dna edit: On the revolutionary road

The outrage on social media over Film Federation’s unanimous choice of Gyan Correa’s The Good Road as India’s official entry to the Oscars is remarkable in many ways. For starters, what has sparked the outrage are the relative merits of two films that are ‘different’, ‘serious’ — hence marginal — and do not remotely aspire to be in the 100-crore league. They are the very antithesis of what has come to define mainstream cinema: star-studded cast, exotic locales, sleek action and item numbers.

Correa’s film is dark, and follows the trajectory of three characters — a truck driver, a boy, and a woman trying to escape the flesh trade. Ritesh Batra’s The  Lunchbox, which the cognoscenti feels should have been the ideal choice for the federation, is an epistolary film, marked by lyricism and restrained performances. Even before its Indian release, Batra’s film had created waves in the international film festivals.

Though it is too early to stay whether Indian cinema is experiencing a nouvelle vague, one thing is clear. The space for serious and good films has expanded with the growing appetite for today’s viewers who are much more mature and informed than their predecessors. They are willing to queue up at multiplexes for Anand Gandhi’s Ship of Theseus, which provides a different kind of entertainment through its exploration of issues like identity, justice and beauty. They are willing to pay Rs250 for a ticket for such a film.

The new crop of filmmakers are brave, intelligent and committed to the cause of cinema.
Their faith in the audience’s intelligence has spurred them to eschew formulaic stuff and try out new narratives. It’s a healthy sign of a democratic movement where the marginal is nudging its way to the centre stage. A lot of credit should go to Anurag Kashyap for galvanising this movement. When Kashyap found his artistic voice after years of struggle, he encouraged and mentored directors with similar vision and aesthetics.

Without getting into an argument over the relative merits of both The Lunchbox and The Good Road, it can be said that Correa’s Gujarati film has brought back the focus on regional cinema. In the last 13 years, only three regional films were sent to the Oscars, of which Shwaas (2004) and Harishchandra’s Factory (2009) were Marathi films and Adaminte Makan Abu (2011) was Malayali. In spite of winning the best film award at the annual National Film Awards in 2012, the Marathi film Deool was dumped for Barfi!.

Though regional cinema too is undergoing a perceptible change, it still lacks funding and distribution networks — essential to a film’s survival. Since there is little incentive from state governments, filmmakers have to largely depend on independent producers to realise their dreams. Correa was lucky to get National Film Development Corporation as producer.

But if The Good Road manages to create a stir at the Oscars, it will be a shot in the arm for good films in general and regional cinema in particular. It could even inspire the big wigs in Hindi cinema to go beyond lip-service and actually revolutionise the mainstream.