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HE persistent rain of the past two days had ceased. But the sky over Cannes was still cloudy and sombre as the Gangs of Wasseypur came calling. The buzz was warm as film enthusiasts queued up outside JW Marriott's Theatre Croisette, for a marathon screening of Anurag Kashyap’s two-part gangster epic. Never before in history had the Directors’ Fortnight screened a film this long. One wondered whether viewers in Cannes would last the course, through the complex web of historical references, cultural nuances and multiplicity of characters that the film weaves. All doubts turned out to be misplaced. The two parts of the 320-minute film was separated by a 20-minute break but the audience stayed with Gangs of Wasseypur all the way through, transfixed by its rollicking six-decade ride through the violence-wracked badlands of India’s coal-mining belt, once a part of Bengal, then of Bihar, and now of Jharkhand. The real action of the 65th Cannes Film Festival was unfolding elsewhere — in the main 22-film Competition section and the 20-film Un Certain Regard sidebar, which had India’s only official entry, Ashim Ahluwalia’s Miss Lovely — but for Bollywood watchers on the French Riviera this year, the focus was squarely on Kashyap’s magnum opus. Say what you might about a film that revels unabashedly in its depiction of street violence, but there is a degree of energy and magnetism in Gangs of Wasseypur that is irresistible. It packs quite a handsome wallop. With a soundtrack embellished end to end with songs drawn from both the region’s folk music traditions and Bollywood movies, the film draws its strength from the central performances delivered by Manoj Bajpayee (Part 1) and Nawazuddin Siddiqui (Part 2). Neither actor is a boxoffice powerhouse, but the sledgehammer force that they employ in order to bring their characters alive is all Gangs of Wasseypur needs to propel itself forward. Kashyap was in Cannes with virtually the entire cast and crew and the clamour that they collectively generated assumed the proportions of a veritable din. Manoj Bajpayee flew in for only a day to attend the world premiere. Nawazuddin Siddiqui (who also has a pivotal role in Miss Lovely) stayed longer, and so did Piyush Mishra and a bunch of younger actors. Also in attendance were the film’s three principal actresses — Richa Chadda, Reema Sen and debutante Huma Qureishi — besides the director’s wife, Kalki Koechlin. Gangs of Wasseypur had well and truly descended on the Croisette. The international media did not miss the film’s obvious strengths. The Times`A0of London said of Anurag Kashyap:`A0"(His) gritty, rowdy snapshots of contemporary India have marked him out as one of the hippest filmmakers working on the subcontinent." The Hollywood Reporter`A0described Gangs of Wasseypur`A0"a dizzying explosion of an Indian gangster film, whose epic structure and colourful, immoral killers capture the imagination for over five hours.`A0Gangs of Wasseypur`A0puts Tarantino in a corner with its cool command of cinematically-inspired and referenced violence, ironic characters and breathless pace." Screen Daily`A0commented;`A0"Never a dull moment ... oozing visual style, laced with tight and often blackly comic dialogue,... this Tarantino-tinged Bihari take on`A0The Godfather`A0has what it takes to cross over from the Indian domestic and Diaspora markets to reach out to action-loving, gore-tolerant theatrical and auxiliary genre audiences worldwide." The Directors’ Fortnight isn’t, strictly speaking, a part of the Cannes Film Festival but it is recognised as an independent section that runs concurrently under the aegis of the French Directors Guild and celebrates independent cinema from the world over. It is in this section that has, since its inception in 1969, showcased the first films of directors like Martin Scorsese, Werner Herzog, Michael Haneke and Jim Jarmusch. Although Kashyap isn’t a first-time director, Gangs of Wasseypur is certainly the first of a kind. No Bollywood film had ever made it to the Directors’ Fortnight.
Miss Lovely, the only Indian film in the festival’s official selection, gave the Indian bandwagon some more reason to cheer. This tale of two brothers, who produce cheap sex-and-horror flicks for a quick buck in the sleazy underbelly of the Mumbai movie industry of the mid-1980s adopts an approach to filmmaking that is immediately at odds with anything that one is accustomed to watching in Indian cinema. Describing it as "an impressive transition to features" for documentary filmmaker Ahluwalia, the reviewer for Variety wrote that Miss Lovely is "something new in Indian filmmaking, neither Bollywood nor traditional art cinema, the picture provides a unique, immersive experience`85" The review further says: "`85those who go with the flow will find the thrill is in the Mumbai-born, Bard College-trained helmer’s bravura and baroque visual style, one that owes as much to docu and experimental filmmakers as to Scorsese, Welles and von Sternberg, plunging viewers into the characters’ social milieu." Cannes 2012 could prove to be a watershed for Indian cinema. For a nation that works itself up into an unseemly froth every time Aishwarya Rai lands in Cannes as one of countless L’Oreal brand ambassadors — Sonam Kapoor and Freida Pinto have since been added to the spectrum — the fact that actual Indian film titles were being discussed rather than just designer outfits on the red carpet represented a huge step forward. Pinto, who walked up the red-carpeted stairs of the Grand Lumiere in the early part of the festival, used the opportunity to announce her next international project, Desert Dancer, about a young Iranian, who defied his nation’s restrictions on dance forms to follow his dream. Contemporary Indian cinema has long nurtured this dream of conquering the world. The first steps may have been taken. Not only did India have a presence that went well beyond the raucous beach party that it hosts in Cannes each year, it brought to the table several new under-development titles that have the potential of kicking on from here into a brighter, more dynamic future. Shivajee Chandrabhushan, the award-winning director of Frozen, was one of 15 directors from around the world selected by Cinefondation’s L’Atelier, a platform designed to help films in development find co-producers in the course of the Cannes Film Festival. Chandrabhushan’s new film, The Untold Tale, an Indo-European co-production, is likely to begin principal photography by the end of the year. Also in Cannes was the duo of Sanjay Suri and Onir, who have three new films in the pipeline, including one to be helmed by latter. "Our kind of cinema has very few backers in India," laments Onir. One small-time Indian film producer, who was in Cannes for a few days, was quoted as saying on his return that this country’s cinema is a "big joke" in Cannes. What a joke! The guy obviously has no clue what he is talking about. Even a joke in Cannes can be worth much more than the vacuous utterance of a man in desperate need of a crash course. (The writer, an eminent film critic, was in Cannes for the 65th International Film Festival)
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What made Kashyap’s
feat even more significant was that another of his productions —
Vasan Bala’s Peddlers — was in the Critics Week, competing
for the Camera d’Or, the Cannes Film Festival’s award for the best
debut film screened across its various sections.
