It’s heartening when a film award recognises genuine talent. One of the most deserving picks this year at the 63rd National Film Awards is writer Juhi Chaturvedi for the screenplay and dialogue of Piku . A lot of the Shoojit Sircar film actually belongs to Chaturvedi, and in her ability to go against the usual story and plot-driven, high-on-drama content. Instead, Chaturvedi has created heart-tugging cinema about characters, relationships and interactions, with her skill at being able to capture cultural details and yet see the universal in the particular.
There are other such reassuring inclusions this year, most of them a nod to the young, progressive, emerging talent in Indian cinema. Like Raam Reddy’s Kannada debut Thithi , a rooted, unorthodox and humorous film about death, or first-timer Bhaskar Hazarika’s beguiling yet disturbing feminist film, Kothanodi , based on the folk tales of Assam, and made thanks to a crowd-funding initiative.
No two films could be as different, but it is good to see them both in the limelight: Gurvinder Singh’s Chauthi Koot about the paranoia in Punjab in the post Operation Bluestar era, and Sharat Katariya’s refreshing, empathetic and endearing Dum Laga Ke Haisha about two mismatched individuals thrown together in matrimony, discovering love and sex along the way.
If the sexual politics and caste narrative in a changing yet eternal Varanasi in Masaan gets a thumbs up for the best debut feature, the best debut in the non-features section is a Marathi short by Nishant Roy Bombarde called Daavratha (Threshold). It is all about an adolescent struggling with the realisation that he may be “different” as he loves dance, mehndi and jewellery.
Another nod to LGBTQ cinema is the best editing award given to Parvin Angre and Shridhar Rangayan for Rangayan’s documentary, Breaking Free , on how Section 377 is being misused to oppress and torture the community. And, of course, there is a lesbian angle in Margarita With A Straw as well, though the jury special award highlights Kalki Koechlin’s “realistic performance as a young woman afflicted with cerebral palsy.”
Despite such goodness in evidence, it’s the big awards that strike a discordant note, seemingly reserved for the mainstream. In the hierarchy of awards then, it’s only thus far that the marginal seem to go and no further.
So Bahubali bags the best film award for its imagination and monumental production value, despite the several debates on its hidden misogyny and regressiveness (remember the warrior woman transforming into a sultry seductress for the hero). Amitabh Bachchan brings home his fourth National Award and Kangana Ranaut her third. If we look at the main awards (not including the language and special mentions), then Bollywood leads with wins in 18 categories.
Has mainstream Bollywood taken such quantum leap in quality? Or is the so-called regional cinema on a downswing? Where have the Malayalam and Bengali films, always at the top of the heap, gone this year? Have the National Awards taken a leaf out of Filmfare-Stardust in trying to make everyone stay happy, from young to old, offbeat to mainstream, left to right?
The National Awards have always been about discovering the hidden gems among films and filmmakers. This year, that discovery has come in the film writing section with the Best Critic Award going to Meghachandra Kongbom from Manipur, a state where Hindi cinema is banned. To give the award then to the Film Whisperer in Manipur, nicely balances out the Bollywood predominance this year.
However, the most perplexing new award has been that for the most film-friendly state. What’s the point of this exercise? And why begin with Gujarat where, just the other day, Shah Rukh Khan’s convoy got pelted with stones during the shoot of Raees . Even if they had to initiate something like this my vote would have gone to Uttar Pradesh. Tevar in Mathura/Agra. Masaan in Varanasi, Meeruthiya Gangsters in Meerut and Noida, Talvar in Noida, those famous Sandila ke laddoos in Piku , Aligarh in Aligarh... Bollywood has been warming up to Akhilesh Yadav’s Ulta Pradesh, or rather Ulta Pradesh has been warming up to Bollywood like never before.
