The power of silence

I know what you’re thinking. You’re wrong. This post isn’t about philosophy.

It’s about Bollywood. It’s been quite a while since I saw my last Bollywood movie, “Iqbal”. Any decent observer of the Indian movie industry can tell you that one of the defining characteristics of a Bollywood movie, is its extravagant usage, or rather, dependence on music for expression and ambience. Now in general I feel that there is nothing wrong with such dependence. Music is critical to any form of commercial cinema anywhere in the world, and is one of the most powerful tools available to the creative vanguards of movie-making.

Any tool’s existence is a necessary and sufficient proof of existence of an ill-use of the same. Bollywood, I think, sometime in the past, went hyper on music. And then it did that again. And then over and over and over again. Do Indians have some special psychological connection with music that the rest of world doesn’t?

My explanation for the overweening excess is two-fold: Creative inertia and stunted cinematic growth. Bollywood has had a very uneven growth from its initial roots - while SFX and editing technology is constantly approaching western standards, aspects such as utilization of music hasn’t quite followed the transformation of Hollywood music from the musicals of ’70s to the present day’s poignant soundtracks/backgrounds. Creative inertia, however, is a typical Indian phenomenon, a fear of the new and the bold, the much-ridden concept of the “formula”.

Anyways, the central topic is a repercussion of the above, it’s the loss of silence. The most talented of movie-makers have shown the world how silence can be the most soul-entrenching form of expression. That moment of complete vacuity before the deciding penalty kick; or that eerily silent search for grit in the face of certain terror. Or the moments of charged emotions where the talking is done by dripping eyes or grimacing face.

Today’s Bollywood is garish, loud and vocal in comparison to its own past image. When I think of silence in cinema, I invariably remember a particular enactment in “Kaagaz ke phool” where Gurudutt and Waheeda Rehman are just standing and looking at each other from almost 2 meters away. I’ve seen people cry to that scene. Saying nothing sometimes says the most.

Kuch baat hai ki hasti...

I was in New Delhi when the serial blasts that rocked India took place. As a passive spectator, I observed the city and its denizens, as they went through random emotional stages of utter shock and disbelief, anger, dismay and fear.

I saw with silent concern as the state government deployed more than 2600 special services personnel all around the city within a day of the terrible event. News channels were agog with stories of anxious relatives searching for their dear ones. The fateful day’s events we deconstructed innumerable number of times in all forms of media. Delhi Police launched the biggest manhunt ever in the National Capital for the perpetrators.

And then Diwali came by. And it was subdued. Delhiwallahs are known for their sometimes preposterous extravagance in burning firecrackers at the nation’s foremost festival, and they were no different this time. But if someone were to say that the blasts didn’t affect the average Delhiwallah’s general impudence in firing enormous amount of firecrackers, he’d be wrong.

He’d be wrong again if he were to say that the blasts left an indelible scar on the minds of the residents. For the next day, I was witness to innumerable pushes and shoves and expletives and arguments at a popular local marketplace. The crowd was back, and so was Delhi. The 2600 special service personnel disappeared, making way for the loud fruit vendors, shrewd shopkeepers and bargaining aunties. Almost as quickly as the doom had set in, the clouds evanesced.

If introducing fear and anxiety into the hearts and minds of the city-dwellers was the motive of the terrorists, then they chose the wrong city. There were three heroes in the episode – Two of them being the driver and conductor of the bus which had the third bomb planted in it, who saved more than 100 lives with their common sense. The driver tragically lost an arm, hearing capability and an eye while trying to throw the bomb out of the bus after they had emptied it of passengers. And the third hero was the Delhiwallah, the man on the street, whose bravest deed in the times of terror was to do just that, be there on the street.

I’m not a chauvinistic nationalist, if that’s what you’re inferring. But there are certain things that make me proud to be an Indian. And the character that the city of New Delhi showed in the face of extreme terrorism, is one of them.