elder son died one day and when she came to my place she held on to my legs and cried her heart out. I never ever felt so bloody helpless in my life. I still remember the Idlis and dosa she use to make for me. She use to bring the batter from her house.
@Magik you have a story. Ek picture banaate hain :-)
@ Shivajee sir: i had actually incorporated ‘usha darling’ charecter in a serial that i was writing. un/fortunately that serial got shelved… i guess the option to make a movie is open. cheers to cinema.
Poore solah aana ka write up hai, Kenny. Will catch this over the weekend.
@Magik
Hmm…So Rights are open :-)…cool
Kenny,
Can I’ve contact details of the organization? I wish to do the same. Please send it to me.
you may mail me the contact details to maverick_dot_mm[at]gmail_dot_com
regards,
Thanks for the support, guys.
A just A,
go to http://www.nanhikali.org
I also just saw this
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8333507209347604437&hl=en
It’s a video about an organisation called MagicBus that takes street children outdoors to play sports and take part in other activities that provide some focus for their lives. The video’s directed by Mahesh Mathai (Bhopal Express)
Excellent writing and hopefully as great movie
“I call them by names”
The reader would start thinking that you do this automatically, not because of any external vested thought that you put into doing it. Simply enough, you do not do it because of a reason, but because it comes naturally to you.
But then you read this,
“I might have been in their shoes if the birth lottery had played out a little differently.”
You do it out of sympathy. Your whole attitude, which you will obviously not admit to, reeks of an assumption that a better economic status means you are luckier than them. Who told you that they need you to bend down to them? Who told you that they need your sympathy? Who told them that you, in any way, have a better life than them?
And the top prize goes to,
“She said that for her, air hostesses were nothing more than waitresses. What attitude! Are waitresses not supposed to be human beings?”
Similarly, what attitude to you! How can you deride not only the status of the watchman, driver or waiter, but also, in one glorious swipe of your condescension, also derogate their entire life, “I might have been in their shoes if the birth lottery had played out a little differently”. Why? Why do you think their lives are so bad that it is actually a matter of fortune that you are not living them? Aren’t they human beings? So while that prospective air-hostess only noticed the similar nature of both the professions, you, on the other hand, are prone to suffer from your assumed need to ‘help’ them?
And no, as much as you would like to believe it, the lower classes DO NOT always need your ’sympathy’. They need your ‘understanding’. Appreciate the difference. The inherent hypocrisy of your post is glaring, and really, do not use the watchmen, drivers, or the waiters to assuage your bourgeois vanity. It is ridiculous how everyone is getting together here and instead of being AMONG the poor people, looking DOWN UPON them. You need to reexamine your stand and stop feeling sorry for people, and direct your sorriness upon yourself. Seriously.
Gut wrenching writeup Kenny..jeeyo!!
“150 bucks is the fruit of 7-10 days of sweeping and scrubbing someone’s house.”
I know the days when i was a dishwasher!!
I will tell you something…well i didnt have a scholorship or on campus job in my schooling days..so, to pay fees and kharcha-daaru..started out as a dishwasher in a prominient restaurant..never ever was mistreated and not the customers would not be tolerated if they mistreated or anything with the staff..
Then i go to India and proudly tell evrybody how i was paying my fees by washing dishes..and believe me the number of people who looked down upon and would pass sarcastic jokes like ” leave the dishes OM is experienced he wil wash them all”…then do you realise..Globalization, Education, Broad-mindedness…GHANTA!!!! Chutyon ke bauchaar hain bhai!!!
@Dobojit..you misunderstood what kenny is saying here..he is not bending down or any..its self-realization..and he has penned it!
@OM
“never ever was mistreated and not the customers would not be tolerated if they mistreated or anything with the staff”
Do we see such respect for work here? It’s always ‘the customer is always right’
@Debojit
Mr Auteur, mujhse bahot badi galti ho gayi. I accept it all. I’m a blatant hypocrite, I’m condescending, I should learn ‘understanding’ instead of sympathy, I need to transcend into higher and more spiritual levels of thinking, preferably in my armchair. You are so right. Thanks for showing me and all those who agree with me THE LIGHT. I always had a sneaking suspicion that I should feel sorry for myself. Seriously. You have shown me that I do indeed. So I’m starting right now. I’ll feel so sorry for myself that I’ll apply for a reality show that’ll be called Dev D 2
For all the verbal and physical battering these people get they usually have the biggest hearts. My dad had an accident on the road and not one middle class guy got off his scooter or car to take a look at a 75 yrld needing help. It was the supposedly awaara rikshawaalah and the iron walla who brought him home.
One has to learn lessons of humility, dignity and affection from people doing these humble jobs.
Our people are fixated with high paying jobs.
Education means just access to a high paying job. Character is never emphasised… only outward personality is.Banta dhaar ho raha hai.
paisa aaya to bane shopoholics hum, paying lipservice to causes…hip causes.
I am glad barah aana is showcasing the talent of vijay raaz and Anuj. There is something genuine in their rustic , earthy voices thats missing in all the sohisticated stars of the industry.
Kenny this is one movie i am looking forward to see, love Naseer as well as Vijay Raaz. Regarding our treatment of people down the social class, i guess its our age old feudal mentality and our unwillingness to get our hands dirty. For us a job is not a job, unless we r an officer( in olden days) or manager or IT professional( in recent times), all other jobs r dirty.
Forget about US, i was in Korea for a year, and this is a country notorious for its hierarchy in corporate sector. Yet if the water filter got over, i would see people of CEO or VP rank, personally fill it up, without any issue. During my entire one year i never found office boys there, u want to have ur coffee, go get it urself, even if u are the CEO. And people dont think it infra dig to get their hands dirty. In sharp contrast, i have seen even medium level managers use the office boy just to fetch a glas of water here in India.
Honestly whenever i see the rich brats, living off their dad’s money, snapping their hands at waiters, feel like wringing their necks. Bastards never know what it means like to work for a living, and they dont respect people who work for a living either.
I just dont understand why we feel we r so superior to some one, just because of a scrap of paper we have. Or why we r so lazy to get off our arses and bend our backs, just because we r educated.
@Kenny,
will bear to call him/her as opting profession of barbar. same is true with fashion designers. call them opting profession of tailor and they will be angry because they think it was not a good professon while what they are doing is great and though fact remains they remain heavily dependent on tailors.
Difference in economic class in developing countries make difference. Midlle class wants all the faciilities which only really riches can afford in a developed ecenomy but middle class does not understand many things.
People want domestic help in big and so called metro cities and they complain about higher rents and costly real estates and they can not afford to give space to domestic help at their houses and they hate slums where low paid workers live and exist and they hate why domestic helper has come late forgetting that s/he might be travelling many Kms. Things are contradictory.
So called intellectuals make hue and cry when a barbar association tries to change the title of a film because they find it associated with cast but address wife of a celebrity who might be in to hair styling and he may slap you. He and she can not bear the word because its understood as associated with low paid work associatd with low cast and they think its wrong if some group tries to fight that its a cast based word and not suitable in present time.
Which of the high class hair designer
Work is divided in to good, bad, small and big categories and this is the problem. Same people who may slap their domestic help in India wont mind calling such helpers as Sir or Madam in advanced country because they are individuals there. social awareness is killed by people themselves. They dont want to see the change atleast in their life time.
am too eager to see this movie.
And i also agree to the fact that people spend more on their pets and treat their maids worst then animals. Still clueless about what they want to prove..
@kenny
Yeah,apne pe baat aaye, toh ya toh bechari armchair ki phaad do, ya phir seedha sadha acceptance ka dhong rach ke nikal lo. Chalo sahi hai. Lage raho bhai.
@darkndusky
I appreciate you sharing that experience
@Ratnakar
About Korea, very enlightening. Thanks
@Debojit
Good god! You’re right! Acceptance ka dhong kar raha tha main. You’ve made me realise the truth and this is my acceptance of my acceptance ka dhong. PS: I’m really sorry about the armchair. It must have been really comfortable
@Kenny
Ha beta, tum toh yeh saari kahaaniyan aur apni pasandidaar filmo ki dastaayen, jin se tum thode mashhoor huye phir rahe ho, treadmill par bhaagte bhaagte, ya cycle chalaate chalaate likhte ho, haina? Armchair par toh sirf hum hi chipke huye hai. Kyun?
@Kenny
“How many of us could even think of how we’d manage with 4000 bucks a month in a metro like Mumbai?”
A lot of Assistant directors in Bollywood make less than that….
Ye Bon Jovi ko beech mein laaney ki kya zarurat this yaar? Ache bhaley emotions ki gaand maar di…
thanks for the thumbs up Kenny. Wonderful article. About the subject being discussed, I think the basic base requirement actually is respect.Dignity of labour is what we’re missing. It is respect that makes all men and women equal. Everything else is temporary. Anyway what important is that the subject is being discussed.
Kenny,
Thx.
@Mainak
The ADs in Bollywood do it by choice. For that matter they work for free also. And many share accommodations and don’t live in slums and get set ka khana and get money from parents also. And if they are close to the directors free daaru also ;-)…
@ Mainak
I know it’s a weird contradiction, but my favourites are Bon Jovi and Dream Theater. Been a Jovi fan for 13 years now. And DT for 9.
And Mainak, the rupee isn’t what it used to be.
@Raja Menon
The director himself! Thanks for commenting! The best thing about your film’s message, if I may use such an abused term, is that you got it across without being preachy even one bit! We knew what it was about, but never did we get the sense that we were being handed a sermon. Congratulations on a fine piece of work.
@Debojit
That was such a witty comment I think I won’t dare to blog for the next 7 and a half years
Heartfelt writing kenny – if the film inspired you to write this, i will watch it for sure. thanks.
Brilliant write-up Kenny.
made me think – not just about watching the movie
Very emotional post. I have seen the movie and agree with you. Seldom we get to see a movie which entertains us and send a social message within 97 minutes.
Kudos to Raja Menon and for showcasing talents like Vijay Raaz.
Cheers!
~uh~
thanks ~uh~ . I’m glad the film is speaking to some people the way I hoped it would. When I feel it has, its a high I can’t explain.
And Vijay Raaz… an even better human being than an actor if that is possible.
cheers,
Kenny-san, how does one get in touch with you?
kennydb[at]rediffmail[dot]com
Great post. The writing style is so fluid, with open ends- compelling and thought-provoking.
Thanks, Jyoti. It means a lot more when compliments come from a good writer