Bollywood baddies
Author: Tapan K Ghosh
Publisher: Sage, Rs395
Tapan K Ghosh’s book explores how ‘Bollywood baddies’ have shaped Hindi cinema. Excerpts
The villains in Bollywood cinema both prior to Independence and after offer a valuable case study for identifying the social, economic, and political faces of India as the country progressed over the decades. If the country stuttered in the thirties and forties, the villains did much the same. Running in tandem with the nation that tried to articulate her voice since Independence, the villains gradually broke their shackles, and looked far more aggressive and authentic as the decades rolled on. Bollywood films have from the beginning shown an awareness of what was happening within the country. This probably explains its overwhelming popularity among the masses.
During the fifties, sixties, and early seventies, politics was not an epiphenomenon. The state was not considered an agent of the ruling class. Author Rajni Kothari speaks not only about the “distortions in the policies and in the functioning of the system since 1965,” but also relates them to the “mistakes committed during the period before 1965.” The bourgeois as well as the landed gentry were fragmented even in the fifties. Still, people believed that the state was going to be a provider, ensuring liberation from social inequity. This faith in the state was gradually lost, and there has been since then a massive erosion of the idea. In the fifties, down the decade in particular, there was a feeling of discontent about the implementation of the policies of Jawaharlal Nehru’s socialist agenda. The sixties witnessed changes in social hierarchy, making it difficult for people to accept traditional values. This was also the time of the uprising of backward classes. The opposition parties in politics were gaining strength, questioning the Congress hegemony which was reeling with discontent. This led to the division of the Congress down the sixties, and again, later also. The era showed how the villains during the sixties started operating from cities — a feature that signalled emphatically the villain’s location shifting from the rural to the urban.
The villain is one whom we want to see punished in a story. Still, he should be there, brandishing his sword and challenging the hero. If the villain is not there, the story fails to hold our attention, and loses much of its charm. The presence of the villain in a story brings out the qualities of the well-meaning charismatic hero, his inner strength, and self-belief to go through the ordeals put before him. If the villain is weak and effeminate, indulging in thoughtless carousals and luxuries, the image of the hero gets tarnished. Any easy encounter between the villain and the hero turns out to be a mere bagatelle. The heroine who looks for the exploits of the hero, whom she adores, may have second thoughts before spending the rest of her life with a gullible fellow.
The stronger the villain, the more charismatic becomes the image of the hero. It wouldn’t be blasphemous to say that the hero receives a considerable mantle of the villain when the latter fails down, releasing some parts of his vigour. One cannot be sure if the invisible translucent process has anything to do with the duel when the two are engaged with physical confrontations. In fact, the larger-than-life image of many villains during the seventies and eighties of Bollywood cinema has stunned viewers. As a continuation of this phenomenon, the ghazal singer in the film Sarfarosh (1999) impresses even when he perishes. Satan and the fallen angels in Milton’s Paradise lost have captivated the imagination of critics and readers. Bollywood cinema, following this pristine tradition, has shown many powerful villains on the screen.
We should remember that, like the hero, the villain too has to fight against his fate, society, family, friends-turned-foes, even intransigent siblings who, unknowingly or even knowingly, as the case may be, conspire against him. This is in addition to the hero (often more than one) the villain has to tackle. When the villain believes that he has licked his adversary, another, a look-alike, takes his place, as it happens in Kalicharan (1976). The other instance of unprecedented working of fate is found in the rebirth fiasco, as it happens in Madhumati (1958), Karz, Karan Arjun, among others. The poor villain in all such instances finds no respite. He is dragged on every time from oblivion and has to surrender to his fate. Society, too, conspires against them. Suddenly, everyone becomes united against him, as it happens in Shyam Benegal’s Nishant. In Mirch Masala, women beat the subedar and throw red mirchi in his eyes.