NIKHIL ADVANI'S 'D'DAY' - WHAT IDEOLOGY?

Films like ‘DDay’ really annoy me. The following write up is full of spoilers!

The first half is good; believable and likeable characters with emotional tracks that you immediately connect with and a very realistic and gritty feel to the film. I fell in love with Irrfan Khan pretty much immediately. I started liking Arjun Rampal once his mystique gave way to an intense relationship with a prostitute (Shruti Hassan). I didn’t really get Huma Qureshi’s emotional track at all but anyway, a minor thing like that was easily forgotten.

The actors are great – Irrfan is mind-blowingly brilliant. That one shot when he bids farewell to his son at the airport took my breath away. That isn't acting, I thought! If a camera is suddenly pulled out and a picture taken, most people, in the middle of their individual moments, end up looking awkward and camera-unfriendly. But when you are acting for the camera, I believe it would be very difficult to conjure a look not meant for the camera. For me, Irrfan is this character feeling that emotion. It isn’t acting. It is a moment of brilliance and there are many such brilliant moments in the film, thanks to Irrfan. Rishi Kapoor is as usual effective, although I do feel that he is capable of much more than what he showcased in this film. Arjun Rampal has mightily improved. Shruti Hassan is a great surprise package for me and the supporting cast is excellent as well.

The cinematography is superb. A realistic feel with effective gloominess and grains (which works in this film as opposed to in 'Lootera', considering the space, the aesthetic and the tone of the film in focus) mixed beautifully with stylistic shots and lighting that become evident without taking anything away from the narrative/content.

But let’s not get too much into the technicalities and the craft, however great they might have been. The film is good up until the ‘Alvida’ song, which is an absolute delight in the way it’s visualized and choreographed. Things are looking up and then suddenly, it all goes downhill! The film goes for a toss. The characters suddenly become "filmy", lose their appeal, things become too convenient and story finds escape routes through coincidences. And I am not going to harp on all the dragging towards the end and the unnecessary twists and turns and hyper-emotions that put me off completely.

I am going to instead focus on the thing that usually annoys me the most about Commercial Hindi films of the ‘Political Thriller’ genre. What ideology exactly is the film trying to sell? Isn’t it our usual favourite; the only way out is to take law in your own hands which films like ‘A Wednesday’ and ‘Rang De Basanti’ did to my annoyance. We love to hear stories about messiahs coming and saving us from the claws of corrupt politicians. But at what point does a vigilante stop being that and become an uncontrollable force that misuses all the power bestowed upon him/her.

And how are we expected to be so blind to the fact that the so-called savior within the film is selling out to the demands of the very charming, very charismatic and a very cunning villain. Each time Goldman is captured, all he hopes for is to be killed so that he doesn’t have to go through the ordeal of being interrogated, incarcerated and humiliated. Or so I believe! (It’s possible that Goldman is simply taunting him knowing fully well that the Indian agent would never kill him. I didn’t see it that way. I may be wrong but I choose to stick to my perception.) Goldman tempts the RAW undercover agents to shoot him but they don’t because they don't want him to become a martyr. They want to bring him back to India alive. At first, it seemed like that was merely a device to prolong the film but later I convinced myself that perhaps that WAS the right thing to do. In the end, after a lot is lost and sacrificed and against all odds and an unbelievably long amount of time spent in the theatre, the mission of bringing Goldman back to India is accomplished, the agent pulls out the gun, says a fancy line and shoots him! I mean seriously?! Of course when Goldman gives an annoying speech about how he is an Indian, glad to be back and he can continue his business sitting in any of the jails, out eventually only to enter ‘The Big Boss’ house and sit and talk with Salman Khan etc., I felt like snatching the gun out of Arjun Rampal’s hand and shooting him myself. (Wait I am confused, actually I felt like shooting Nikhil Advani; it sounded more like the director’s philosophy than the character’s anyway.) But then that precisely is the purpose. I felt that the speech was Goldman’s escape route. He wants to be shot! He wants to be rescued from all the humiliation he would have to go through post the arrest. He invites temptation so that he can be freed from the ordeal that’s to follow; he does it all very cleverly and guess what, it works too! He tempts the agent to shoot him and the agent does! Not only does he attack the constitution by taking law in his own hands but also sells out to the demand of the man who is responsible for the doom of many Indians and his own friends. As if all that isn’t enough, he finishes the film with an awful line about how Goldman must take off his rose tinted glasses, face the new India, the changed India, the India that’s not “cowardly” anymore and doesn’t flinch at the thought of flaunting guns and pulling triggers. What a message!

After having been treated like a complete idiot by the filmmaker, the only thing that could have made it worse still, was an applause from the audience as the end credits rolled! Yes, there was…plenty of it!