A Film Maker's Dilemma

The enjoyment of the experience of watching a movie has to do with the audiences suspension of disbelief of whatever is being presented on the screen and accepting the audiovisual imagery as real for the time they are engrossed in its content. Different people have different thresholds for this suspension. This threshold is determined by their demographics (age, gender, education, income, location, marital status, parenthood etc.) and their psycho graphics (religious beliefs, cultural upbringing, family values, life experiences, worldview etc.). Not all factors are weighted equal and since many of the factors as well as the weights assigned to them change with time for each individual member of the audience, it becomes a real challenge for a film maker to try to identify with some degree of accuracy the target audience for his or her film.

There is another factor which is unique to consumption of this form of entertainment by the audience. And that factor is called" Word Of Mouth". Since most people in the world are "Other-directed" instead of being "Inner-directed", they are not only afraid to express their individual opinion if it is contrary to the majority, but are also willing to change it to conform to the majority, resulting in a "Snowball Effect". Therefore, outspoken opinion leaders, (read film critics, mostly by virtue of the public platforms they control to disseminate their opinion), can make or break the opening of a film. In this day and age of saturation releases, the opening weekend collections account for almost 60-70% of the film's total revenue potential. Weekend grosses are reported by each and everyone in the print , broadcast and cyber media. They have somehow become barometers of Quality and the "snowball effect" their reporting creates mostly results in a self-fulfilling prophecy.

So the film maker's dilemma is whether to make a film which audience wants ( trying to figure that out as explained earlier is almost as difficult as figuring out the existence of God), or make a film which appeals to him/her, and hope that there is a large enough audience in sync with him/her, for it to recoup its investment..

What does movie audience want Part II?

Continuing the analysis of frequently expressed opinions about a movie in an exit poll:
4.PREDICTABLE Hai: In majority of films, the end is predictable. Love stories will always end with lovers uniting either in this life (happy ending), or after death (sad ending). Action will always have the hero vanquishing the villain, Drama will always have underdog triumphing in the end, Romantic Comedies will always have hero professing his love in front of the whole world to his 'roothi hui' beloved, who runs back in her lovers arms jilting the loser standing by at the alter.
Horror will always have every one else hacked to death except the protagonist who will always some how escape and eventually cause the demise of the killer. We can go on and on about predictable endings. What should not be predictable are the surprise turns the screenplay takes in reaching from the beginning to the end. If the journey is engaging and keeps one entertained by what is unfolding on the screen, then Predictable hai should not be seen as a problem in judging a movie.
5. CLICHE'D Hai: One must not forget that Cliches become cliches because time and again in the past, those situations have worked. Heroine gets in jeopardy. Hero shows up in the nick of time and saves her. The two fall in love. Most repeated stock situation in cinema. Sometimes, one ends up using a stereotype or a cliche' because it becomes a shortcut of communication between the film maker and the audience. Without dwelling on an explanation, the film maker can then move on to more complex parts of the story. Therefor, cliches and stereotypes shouldn't always be looked down upon with disdain.
6.LINEAR Hai: This I call the Tarantino effect on the new breed of film makers. Ever since PULP FICTION, it is considered cool to break up an otherwise nice linear story and randomly move its parts out of sequence even at the cost of making any logical sense. This more often than not ends up creating confusion rather than suspense but if you have succeeded in creating the right buzz, people will be afraid to admit that they are confused lest they be perceived as less intelligent.
This happens a lot in the movie business, where a film maker's creation is judged by all and sundry. Every one has an opinion about what is good acting, what is good script, what is good photography, what is good music and what is good direction. All that is fine but the problem is that rather than expressing it as one person's opinion, it is spoken about as if it represents a global consensus.

What does movie audience want?

Every film maker in the world is looking for an answer to this question. It is the holy grail we are all searching for and few find, albeit momentarily, and then it suddenly disappears putting the film maker in its quest again. The exit poll every friday outside a multiplex in a metro in India has pretty standard responses. Let’s examine what they are:
1. TIME PASS Hai: I suppose it means it is neither good nor atrocious. It baffles me because time is one thing which we can not replenish. Once gone it is gone. So this cavalier attitude about time pass specially by young moviegoers is rather disheartening.
2. PICTURE SLOW Hai: All films in cinemas run at the same speed of 24 frames per second. So it is not the speed of the projector, it is the pace at which story unfolds on screen. Different type of content requires different pace of narrating a story, but a remark like this from a youngster with attention deficit disorder condemns the film to everyone as B-O-R-I-N-G.
3. HEAVY PICTURE hai: It is not like the audience is asked to lift it. What it means is that it made me think about issues I want to ignore as it is not always pleasant to accept my share of the responsibility.
Leave alone the half-literate or illiterate movie goers, ( in filmspeak known as Masses), India’s literate and educated audience, (in filmspeak known as Classes), also proudly claim that when they go to the movies, they want to leave their brains behind. Is that entertainment? Without that brain, how can you have an emotional connect? It is that brain which keeps you engaged with what is unfolding on that screen.
From somewhat more articulate audience, there are other responses such as, PREDICTABLE hai, CLICHE’D hai, LINEAR hai etc. which I will try to analyze in the next blog.

3 Mistakes of 3 Idiots

At the outset, I will honestly admit that like Raju and Farhan who were upset about Rancho being a topper while they were only mediocre;  I , as a film director working in what we now call Bollywood, am extremely envious of Raju Hirani’s astounding success as a film maker. I use the word ‘Envy’ and not ‘Jealousy’, because envy makes you want to push yourself up to be like one who is more successful, where as jealousy makes you want to pull down one who is more successful. So when I point out the loopholes in plot, motivation or characterization in the otherwise brilliant screenplay of three idiots, my purpose should not be misunderstood.

Like everyone else, I was also blown away by the sweep of this thoroughly entertaining film when I went to see it for the first time. Within a week, I went to see it again to imbibe the craft of its writing as I have admired the collaboration of Abhijat Joshi and Raju Hirani in both Munna Bhai movies and now 3 idiots. I have tremendous respect for a film maker whose film appeals to both the classes and the masses because the tastes of the two demographics are so far apart  especially  in what each group finds funny. When a film maker and writer team is able to score a hat-trick with their humour, you have to tip your hat and salute their achievement. To somehow dissect that magical element embedded in their screenplay, I went to see 3 idiots again. This is when I found the three loopholes which I am  surprised that the writers didn’t bother to plug, even though I am not surprised that the audience glossed over them.  Here they are:

1. Loophole in Plot: For ten long years, neither the two idiots, nor the dean’s daughter, bothered to go through college registration papers of Rancho, which may have had a false identity for Aamir as Ranchoddas Shyamaldas Chanchad, but would certainly have had his address at Chanchad Estate in Simla. As a matter of fact there is a scene where Virus admonishes Raju by saying that Rancho’s father’s monthly income has so many zeroes that even if you take away a few nothing will change in his life, whereas  Raju will be in serious trouble if he didn’t graduate. So, the dean is fully aware of Rancho’s father’s wealth and status. It is safe to assume that all that information is in his college registration documents.  Even if we buy the fact that a gardener’s son was presented as Shyamaldas’s son, as no one knows what he looks like, it is difficult to buy that his Simla address is not in the application, and it took ten years and a chance appearance in the background of a photo snapped of  Chatur’s secretary on a visit to Simla  for everyone to realize that Rancho is in Simla which is when the three classmates show up there to look for him at Chanchad Estate. If they had done so after Rancho left the campus and didn’t keep in touch with his mates and girlfriend (because of the promise he made to Mr.Shyamaldas), they would have found out in a few weeks what they learnt after ten years and plot wouldn’t have moved to the second half of the film.

Now that I have pointed to the problem, I have a suggestion for plugging this loophole, as already a setup was done by giving Rancho the duplicate key of Dean’s office to copy the exam paper. If at that time, Rancho had also removed his file from that office, we would accept that after he left college, he couldn’t be traced.

2. Loophole in Motivation: Second loophole was that of the motivation of Dean’s daughter played by Kareena Kapoor. When Rancho had so cleverly demonstrated to her the shallow attitude of her fiance whose ring she returns after calling him an Ass, after ten long years, an accomplished doctor and a beautiful woman can’t find anyone else but the same jerk to marry whom she gullibly accepts by thinking he must have changed. Even if she didn’t go looking for Rancho by going through his college application papers, she would have gotten many other offers from possible suitors or better still, would have chosen to be a career woman.

As it is, story wise, this ten year gap was too long. In this day and age of information technology, fortunes can change in an year; so at the most five years would have served the purpose of the story.

3. Loophole in Characterization: Third loophole was in the characterization of Professor Viru Sahasrabuddhe. The name suggests that he is a Maharashtrian. I went to IIT, Bombay and had many Maharashtrian professors including one called Sahasrabuddhe . Unfortunately,  Boman Irani as Viru Sahasrabuddhe had no trace of Maharashtrian in him. His  clothes, styling, accent, as well as his home and his daughters were completely cosmopolitan. If anything, he looked like an eccentric Parsee. I understand that the joke was in calling him Virus but then he could be Cyrus Dastur and still be called Cyrus the virus.

The film’s unprecedented success doesn’t need a stamp of approval from any one,  but as a lifelong student of Cinema, and because of the high esteem I hold the team which made this charming and meaningful film,  what I have done is  an academic exercise in dissecting  what seemed like a flawless screenplay, otherwise consistent in its own logic, with every setup having a clever and satisfying payoff.

In spite of what I have pointed out in this blog,  ALL IZZ WELL.

 

Jag Mundhra, Director

"crossover films for a global audience"