Director Shonali Bose explains why she picked 'Dusokute' for her film...
'Dusokute', the rocking number from "Margarita With A Straw", was originally part of composer-singer Joi Barua's Assamese album and was included by Shonali Bose in her film as she was bowled over by its "anthemic" feel. "Shonali heard the song through a common friend Amitabh Bhattacharya, the National Award winning lyricist, and fell in love with it. She wanted something like this to kickstart a very essential part of the movie. She liked it for its anthemic feel. She felt it contained the essence of youth and optimism," says Barua, who hails from Jorhat in Assam and is based in Mumbai.
The song shows protagonist Laila (Kalki Koechlin), who is the lyricist of her college band, using the Assamese word 'Dusokute' meaning 'in the eyes' in her composition to impress Nima, a boy from Assam whom she loves. The word has been retained from the original composition, while the rest of the song has been written in Hindi by Prasoon Joshi. "'Dusokute' was originally part of our Assamese album 'Looking Out of the Window' (2010). This was a song done looking back at life, when I was a student of Gauhati Commerce College. Those times gave me a terrific feeling - a kinetic energy or force. That was the genesis of the song," 40-year-old Barua told PTI.
Bose fell in love with the song after hearing it. "After hearing this song by Joi I loved it so much that I asked him if we could have it for 'Margarita' and put it in Hindi. Prasoon penned such amazing lyrics for it lifting it to another level," she says. "From a narrative stand point it fit perfectly that I found an original Assamese song. The boy Laila falls in love with - Nima - is Assamese. I made him Assamese in the script because wherever possible I try to bring in different underrepresented communities in the film.
"And I present them as the mainstream by avoiding the pitfall of exploring their minority identity or issue. There are many kinds of Indians - not just generic north Indians (as Bollywood portrays) and when we see them on screen it should be about who they are as people - not stand-ins for their communities.
"'Margarita, With a Straw' does this at multiple levels - from Assamese to Pakistani to disabled to gay - we look at these characters beyond these narrow identities. Their identity is just a part of who they are," Shonali says. Barua feels good to have used the Assamese feeling in the song saying it sounds different from everything out there. "I have kept the feel of the original composition. I thought words from other languages get into mainstream Bollywood, so why not Assamese? We've had Marathi, Punjabi, Bengali etc. Assamese is also a magical sounding language, with very soothing phonetics. Maybe this is a pathway for all of them to discover another gem of a language," he says.
Barua, who has worked as a playback singer, vocal arranger or background singer in a number of films like "Agent Vinod", "Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara", "Udaan", "Dev D", "Munna Bhai M.B.B.S.", "Lage Raho Munna Bhai" and "Golmaal", has now worked on the entire musical score for John Abraham's next movie. "You might hear it soon. I am working on the music. Giving it the direction. Working and collaborating with a few international artists too. Those are some of the things on the plate," he says.
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