No laughing matter

At a dinner last Sunday,a friend accosted me with a query Ive come to dread : what did you think of Ready? Clearly,he doesnt read my reviews. A question of that nature usually prompts me to say,please read what Ive said,which is pretty much all I have to say: in the computer thats my memory file for movies I see on a weekly basis,the film is already in recession mode,gone wherever the shut it-forget it part exists. But hes an old friend,and I dont usually bite the heads off old friends,only movies which have no head. Or tail.

The slightly aggressive tone belies any interest in my answer. Basically all he wants is to tell me why he enjoyed every minute of the film. It made me laugh,he says,daring me to disagree. I didnt have to think.

But his comment,and his clear and present pleasure in a film that had me cringing,start to finish,made me think. Of how Ready,starring Salman Khan and a bunch of incidental others,is a monster hit,its first-day collections having surpassed last years mega hit,Dabangg. Of how Salman is the only Khan who gets the kind of opening other stars can only dream of: even his turkeys get the faithful roaring in,on the first day. Of how a fiercely loyal fan base can get you the kind of clout which will make those who dream of the next blockbuster beat a path to the stars doors,and beg him to sign on. Despite the fact that more than most top stars,Salman is only required to show up,only to do a Salman. But more than anything else,it made me think about laughter,and how different kinds of laughter make different kinds of movies. And how sameness can induce,only,ennui.

Anees Bazmees Ready is only the latest template. It recycles and presents,without any attempt at hiding the fact,everything that has made people laugh in his previous films. Why change what cant be fixed? We like foreign locations,so lets just take Akshay and Katrina to Egypt and use the pyramids as a backdrop for their calisthenics. Or cart Salman and Asin to Bangkok to do nothing. Other than gather together a bunch of characters,give them lines of a remarkably transient nature,and let them loose. This is filmmaking of a kind which has always existed,everywhere,and it usually gets in the money. By the bushels. Because when a chimpanzee farts,lifting its end high in the air,with cacophonous results,what can you do other than laugh,helplessly? The laughter is contagious,resulting in more and more people streaming in to theatres to subject themselves to a sound considered impolite in company.

The farting-as-fun can get old,even to those of us who are disposed thataway. If you find the same filmmaker using the act,only attached to a different body,you are liable to not laugh as loudly as you did the first time. Or not at all. The director,with a string of successes behind him,comes from the fine tradition of filmmakers who use the broadest of comedic conventions in the pursuit of creating mass-scale laughter. If the Farrelly Bros in Hollywood can make the grossest bodily functions into a money-making machine,why should the Bazmees in Bollywood be left far behind? In and of itself,the noise that emanates from rear ends,magnified several times over,is an old,old ha ha device,but do we really have to endure it in every one of the films?

How about getting in something new,for a change? Or if thats altogether too tough,maybe just hark back to a time when laughter didnt always have to be about bodily fluids,and extracts,and contortions? My fear is that the Bazmee effect,which has so far resulted in a bursting box office,will steamroll over efforts to do other kinds of laughter,the kind that speaks to the softer,smarter part of us,the kind that tells us that it is perfectly all right to reclaim our parked-outside-brains when we are laughing our heads off. The two dont necessarily have to be mutually exclusive activities,even when we go to the movies.

shubhra.gupta expressindia.com