For years now, I have been a dedicated supporter of second hand books. The awkward marriage of charm and cheapness that gives birth to these books cannot be rivaled by the more expensive new ones. Watching Rakhi Sawant pout away on a music channel, I wondered if this logic holds good for movies too. If remade movies were the same as second hand books, I guess the logic got an egg on its face, sunny side up. The eggs would quickly be succeeded by a fine collection of fresh rotten tomatoes. Now that I’m done with my gastronomic insults, let me proceed to the neighbourhood of the point I’m trying to make.
Bollywood over the years has been very original in copying movies from – mostly the west, occasionally the north, and the south and east whenever copyrights support (or don’t support). The professionalism in plagiarizing doesn’t stop with movies, but works downwards towards copying plots in parts, storylines in full, songs in and out of tune and entire souls off movies – all without an element of guilt. For a long time, Anu Malik remained the beacon of such copying in spite of all his denial. There are plenty of people out there, who believe Anu Malik’s middle name was “Inspired By” – the most common of his comeback lines when cornered by the all-knowing media folks.
Closely influenced by school children who copy in exams, is the duo of Abbas-Mustan. While school children might carry home, along with a not-so-deserving marks card some element of guilt, Abbas-Mastan have remained immune to such emotions. Their contribution to a remade movie begins with changing the title and ends with changing the credits. And the contribution in-between is as much as Steve Buckner’s is towards helping India win matches.
Priyadarshan represents a more refined form of copying – remaking ones own films. With the assumption that humor is not a function of geography, he goes on to remake his movies in the national language and frequently placing his foot in quicksand and upsetting distributors’ profit margins. I wouldn’t deliver too many bricks at him however, thanks to good movies like Hera Pheri.
True forms of globalization can only be reached if the art and culture of different regions start drawing from each other – not in entirety but restricted to only bucketfuls. Black Eyed Peas’ Elephunk theme with an Ilayaraja song for background is a great example. There have been other examples to in the past but this one catches my fancy.
Whatever be the case, I await the day when plagiarism joins the list of illegal activities in the country and where a director who steals another’s story and pants does very high justice to the pants and sufficient justice to the story. Until then, I’ll keep the original content close to my heart and retain my cynicism towards them remake.
~Suri
