Of Herds and Shepherds

Jesus Christ was God’s own son. He was the chosen one. He showed people the way and the people followed Him. Puri Jagannath is the chosen one for the producers of Telugu cinema after the success of Pokiri. They all want to go there, where Jagan went to with his Pokiri. To the banks, Damn it! They even seem to say, ‘see he even sports a beard’. Double dammit!

Anger makes monkey things. I just write on cinema when I am peeved or such. Pokiri has blown up the whole spectrum of commercial cinema once again, with many producers, including the good ones once again falling prey to the clone syndrome, most willingly and obligingly. I must instead perhaps write a vindictive mail to Puri Jagannath on why he is playing with the many careers of budding geniuses like me. My self-love is not the actual point of contention here, it is the ramifications of the success of Pokiri that I am talking about. Every producer I go to(to fill in the rest of the money that I need for my project to take off, and yes fyi, one good Samaritan has committed himself to a good share of the total investment, God bless him!), asks me for a script that is akin to Pokiri, the less demanding ones would be happy with the look-alike of its mediocre cousin Vikramarkudu as well. It will not be long before we see many of their clones prancing around in theatres across AP, with names such as ‘dommari’, ‘thuntari’, ‘dimmari’, ‘thimmiri’, etc etc. Even a ‘kirikiri’ is perhaps on its way, only time will tell. It is frightening really to realize that we would soon be bombarded with the cop syndrome ad nauseam and that we would be left to scratch and shake our heads in disgust.

How hard is it to realize that it is the leaders that shine bright and not the clones. Clones almost never understand why the original worked. By choosing to make a clone of a successful film, what the producer is telling himself is that he has finally understood what the audience wants. That is wishful thinking really. If only directors and producers know what the audience wants, there would not be any flops. Art is a complex process that cannot be recreated. I don’t think even Puri Jagannath can recreate Pokiri again. For God’s sake I can’t seem to make the same kind of Tea twice. It is a combination of hazaar things that makes art click or make a cup of Tea taste good, if I may borrow English August here a little bit. Film ‘Murder’ was a huge hit and was followed by many clones, some even have my favorite Mallika starring in them again, yet none of them were able to recreate even half the magic or money at the box office. Ramu’s Shiva was phenomenal, many clones followed, none created even a semblance of a sound.

The clone makers are good enough to just pick the footnotes’ of the original articles that their masters have made, they fail in picking the truth of those Films, the soul, and hence they fail invariably. The audiences go to theaters looking for the truth, even though they themselves do not know it as explicitly. Film business is, as much as any other business in this world, a work of visionaries. For Film to progress, it is the big Producer who should stand up and make Films with fresh content, it is he who can withstand a failure or two in the worst case scenario. In the best case, when the Film works, the results would be highly satisfying artistically as well as commercially. So my dear Producer, Be a leader, be a man, not just a tiny miniscule part of a large herd. Be the Shepherd.

Other Ticket to fame articles:
• What goes inside
• An Ode to Honesty
• Riding the movie express
• Flirting with Mallika Sherawat
• I am gonna be next Mani Rathnam