‘What’s your name, Basanti?’: 
Rang De Basanti is a commercial blockbuster in the guise of protest cinema. While City of God rose from the barrios, Basanti rose from Juhu Beach. Yes, it’s an earnest critique of corruption and apathy. But it’s also Aamir Khan’s second Lagaan clone: same English love interest, same chest-pounding nationalism, same period costume drama. Our Peter Pan in high-waisted pants is calculating and relentless.
Basanti hangs on an interesting gimmick: an English filmmaker persuades a group of Delhi University students to act in her documentary. As they reenact the Indian independence struggle, they evolve from cynical partiers into hardcore patriots. But after real life (or intermission) intrudes, the plot goes medieval on your ass.
Aamir Khan leans on the same regional rube routine he’s used since Rangeela, only he’s Punjabi Sikh, not Marathi. The real stars are Saif Ali’s über-cute sister Soha Ali Khan, the handsome Kunal Kapoor (no relation to Shashi Kapoor’s son) and A.R. Rahman’s romantic ditty ‘Tu Bin Bataye.’
The movie begins a wastrel yuuuth flick like Dil Chahta Hai and Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak. There’s lots of cheesy ’80s rock guitar, very Karate Kid. Cool, yaar, stop pressurizing me, let’s freak out. At least the cheese is set off with slick music vid cuts. Then it mashes the patriotism button hard with fighter jets streaming the colors of the tiranga. It’s Top Guna for those still in the crib when Goose was in the sod.
The movie smothers its best idea in Bollywood-style subtlety, which is to say none. Like in Africa, corrupt politicians have replaced European colonists as the Man who’s Keepin’ You Down. It’s a neat transposition, but for the mentally slow, the director dissolves the Butcher of Jallianwalla Bagh directly into a corrupt government minister. It’s like admiring someone from afar until they leer at you and grab their crotch.
On the other hand, the blonde isn’t fetishized here, nor is she the babe; that falls to Soha Ali Khan. Alice Patten delivers her lines in the best phonetic Hindi I’ve heard from a Brit actor yet. And it’s always fun watching photogenic desi jocks — those are not the types let into the U.S. on brains. It’s a reasonably original script, not a lift of Oldboy, The Game or Fight Club (thanks, GC). It’s a current issues film, which in the U.S. is considered death at the box office. And it touched me, I let the manipulation in.
This is one of the three-to-four Bollywood movies a year truly worth seeing. I dislike the showy, force-fed patriotism, and the motorcycle/electric guitar factor is tacky and lame, but the issues it tackles are extremely topical: India’s rising self-confidence, the end of the brain drain and a newfound determination to throw the bums out.
WARNING: Plot summary and spoilers below.
While the students are filming the movie, their best friend, a fighter pilot in the Indian Air Force, dies in a MiG training accident. A public probe reveals that the defense minister was getting kickbacks from an Indian arms dealer who imported shoddy parts. The parts had killed 78 pilots and downed over 160 fighters over the years (the stats are from the IAF’s shameful, real-life accident rate).
The arms dealer turns out to be the father of one of the main characters. This twist is so similar to Arthur Miller’s play All My Sons that I wonder whether it was lifted, though it certainly could have evolved independently.
Arthur Miller, the playwright, found the idea for Joe’s crime in a true story, which occurred during the Second World War: a manufacturer knowingly shipped out defective parts for tanks. These had suffered mechanical failures which had led to the deaths of many soldiers. The fault was discovered, and the manufacturer convicted…
Worried by the lost production and not seeing the consequences of his decision, Joe told Steve to weld over the cracks. He said that he would take responsibility for this, but could not come in to work, as he had influenza. Several weeks later twenty-one aeroplanes crashed on the same day, killing the pilots. [Link]
Joe Keller’s famous, tragic line: ‘… I think to him they were all my sons. And I guess they were, I guess they were.’
The students organize a protest at India Gate with the dead soldier’s mother. Worried about political damage, the corrupt defense minister calls up the local saffronist party boss. The boss sends in the khaki-suited goons to beat up the students and the martyr ma.
Here the movie turns very dark. Vowing revenge, the students assassinate the defense minister, take over a radio station, confess their crimes on air, start a national dialogue on government corruption and are gunned down by Black Cat commandos. The movie’s nihilist, taboo-breaking ending evokes Thelma & Louise and True Romance for me.
Unlike Gadar, which came right out of the Rocky-shoots-up-Afghanistan era, the jingoism here isn’t directed at Pakistan, and the Indian Muslim character gets sympathetic treatment. And rehabilitating the BJP lieutenant was a wonderful idea. I only wish the historical story were as well-filmed as the present-day one.
Kirron Kher, who was so good in Devdas, is hilariously accurate as a tough-but-caring Punjabi mom, but Mumbaiyya Punjabi bugs the shit out of me. It’s a fake language formed by speaking Hindi words in a Punjabi accent: the attitude-laden ‘Sanu ki lagda?’ intonation over the Hindi words ‘Mujhe kya?’, with a couple of random Punjabi words thrown in for emphasis. And it’s used all over Hindi movies.
As an aside, the ImaginAsian theater in Manhattan makes a shameless pass at your heartstrings by selling Parle-G biscuits and Pocky sticks and putting a small Bollyart exhibit on its walls. The Loews State was nicer, but A for effort, Asian.
Related posts: Shaitaan’s Billis, ‘Yuva’, Creep, Blessed review: mangal ho, The end of an era
