Movie: Swades

Actors: Shahrukh Khan, Gayatri Joshi, Kishori Balal, Rajesh Vivek, Dayashanker Pandey
Director: Ashutosh Gowarikar, Producer: Ashutosh Gowarikar and UTV

Making the ‘pardesi’ win:

The patriotism of a film like ‘Swades’ is far worse than all the jingoism we see around us. For, it posits one kind of Indian against another. The coloniser here is not a foreigner, but a benevolent Indian living overseas.

The story in short: Mohan Bhargav (Shahrukh) works as a project manager at the NASA space centre. He is part of the team devising a pathbreaking way to conserve and create water for the future. After one such session, he gets ruminative, tells his friend that he wants to meet his childhood governess, Kaveri-amma, perhaps even bring her here with him. He takes a three-week leave, goes to Delhi and then begins his search for the lady and apparently his real self. In the course of his journey he falls in love with Geeta who teaches at the village school and with whom Kaveri-amma now lives.

Ideally, the film could have raised questions about Mohan’s dilemma; it could have shown his growth. Instead, all we see him do is drop his jeans and get into a dhoti. The NRI psyche has not been captured well at all. His continuing to live in a ‘caravan’, a fitted-with-all-amenities van, is supposed to be a wry comment on his clinging to the comforts. It just looks ridiculous.

In fact, the first scene when he starts out looking for the village Charanpur is itself a wrong beginning. For, he loses his way and encounters (what else?) a sadhu who tells him, “Raasta kabhi ghalat nahin hota, log ghalat hotey hai”. Perhaps the message the director should have applied to himself. Problem is he has not forgotten ‘Lagaan’. Comparisons are odious, but if you find characters that resonate, locales that look the same and even a message that is being driven into our heads, then we have no choice. ‘Lagaan’ was about self-respect and sustenance; ‘Swades’ works as self-indulgence, of both Gowarikar and Mohan.

The protagonist is just too one-dimensional. It isn’t that he does not know what he wants that is bothersome, but that he seems to know it all. One can understand it if the villagers are in awe of him, but the thought of him single-handedly bringing about a revolution is too pat. At no point earlier do we see him with any such zeal. To build up a character there has got to be some momentum.

Agreed that issues of caste, illiteracy, poverty plague our society. In ‘Lagaan’ when Bhuvan points them out to his fellow villagers it tugs at the heartstrings. Here bottled water, cigarette-smoking NRI pointing it out comes across as a homily. He could just as well have said he had returned to seek personal nirvana, like any other Westerner.

One is glad that Kaveri-amma had laid a bet with Geeta that if Mohan returned to meet her she would win an ice-cream. He really isn’t worth much more.

As for Geeta, she is another instance of a pat solution. There are women like her, who come from cities to work at the grassroots level. But nothing about her – the way she dresses, the way she talks, walks, reveal that she is part of that society. She could well be on one of those summer trips, visiting from the Bahamas and doing research on village life. Her idealism is restricted to having minor altercations with Mohan about how the government is doing something (which is more establishmentarian than idealism) and finally giving him pieces of Indian soil and leaves to beguile him back to the country’s womb.

Another rather strange moment is when a neighbour asks Kaveri-amma whether Mohan wants to take her back to make her work for him. The manner in which it is discussed is as though some maharani was being asked to do jhadoo-bartan. She is an uneducated village woman who had to live in an old people’s home and even Geeta brought her back to get some help. So, what is the big deal even if Mohan was taking her to be around the house and help?

Then the way in which Mohan manages to get electricity to the village just does not ring true. Again, no momentum is built up…no cricket team slowly starting from scratch, so to speak. Here he is given 100 people to work with him, they get some machinery going and bingo after one false start (where our hero dives in to remove some kachra that was stopping the flow) there is light. Even god would have taken longer.

Now, we must ask: where were the bureaucratic impediments that he had been railing against all the time?

Mohan decides to leave. And Melaram, the small dhaba owner who had wanted to start one such outlet in America and made all plans to go with him, suddenly decides that he cannot do so. He says he has what he has always wanted (was electricity his only problem?) and as he declares, “Why should the light from my house brighten my neighbour’s house?” So, what were all his ambitions about then? What brought about the sudden change? We don’t know, but it just sounds good, never mind that the United States of America will now live in darkness without his light.

Then there is the village school master, who talks about principles and Gandhian values. He is on his deathbed and tells Mohan, “Ab tum aa gaye ho tau main chain se ja sakta hoon” Huh? He had never raised questions about lack of electricity in the village, so why make this into an issue now? To score some points in heaven? Or to elevate a man to an idol?

This seems to be the premise of the film. Mohan Bhargav returns to the US and images of India keep flashing before his eyes. He wants to return and his superior, John, a White man, finally tells him, “Okay, go light your bulb”. Honestly, if this weren’t so cheesy, it would make one puke.

The cinematography does capture the expanse of open spaces well, although the art direction is a bit staged. The colours used are reminiscent of ‘Lagaan’. The music by A.R.Rahman is a major disappointment and there are too many songs at the wrong moments. The performances are strictly in keeping with caricatures. Except for the postman and Melaram who display some life, the rest are just about ok. Gayatri Joshi as Geeta has one expression – a mix of L’Oreal cosmetics trying to meet Body Shop ethics. She is a walkie-talkie advertisement for branded idealism. Shahrukh Khan’s usual problem is that he plays Shahrukh Khan. This time round he does not even do that – it is worse. He tries to underplay, which is like getting a hurricane to stand still. So, whenever he gets an opportunity, he starts his jerky-shivery antics.

He gets it best when he takes over during a break in a film show and teaches these poor villagers how they should look at the stars in the sky…make patterns of them and they will become powerful images. Wonder why then he ought to get sole credit for bringing bijli in Charanpur.

The final scene shows him in a wrestling match with the postman, who is trained in kushti. Mohan Bhargav, NRI now returned to roots, wins. He has even soiled his body with the mud on the ground and cleans it in the river which might be polluted. But he is the victor. He saves all, he cleans all.

‘Swades’ is a slap on the face of any self-respecting Indian.

- Farzana Versey