I am glad, that RRR won a Golden Globe award. And I am equally glad that the Golden Globe committee thought it fit to honor just the song “Natu Natu”, and not the movie per se. It is important to realize that the Golden Globe award for best song is awarded to a songwriter for a song written and performed within the framework of a film. And in that respect, Natu Natu, written by lyricist Chandrabose and tuned by Keeravani, received well-deserved recognition. Those 3.26 minutes of the song on screen is a visual treat, with Taraka Rama Rao and Ramcharan executing with consummate ease and clockwork precision a set of very complex dance movements to a foot-tapping and energetic composition by Keeravani. Beautifully choreographed and exquisitely orchestrated, the song encapsulates everything that the film purports to showcase: the uneasy relationship between the British and the Indians and the symbolical demise of the British Raj. In fact, one can walk out of the film after this song. There is nothing more in the film.
I am happy to note that RRR is not making it to the Academy awards. It doesn’t deserve it. As a movie, SS Rajamouli’s RRR doesn’t click at all. I found it extremely difficult to sit through three hours of the film at a local theatre here in Atlanta, despite the popcorn, burghers, and cokes that accompanied the process. After the spectacular two-part fantasy that Bahubali was – with not a misstep anywhere in both the parts – RRR simply couldn’t hold my attention for more than forty minutes. This may be a very subjective opinion, but I stick to it. The movie failed to work for me at multiple levels, least of all, in its storyline, and its bizarre narrative. Even for a film whose core storyline is about two freedom fighters and their joint rebellion against the British, it is told in a manner that borders on the fantastical – which is fine, that is how Rajamouli likes his films; but even by his standards, RRR was an affront to the lowest denominator of intelligence I brought to bear upon the film. It simply didn’t make sense, whichever way I tried to digest the movie. Towards the end, I was afraid for my sanity, and before something snapped, I left the theatre, There was absolutely no structural integrity to the film; all that we were left with are slices of SSR’s cinematic brilliance here and there, drowned and submerged under an avalanche of overconfident sequences, and loose, mindless special effects and film-making. Thank God, it didn’t go to the Oscars. There were several regional films in 2022 that could have been fit candidates for the Academy Awards if only those creators had the money power and clout the SS Rajamouli troop seem to have had in pushing their film to an international stage.
I have never really understood the Indian film industry’s craving for International recognition. It seems like an obsession to be nominated to the Academy, and each year, we seem to wait with bated breath to see which movie is given the nod. As an Indian, I find this slightly distasteful and quite unnecessary. Our movies cater to a specific audience who have specific tastes. An art form thrives only in its local milieu. The fact that we have so many forms of dance and music and other visual arts in India is testimony to our diversity and the role of art in satisfying the deeper requirements of specific communities. Even the term “Pan India” irks me. But of course, the compulsive need to go big in movies dubbed into multiple languages is a direct result of commercial interests taking over the artistic essence. The wider the spread of the distribution, the more money for the few who have invested in its making, to take home.
In fact, the terms Bollywood, Kollywood, and Tollywood are abhorrent to my ears. Frankly, they are unnecessary variations to the term Hollywood – which is a real place in the US where movie barons reside and big studios are located. We demean ourselves when we crave acknowledgment for our work through someone else’s lens. No other country, to the best of my knowledge, attempts so desperately to be accepted in the embrace of the Academy of motion arts and sciences, as we do. It is almost a penance for us to stand at least once on what we think of as the hallowed ground of cinema. In most other countries, their own national awards are considered more precious and coveted. For instance, for the French, the Caesar Awards (Les César) award given out by the French Academy of Cinema Arts and Techniques (Académie des Arts et Techniques du Cinéma) is held in high esteem. They really don’t care for the Oscars. In India, the National award winners are rarely publicized. They are often announced without much fanfare and consequently get very little real estate in the media. We have to focus on making good regional cinema, the rest will come.
How did Satyajit ray’s work gain international recognition despite being grounded in the local culture and specificities of rural and urban Bengal? The answer lay in Ray’s treatment of the subject and the brilliant use of the medium to bring out the universality of emotions through his stories and characters. In contrast, most of our films are very local in texture and often told in a local style and verve. It is impossible for our commercial movies to touch deeper chords anywhere else. Even within India, people who live in the northern side don’t understand or appreciate movies made in the south, and vice versa. (Therefore remakes are a big business if nothing else works out.). Fortunately, in recent decades there is a new wave of young filmmakers and actors who have managed to break the mold and have begun to experiment with cinematic forms. The advent of Netflix, Amazon, and other streaming platforms has helped their cause. These young artists are bridging that yawning gap between commercial Indian cinema and art films, a chasm so deep in India, that it takes something extraordinary to make a film that has solid cinematic content and technique, and also does well commercially. When this tribe of filmmakers increases, international doors will automatically open. SS Rajamouli is among these new-wave directors, but RRR is definitely not representative of his work. He was just riding the wave of success the previous two films generated.
Circling back to the Natu Natu song, I am happy for Keeravani, the music composer. He has been in the film-music business for more than three decades and has evolved a unique style for himself. Very distinctive and catchy. A humble man, with no pretensions of doing anything other than what the director wants from him. And within those boundaries, he has, over the years, managed to create a consistent body of good music in different languages and regions. When he walked up to the Golden Globe stage to collect the award, he was clear that this award is for the songwriter and all those who helped create the song for the screen. Unlike in the west, where the songwriter, the singer, and the musician are often the same person or group; in India, they are broken into different skills, and that gives rise to questions about who gets the credit ( artistically and money-wise) for the song. Keeravani had a long list of people to acknowledge for his award starting with his younger brother SS Rajamouli all the way to the “superstars” who vigorously danced their way through the song. I thought It was a nice, sweet speech befitting the man who has always remained silent and reticent about his musical skills. It was a big stage for him and he carried himself well.
It is also ironic, and in a way, quite interesting that Ilayaraja, arguably one of the greatest and most prolific Indian film music composers in the modern era is yet to stand on an international stage to receive an award for his work in films. Though he is widely known and praised, international awards have eluded him. On the other hand, AR Rahman, his younger contemporary and one-time assistant – whose meteoric rise as a sound engineering wizard more or less dethroned Ilayaraja as the leading composer during the nineties and onwards – hit the big Academy stage with “ Slum Dog Millionaire”, and now Keeravani has bagged the Golden globe. Suppose one cares to ask Ilayaraja himself about this matter, it is quite possible he may either brush the question away philosophically or bristle with irritation at the irrelevance of the question, and fume over the meaninglessness of awards to a great artist. Ilayaraja’s beautifully composed folkish melody with western infusions “ Adi rakammma kaiyya thattu” in Maniratnam’s Rajnikanth 1989 blockbuster “Dalapathi” was the closest he ever got to international recognition for his film music, and the song was listed as one among the top ten songs in BBC’s list that year. Success is cruel, sometimes, and not as linear as one would think it is.
As an Indian, I would love to see a lot of movies made in India do well and be accepted internationally. For this to happen, we need to get out of this maniacal craze of big budgets and overpaid stars, and focus on what matters. In the last five years, I have had the privilege of watching cinema from all over the globe, both in theaters and on selected streaming channels. And I am sure now more than ever that films, like dance, music, and literature, have to reflect the universal in the particulars, and there must be something in it that goes beyond the titillation of the senses and the mindless brainwashing on screen. A movie should make one think, and reflect and should tease us out of entrenched opinions, and/or expand our horizons. Only such movies will stand the test of time, regardless of whether it receives an Academy award or any other international acclaim.
On a final note, I am thrilled that RRR is only the third film after Richard Attenborough’s Gandhi, Mira Nair’s Salaam Bombay, and Garth Davis’s Lion to have been nominated for the Golden Globes. We would like to see many more follow suit on a regular basis, not merely for a song or two, but for the entire movie experience. That would make us proud indeed.
Fantastic narration about the recognition from foreigner.Lets be confident of what we are👍