Jumping the gun!

The trailer of ‘Thugs of Hindostan’ is all set to touch six crore plus views on YouTube. In just about one week of its release. You can call this phenomenal anticipation of the movie for one simple reason Amitabh and Aamir coming together for the first time in what has been a three-decade-long wait for audiences.

There is something else too which has happened post the release of ‘Thugs of Hindostan’. The equal amount of ridicule the trailer received from those who expected better. 

What better they expected is not yet known but they expected better. This is the irony of all major entertainment movies. Deep down we love them. We enjoy them but somehow, we are made to feel guilty about enjoying them. These are not intelligent films we are told and what exactly is an intelligent film nobody knows. For the time being, let us stay focused on the criticism of the movie.

The critics told us this one looks heavily inspired from ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’. They probably had a point. Sure, the movie looked visually inspired from that movie or was it? The movie tells the story of pirates who ruled the sea against the Britishers. 

So, while we can see inspirations the story is different. The larger question is how much of our cinema is original? ‘Sholay’, ‘Deewar’, ‘Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge’ all drew inspirations from yesteryear movies. There was another bunch, which was not very happy about how Aamir came out in the trailer. 

The complaint was he was loud! That, if you ask me, is a brilliant stroke by the director. Aamir’s loudness will blend superbly with Amitabh’s cold ruthless Khudabaksh Azaad in the movie. Remember how Veeru’s flamboyancy was such a perfect foil to Jai’s cold thinker in ‘Sholay’? 

If the director has written a good screenplay there will be sparks when such contrast characters will clash on screen. You will also have to understand that sometimes it is a loud character which makes a movie work, you might want to think of Kareena Kapoor in ‘Jab We Met’ to understand my point. Trust the women’s equality brigade to take potshots at a new big Bollywood release and this one was no different. 

This time the criticism was the women did not speak in the trailer. Sure, they did not but at least one had shooting arrows and fighting man to man and did not come across as a decorative material. Amitabh teaching archery to one young girl also was comfortably ignored a man teaching the use of a weapon to a girl is liberating enough, no? 

More importantly when exactly did the director tell or claim that he is making the next ‘Arth’ or ‘Mother India’? A masala entertainer it is and there ends the matter. Then came the never-satisfied-with-the-plot brigade. True the trailer did not give much of a glimpse, but did it cross us that could exactly be the strategy? 

Give us the grandeur of the movie but do not reveal the plot? That is a reasonably perfect strategy because when a movie so anticipated as ‘Thugs of Hindostan’ is coming up hiding the actual content is the best bet to keep the aura and ensure that the first reactions build on the ground spiral of feedback for a film.

Sometimes criticism is executed largely because we the audiences and observers fail to control our expectations. Else look hard what was so great about the teaser of SRK’s ‘Zero’, but the audiences loved it. For that matter, I recall the trailer of ‘Aiyaary’, which promised great things but what a cold ‘bhatoora’ in the freezer the movie turned out to be. Worse is we did not know what to expect but would want to be politically correct and say, ‘oh the trailer was just about ok’.

I’m, for sure counting days to November 8. I want to see who will win the most anticipated battle of histrionics. Before the “bachchas” came to the party the big daddy of action was Amitabh. In this trailer, he is kicking ass with such flair that you remember the chair kicking Vijay of ‘Zanjeer’.

‘Thugs of Hindostan’ is that full of cheese hot burger not meant for those who are scared of living life. I am going to dig in day one. Sword to the critics Azaad!