Often when you are reading the Newspaper, few simple lines can trigger unprecedented, explosive reactions. It happened me few days back, when I read Pakistani Director Shoaib Mansoor ruminating that song and dance routines should have been phased out by now in Indian Movies. His statement was “Ab tak inhe zabardasti ke naach-gaanon se jaan chuda leni chahiye thi (they should have got rid of unnecessary dance and music by now). When I read it, I began to wonder if he is out of his mind or something. Wait… Did I read his name properly? Was he an Asian or some film director from the West, who could probably make such statement? I mean, such statements are palatable to my ears when I hear it from a European or an American film director, pointing out the ludicrous logic of placing a song say, happening at a train in gorgeous New Zealand where the previous frame ended in a train running near Gummudipoondi. I looked at his name again printed in black. After googling his name, much to my dismay, I found out that he was born in the fertile lands of the banks of the river Indus , the cradle of Indian Civilization.
Why are we so obsessed with song and dance in our movies?? As several film critics have analyzed about the presence of songs in movies in umpteen articles, I would like to take a common man approach to understand why songs are and will be an integral part of Indian movies.
Ask any lay man, in the streets why songs are there in the movies. He would simply say that movies run because of songs. There is a large element of truth in it. Most of the damp squibs that came to the screens became watchable because of songs. How else can you explain the success behind movies like Gemini, Thiruda Thirudi.?? Let me make this clear, When I talk about songs, I am not including any of the mindless puking gaana numbers which have no relevance whatsoever to the movies. Before I start venting my fury any further, let me turn to the interesting facets of songs in movies.
For every average middle class Indian, West has always been the ultimate pinnacle of his dreams. Youngsters living either in Mahim or Virudhunagar or Gangtok have their exotic fantasy stories, set either in the breath-taking mountains of Europe or mostly in the El-dorado of Indian consciousness, United States . So, it behooves to construct dreamy sequence only in the West. The viewer who is sitting in the cosy air conditioned comforts theatre, props up either his big time crush in the place of the heroine or herself if he doesn’t have any, picturing himself as the hero on the screen. For few moments the viewer is able to live out his dreams in the perfectly built template of songs. In fact to make the dream setting authentic-wherein lies the director’s intelligence, the protagonist is seen wearing the same jeans and t-shirt in New Zealand as he was wearing in the previous frame in Gummudipoondi.
I am neither a Nostradamus nor Bhejan Daruwallah . However, without the help of any tarot cards or whatever, I can prophesize that no matter people wait for songs either to go on a short sweet trip to Eden or just piss off their frustrations for having the bought the expensive ticket, they will remain forever in our movies.