DNA spoke to directors and screenplay writers to find out whether a film will be better off without an item number if the story doesn’t need one.
Director Shyam Benegal, who has a reputation for serious cinema, could not free himself from the clutches of the item-number when he was making Welcome To Sajjanpur. “He did not want songs in the film. But he had to listen to the producers,” says writer Atul Tiwari who has worked with Benegal.
In one of the songs, which was the item song in the film, a village girl wears tight pants and excessive make-up as her lover dreams of a life of bikes, cars and aeroplanes.
Tiwari, who wrote the screenplay for Benegal’s Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose: The Forgotten Hero, speaks in the director’s favour. “The dream sequence was an attempt to avoid making the song into another raunchy item number. It is to his credit that he tried to make every song integral to the plot of the movie.” Perhaps the decision to include song-and-dance sequences was propelled by the commercial failure of Benegal’s Bose, which did not have any songs.
Producer Sanjay Routri has a different take. “Anybody who talks of marketing considerations as being detrimental to the film should put himself in the shoes of the producer: the man who is spending money and taking risks.” Routri has been the executive producer of Johnny Gaddaar and Khosla Ka Ghosla, among other films. His main job is to ensure the marketability of the movie — from getting saleable actors, to deciding if songs in the film would find favour among the audience.
“Along with controversies, music is the best marketing tools for a film”, he asserts. “In foreign films, trailers are released periodically to garner attention for a film; in India, the songs are our trailers. You can check it out —in most of our films, it is either songs or some controversy that serves as the marketing aid.”
Tiwari, on the other hand, belongs to a school of thought that consciously wants to avoid the pull of the item song and its interference in the film. But he also knows that, from the marketing point of view, it has become mandatory to include an item song. Yet he cannot help asking, “Tell me, how many films do you remember that were declared a ‘hit’ because of the item song?”
Routri agrees that songs, and particularly item songs, are only a tool to generate publicity. “The real solution to increase the success rate of Hindi films is better content,” he says.
Aatish Kapadia,who wrote the screenplay for the commercially successful Aankhen has no problem whatsoever with including item numbers in a film. A big fan of ‘Kajra Re’ from Bunty Aur Babli, he says, “I look forward to the item song in every film.” But he still doesn’t believe that an item song by itself can attract more people to watch a film. “People went to the theatre primarily to see Bunty and Babli, and in the process, they also enjoyed the song.”
Routri, however, believes that item numbers “will only draw more people into the theatre, and they won’t subtract from the viewership”.
This logic, however, does not justify why the film Summer 2007, directed by Suhail Tatari, bombed at the box office. The film dealt with farmer suicides but it was touted as a college romance. Instead of highlighting the theme of the film, according to Tatari, the item song was given more prominence by the producers, and newspaper headlines claimed that the film will ‘redefine item numbers’.
Tatari is convinced that the item number and the other songs in the film were a hindrance to its success. “They made the screenplay look long and cumbersome.”
Tatari believes that his film lost out due to “improper marketing.” He says, “Marketing is not about gimmicks. It should involve telling people what the film is about. In India, we hide the story behind the songs”.
Talking about his film’s marketing blunder, he says, “The village was central to this film. But the producers decided not to show or mention the village in the promotional campaigns. Naturally, people didn’t know what the film was about.” And Tatari also knows why the producers wanted to hide the theme from the people. “They felt it was a financial risk to show a village to the city audience. The common marketing wisdom is that we have an apathy to what is not ours.”
Playwright Vikram Kapadia, whose comedy, Black With Equal, is being adapted into a film, feels that “there is no fixed formula as to what makes a film work”. His play is about the trials and tribulations of a housing society, and his main concern is to avoid dumbing down of the content. “I want the audience to understand my film but I don’twant to sacrifice the richness of the content — the reason the play was popular.”
So will he give in if the producer demands an item number? “Well, it would mean giving too much importance to the song”, he says and adds, “However, there is a a bar dancer character in the film. I guess we could include the song somewhere.”
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