There are some films, which continue to bemuse, baffle and bewilder me, after all this time. Films which should have been consigned to the dustbin of history (Hahahahah!! ok I know, I sound like the boring politicians who appear on countless news shows and pass such trite comments on their opponents) have been made not only hits but superhits. Now like countless unsolved mysteries like -who was behind the assassination of JFK or the suicide of Marilyn Monroe or the reason behind Vajpayeeji’s long pauses or why Kareena still thinks she’s god’s gift to mankind, the question why these films became hits continue to flummox me.
But anyways here are the 5 films which the ’Jantaa Janardhan’ (okay for people whose Hindi Gyan is limited; it means PUBLIC IS GOD!!!) in their infinite wisdom made HITS:
COOLIE- Now this was unarguably Manmohan Desai’s worst film and one of Amitabh Bachchan’s worst films (Big B topped this effort with Jadugar, Toofan and Mrityu-data later. With a plot which had superman AB playing a Coolie, with pseudo-socialistic dialogues which belonged to the Marx era, Rishi kapoor who played a buffoon who thinks he’s a journalist, Rati Agnihotri who keeps shrieking and shouting as AB’s love interest, villains like Kader Khan and Suresh Oberoi who shout even more than Rati Agnihotri; this film was an unquestionable disaster. But wonder of wonders this film turns out to be a big hit. WHY?? WHY?? WHY??
A film which had the old-age, hackneyed lost and found formula, an eagle (yeah AB has a pet eagle in the movie-that’s the novelty of COOLIE), with coolies acting as if they were members of West Bengal’s trade unions (You half-expect them to shout-’EEE SOB CHOLBE NA’ anytime) and songs like-Dono Jawaani ki masti mein choor, mera kasoor na tera kasoor, na meine signal dekha na tumne signal dekha, ACCIDENT ho gaya, RABBA RABBA!!! Wow!
The only reason, which comes to my mind why this trash of a film was a hit, is the accident, which happened on the sets of COOLIE (yeah the ACCIDENT song is no co-incidence) when the entire nation prayed for BIG B’s well being. SYMPATHY works in strange ways I guess.
RAJA HINDUSTANI- This film, which starred Aamir Khan and Karishma Kapoor in the lead, was directed by Dharmesh Darshan who considers himself the modern Raj Kapoor-Vijay Anand-Bimal Roy-Guru Dutt all rolled into one. With a story as old as the hills and a screenplay directly lifted from the old Shashi Kapoor starrer Jab Jab Phool Khile this was one of the biggest hits of 1996.
It is considered to be one of Karishma Kapoor’s best roles-ahem!!! Now I mean if you can call simpering and saying ’oh papaaaaa’or ’oh Raajaaaaa’ in that moronic way for 1/3 of the film, grimacing and fluttering your eyes for another 1/3 and screeching, screaming and shrieking for the rest of the part of the film ACTING, well then Karishma is Katherine Hepburn of the Hindi Film industry!!!
I think Karishma Kapoor got the accolades more for the transformation she underwent in that film-Come-on it’s no easy task to change yourself from Randhir kapoor-look-alike to Babita-wannabe overnight!!! And what was Mr.Perfectionist Aamir Khan doing in this film- playing a taxi-driver who has an attitude matching the owner of TOYOTA company with half the time wearing a lipstick and half the time wearing his trademark cap. Yeah Aamir wasn’t bad in the film but then neither was he good as he usually is.
The rest of the cast led by Johny Lever and gang is enough to drive you to insanity. People say this film became a hit because of its songs. Well if rehashing the same old tunes and picking up a Nusrat fateh ali khan number (Kinna Sona) blatantly is good music then Nadeem Shravan are the Mozart of this age and well oh-the-so-aesthetically picturised kiss-which-lasts-forever scene too contributed a wee-bit in making it a HIT!!!
MOHABBATEIN- This to date remains the biggest mystery. What prompted Aditya Chopra to unleash this monstrosity on humankind? WHY on earth did he make something as absurd and pathetic as this movie after DDLJ?? Why did he have to weave not 1,not 2 but 3 absolutely tiresome love stories with an even more tiresome cast?
To cast 1 actress without an iota of acting skills maybe courageous but 3 actresses who are on ground zero when it comes to emoting is hara-kiri but Aditya Chopra did precisely that. To pit Amitabh Bachchan and Shahrukh Khan against each other and make them nuke each other and the poor audience with one bombastic dialogues after the other accompanied by thunder and lighting; was this film made in Y2K or the 50’s and 60’s.What was going though his mind??? Only HE knows.
Good songs sometimes uplift even a bad film but here the songs were, barring a couple, torturous to say the least assailing your senses regularly, remember ’Pairon mein bandhan hai or Soni Soni’.
But know what this film is a hit. Maybe the audience loved the ’taali-maaro’ confrontations between Big B and Shahrukh.Maybe they loved Shahrukh wearing Specs and playing a violin too much. Maybe the audience don’t care about actresses’ acting till they keep prancing around in teenie-weenie, itsy-bitsy clothes. Maybe Aditya Chopra cashed his goodwill earned through DDLJ. Well, MAYBE!!
PYAAR KIYA TOH DARNA KYA- This film’s success continues to amaze me and Sohail Khan, Salman Khan, Arbaaz Khan, Kajol and whomsoever even remotely connected with this movie. How could a movie, which tried to copy, albeit unsuccessfully, so many movies at the same time become one of the HITS of 1998??
The film had asinine jokes, tomfoolery in the name of acting by look-I-m-naked khan, an over-the hill Dharmendra trying to act like Marlon Brando by mumbling his dialogues, more wooden-than-your-entire-set-of-furniture Arbaaz Khan and a bored Kajol who besides wearing some ill-fitting clothes wore a gimme-my-money-i wana-go-home look throughout this movie. Rest of the cast please excuse my amnesia for forgetting and also forgiving you for acting in this travesty of a movie. Redeeming features, if a movie as bad as this can be redeemed, were a couple of songs.
DEEWANA- This surprise HIT of 1992 still doesn’t cease to surprise me. It had the old and haggard looking Rishi Kapoor wearing many of his colourful pullovers and sweatshirts . It had one of the most original plots of a husband coming back from death and realizing that his wife(Divya Bharati) is going to marry another guy.Now this another guy falls for this lady-in-white(who looks relieved really after ’sweatshirt’ disappears from the face of earth, the no-make up look and bottles of glycerine notwithstanding) who can’t resist his crazed look for too long!!!
OH I forgot Shahrukh ‘mein hun naa’ played the other guy in this movie which incidentally is his debut film. Shahrukh Khan keeps wondering in his innumerable interviews that how could audiences accept an ugly looking guy like him. Well watch this film and you too will start wondering with him and well regarding his acting in this film- its so pathetically dramatic and hammy that you will know how Shahrukh is our very own ’HAMMERstein’ which we the people have unwittingly created.
Coupled with some age-old villainy by Amrish Puri and hamming away to glory by Sushma Seth you have a perfect recipe for disaster. But AILAAAA.NO.ITS A HIT and all flaws are forgotten and forgiven. What made this film a HIT? Well except for some hummable songs by Nadeem-Shravan, can’t seem to think of anything.
The other films which were top contenders but missed this exalted list by a whisker are: RAJA BABU, MOHRA, DIL TO PAGAL HAI, PHOOL aur KAANTE, K3G, AAJ KA ARJUN, DULHE RAJA, KARAN ARJUN, ISHQ, RAJA, JUDAI etc., etc., etc
Thanks for reading and will be glad if you could drop a few comments!!!
CHEERS!!!
