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Over the years, these and few others themes have been repackaged time and again. The latest to join the bandwagon of old theme of village is Matru ki Bijlee ka Mandola. In the last couple of years, Hindi cinema seems to have rediscovered its bonding with desi roots. More and more films are extolling our villages, small towns, gamchas, bhasha (language) and culture. The trend, which restarted with Omkara, caught momentum with films like Ishqiya, Dabangg, Aarakshan, Rowdy Rathore, Gangs of Wasseypur I & II (GOW I & II), Shanghai, Bol Bachchan, Ishqzaade and Paan Singh Tomar. Interestingly, even the
multiplex audience is lapping it up with the makers raking in the
moolah. An urban teenager who loves his Reebok, DKNY and Levis is
happily using the lingo which hitherto was restricted to the
hinterland of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar or Haryana. All courtesy the
dialogues being mouthed by actors like Nasseruddin Shah, Arshad Warsi,
Nawazuddin Siddiqui, Manoj Bajpai, Emraan Hashmi, Ajay Devgn, Salman
Khan, Irrfan Khan and others.
It’s not only the dialect. The UP and Bihari dialect has been used by thespians like Dilip Kumar (Ganga Jamuna) or Amitabh Bachchan (Adalat, Shenshah etc.) in umpteen number of films. They spoke the beautiful language in authentic dialect but never uttered abuses. What has changed in today’s rural films is that the characters are no longer flaunting rural attire of ghaghra-choli, odhni, tattoos, dhoti-kurta, etc. This is in keeping with the aspirations of the present-day villagers, who are matching their urban counterparts in their dressing sense and lifestyle. They wear bright-hued salwaar kameez to look like their idol Madhuri Dixit, Sridevi and their ilk. They no more ride a bailgaadi or cycle. They zoom around in their Yamahas and Hero Hondas. This is precisely what
is being shown in today’s films. Compare films like Ganga Jamuna
and Paan Singh Tomar. Both were dacoit films but Dilip Kumar is
garbed in dhoti where as Irrfan wears well-fitted khaki
pants-shirts. Vyjayantimala looked cosmetically refined village belle
in the film whereas Mahie Gill’s make up and attire couldn’t
differentiate her from a real villager. Even in the highly successful
film Lagaan (2001), Aamir Khan admitted that he didn’t have
the time to practice the language of the locals. So in the film, urban
Hindi was used. Though the film got an Oscar nomination, this film,
too, looked a made up rural story. And that is the major difference in
film in the last decade.
Besides this, our media, print as well as electronic, have started covering small-town news. Their scams, love stories, crimes are getting prominent display. Televison programmes like Kaun Banega Crorepati, Sa Re Ga Ma Pa etc. have had many success stories from small towns. The urban youth, too, has started identifying with their village brethren. They happily pick up the village lingo even in the elite colleges and would not mind sporting a red and white gamcha. Collegians love to repeat the dialogues from these films. And this is definitely the reason films set in rural backdrop, which had faded away since the 1990s, have bounced back with a vengeance. And almost all of them are very successful. Another reason for this new phenomenon is the new crop of directors. Most of these films have been made by directors who have grown up in small towns. So one could have the flavour of Uttar Pradesh in the films of directors like Gorakhpur-born Anurag Kashyap (Gangs of Wasseypur I & II), Bijnor-bred Vishal Bhardwaj (Matru ki Bijlee ka Mandola, Kaminey), Allahabad native Tigmanshu Dhulia ( Paan Singh Tomar, Saheb Biwi aur Gangster etc), Faizabad’s Abhishek Kaushik (Ishqiya), Obra-born Abhinav Kashyap (Dabangg etc.), and others and their tribe is increasing. They can easily relate to the language and also that lifestyle. And are comfortable giving the rustic and regionalist touch to an otherwise common story of love, sex and revenge saga. As Karan Johar, in one of his interviews, had said, "I grew up aspiring to wear DKNY, Lewis. So, I can identify with only that lifestyle and my films reflect that lifestyle. I don’t know hinterland". Besides this, by now, most of the foreign locales like Swiss Alps, New York, Australia, Turkey, etc. have been so overdone that the audience wanted to see something different. And with India shining, moviegoers readily lapped up Indianness and also realised that there is more to India than Mumbai, Bengaluru, Delhi or Chennai. The new crop of directors use real village locales like Chambal, Wai, Bhuj, etc. they don’t like to set up scenes in studios. This makes the film much more authentic. But for every such film, there are cosmetically touched village films like Bol Bachchan, Rowdy Rathore. These films too rake in the moolah. Whatever it is, rural stories are hitting a jackpot and stories are being told differently, which is being lapped up the audience.
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