Thursday, January 25, 2007

Guru: Why I didn’t like the movie!

I am disappointed with Mani Ratnam. Guru turns out to be a lackluster, slow-paced and very predictive movie. The latter part of the movie turns slow and quite boring. The songs were not spectacular either.

But that’s not why I didn’t like the movie. I didn’t like the movie for the message it conveys- Do whatever it takes to succeed, even if it is the corrupt or illegal means. The message is dangerous and it epitomizes the attitudes of the new generation of India- inimical to itself. When a poll was conducted if the Indian youth would resort to the methods employed by a scandalous stockbroker to earn the ‘success’, majority of those who polled said a resounding ‘yes’. When I saw that result in a magazine few years ago, I couldn’t believe it. India has changed. It has changed for good in many ways. And it has changed for the worse in many ways. The Indian youth has wrong role models and that’s not a good development.

While I expected the protagonist to be punished for his illegal practices, the movie condones, accepts and legitimizes those actions. Such condoning, then accepting and then legitimizing all pervading corrupt practices leads to institutionalizing them forever. The present India needs to moves away from doing that- we need to move away from corruption that seems to touch every Indian soul. We need to say what is right and follow it, however hard that path may be. We need to know what is wrong and discard it, however hard that path may be.

Babudom, corruption, untouchability, casteism, nepotism, dynastic politics, etc, are all bad things of India. Legitimizing those practices perpetuates them. This movie does the same.

Should judiciary be influenced by public opinion? I think NOT. In this movie, the judiciary falls for the applause and approval of the corrupt protagonist and basically gives him a clean chit. I came out of the movie with a heavy feeling. What has become of us? Why are we rationalizing and explaining away the wrong acts as if we are victims of this system? What Guru Bhai does is plain wrong. Just because the system is wrong, we cannot use subversive tactics to undermine it and capitalize on it, to reap rewards from it.

Just because the tax system in India is fallible, should we stop paying taxes or evade taxes using ‘smart’ techniques? Should we disobey traffic laws just because they are not perfect? Our corporate laws are not perfect. I face these imperfections everyday in my life. We all get ample opportunities to easily subvert the system, go around it, to basically reap the bounties. That’s not right. We need examples of heroes who have done it right in spite of the flawed system. Not the examples of those who have ‘smartly’ outmaneuvered it.

18 comments:

  1. I don't understand why many reviewers feel that Mani Ratnam is giving a message through this movie and legitimising his protagonist's actions. It's a partially fictitious biopic of Ambani, period. What Ambani did is being documented. Are we still immature to think that movies should have good guys bashing up bad guys and bad guys being punished?

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  2. Thanks for the review. You saved me a lot of money :-) My wife wanted to see this movie. Now we will wait for it to come on little screen. I read somewhere that one of the Ambani brothers gave a thumbs up as the movie has something to do with Ambanis...That means automatic thumbsdown from my side.

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  3. Dear Sujai,

    I don't agree with your viewpoints.I saw the movie yesterday and please look into my reflections in the URL below:

    http://jayab.blogspot.com/2007/01/reflections-on-guru.html

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  4. randramble:
    If the movie is really an account of Mr. Ambani, then what the director could have done was say that it is a true story.

    If it is not an account of Mr. Ambani, then it is fiction. Mani Ratnam could have taken it the way he would have wanted it. What happened to the top guys at Worldcom and Exxon makes much stronger case and message for India.

    Yes, I do believe that movies convey messages.

    (But I don't think there should be a regulation on what that message should be.)

    Either you like the message or you don't. Here, I am saying I don't like the message. That's all!

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  5. Sorry- it should have been Enron and not Exxon.

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  6. Actually, sujai, Exxon can also be included - The damage caused by the Exxon-Mobil oil leak in Alaska required them to payout $4B, they got away with $40M. In India, Union carbine got away with even less.

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  7. Regarding your comments about Guru, guess its a valid critique. A journalist friend of mine did not like Rang De Basanti for the same reason, that incites the youth to take the path of violence against corruption/rogue politicians while others like me were not really looking at RDB from that lens. For me RDB was a significantly improved version of a hindi movie which is contemprorary, very good editing and story which leaves much room to predict unlike the trash which comes out of hollywood. In Mani Ratnam's Guru, from what I have read ( I am yet to see the movie), it is a similar potrayal to 'The Aviator' based on the life of Howard Hughes. But Aviator was done very well and one comes away feeling pity for the lonely/distraught hughes. Wonder why Mani Ratnam couldn't bring out a better ending if it was really fiction. I am also not keen to know about the Ambanis ! Reliance has caused & continues to cause much pollution !

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  8. savita:
    I also have my critique on Rang De Basanti (on this blog).

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  9. Not sure, how I missed this post in my feed reader. Hence the delayed response.

    My views about Guru are exactly the same as yours. The message is wrong. That too, in the current era where youth think that it is perfectly legitimate to do anything against govt. and regulations, this movie can even be considered dangerous. Good review.

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  10. OK, I'm gonna play the devil's advocate here.

    Yes, the movie has shown Guru breaking a large number of rules. But another question arises: should those rules have existed in the first place? Read Gurcharan Das's India Unbound, he's explained it well.

    The rules that existed in those times had no conceivable reason. Why should it be the govt's business to dictate what to produce and how much to produce? The License Quota Raj was a system that clearly favours the entrenched players, as shown by the Contractors (Wadias) in the film.

    In such a situation, what is a person starting from scratch supposed to do? To be successful, he may need to bend the rules, even break them.

    The methods may be unethical. But to succeed in an unethical system, you often need to resort to unethical means. I'm not saying what he did was right. But to see it in a black-and-white ethical viewpoint without considering the realities of the time, isn't going to take us anywhere.

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  11. OK, I'm gonna play the devil's advocate here.

    Yes, the movie has shown Guru breaking a large number of rules. But another question arises: should those rules have existed in the first place? Read Gurcharan Das's India Unbound, he's explained it well.

    The rules that existed in those times had no conceivable reason. Why should it be the govt's business to dictate what to produce and how much to produce? The License Quota Raj was a system that clearly favours the entrenched players, as shown by the Contractors (Wadias) in the film.

    In such a situation, what is a person starting from scratch supposed to do? To be successful, he may need to bend the rules, even break them.

    The methods may be unethical. But to succeed in an unethical system, you often need to resort to unethical means. I'm not saying what he did was right. But to see it in a black-and-white ethical viewpoint without considering the realities of the time, isn't going to take us anywhere.

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  12. I guess that one message that Mani Ratnam has given through the movie is that "If a person thinks,than he can me the impossible possible".This is what he wanted to convey through the movie.As you have mentioned,the judicial system in India has flaws and that is correct.

    To add to this,there are people like Dhirubhai Ambani,LN Mittal who have proved this point.But at the end of the day,"Reviews differ from people to people"

    How about having a link exchange?

    -Himanshu
    (Contributor to http://startups.in/india)
    (Blogger at http://thoughtsprevail.blogspot.com)

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  13. I guess that one message that Mani Ratnam has given through the movie is that "If a person thinks,than he can me the impossible possible".This is what he wanted to convey through the movie.As you have mentioned,the judicial system in India has flaws and that is correct.

    To add to this,there are people like Dhirubhai Ambani,LN Mittal who have proved this point.But at the end of the day,"Reviews differ from people to people"

    How about having a link exchange?

    -Himanshu
    (Contributor to http://startups.in/india)
    (Blogger at http://thoughtsprevail.blogspot.com)

    ReplyDelete
  14. I too believe that Bollywood movies should convey a message against corruption, lack of civic sense and various other evils existing in our society. The reason is that the movies are watched more by uneducated Indians whose only means of educating themselves is via television or cinema. Eve-teasing probably had its birth in India after bollywood movies. So also, the concept of filmi style romance . I am not saying all bollywood movies should convey a social message. But most Indians are an extremely naive (though at the same time, cunning) people. Many probably still believe what is happening on-screen is for real. The illiterate or half educated youth are especially influenced by movies. I think the recent increase in violence in the form of riots etc. could probably be due to movies condoning violence. Well, Hinduism never said no to violence or corruption, in fact Hinduism warrants making money - that could be another factor. We are not a rational people and we are not yet ready for hollywood style movies.

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  15. Movies are for telling a story, not for giving messages to the people. Unless you are talking about a documentary. If a movie, in telling that story, explores certain social issues or comments on them, then that's great, but it does not necessarily have to. Also, Shyam Benegal and Govind Nihalani have been making such movies for decades now. How many of them have been BO success?
    -Chirkut

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  16. The point about this movie is that its shows that a common man can not succeed in life without cheating. This movie does not give the message that we all should start cheating but what it is trying to do is to give a message that our government is so messed that a common man even though he has lots of potential in him cannot succeed in life. So it is indirectly a message to change the government system. Few years back,a book named "the white tiger" which won the man booker price also gave in a similar message. But when reading the book people can get the message clearly but in the movie also mani rathnam has tried to give the same message but now i understand that lots of people have misinterpreted it.

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  17. To all who think that guru gives a wrong message, I would say they are clearly misinterpreting the message.
    Wisdom and intelligence is not limited only to law makers. Any person who has reason to believe that certain laws are unjust and stifling for doing the right thing, he should have to courage and smartness to get right things done. I think this is the right message.
    Otherwise one may categorize all the Indian revolutionaries as well to be criminals revolting against the laws in the British era using violent means.

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  18. well I am a tax payer.. Every year i pay tax and i have been paying for the last 20 yrs.. even though i dint see any developments in our country.actually the tax collected should be used to develop teh country instead it is going in to the politicians pocket.If that is the case then i would feel that there is no wrong in exploiting the flaws in govt rules and systems.So i support Guru movie is a message oriented .

    ReplyDelete

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