Skip to main content

Relevance Etched in Stone

Top post on IndiBlogger, the biggest community of Indian Bloggers


By Jaideep Sen

It’s often said that good writing can stand the test of time. Its power and relevance can shine through decades later. This thought struck me like a double whammy in the context of the masterful works of Salim Saab and his erstwhile writing partner Javed Akhtar Saab. 


Amitabh Bachchan in Zanjeer
Recently I watched a TV show, where a boy has a nightmare and gets up with a start, in a scene that is reminiscent of the introduction of the adult Vijay in Zanjeer, the film that set off Mr.Amitabh Bachchan on his unending journey of super stardom. It struck me that almost all of Salim Saab and Javed Saab’s writing have helped to create the ‘immortal’ persona for Mr. Bachchan and set him up for till now unseen success.  


Dharmendra in Sholay
The second instance was when later, on the same day,  I watched and heard the hook-line lyrics of a song from the soon to be released Super 30“Basanti, No dance in front of these dogs” – which has been interpreted from the epic Sholay’s memorable dialogue:  Basanti, in kutton ke samne mat nachna.


Two examples in one day have only reinforced my firm belief that the most memorable creative work that has happened in not just Hindi but Indian Cinema has flowed not only from the nib of Salim Saab-Javed Saab’s pen but also from Salim Saab’s individual and independent fertile imagination. 

Sunjay Dutt in Naam
In the recently released super hit,  Simmba,  there is a scene which harks back to one of the most powerful sequences from Naam, filmed on Sanjay Dutt, to underline the brave qualities of a Hero. In Simmba, the same has been reinterpreted to establish the daredevil attitude of the teenager Simmba.


Am still wonder struck that Salim Saab’s Naam which was released in 1986 continues to inspire after all these years. Salim Saab’s Writing has left such permanent footprints on Indian Cinema’s psyche that at a time when we forget entire films within 30 minutes of viewing – and sometimes even 30 seconds – his writing finds resonance  after  32 years (Naam) as in the case of Simmba and his work with Javed Saab (Sholay) after 44 years in the case of Super 30!

Such is the relevance of the Maestros of Writing – one that is forever etched in stone.

Jaideep Sen is a filmmaker and a connoisseur of the art of storytelling. 


Read some of his earlier pieces in this series here...






Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Basu Chatterji's "Balcony Class" Films

Basu Chatterji's Rajnigandha was like a breath of fresh air in the 1970s film universe of Bombay. At a time when the Angry Young Man was beginning to dominate celluloid screens, Amol Palekar was as un-hero-like as you could get. He was the Common Man who traveled in buses, did not have hero-like mannerisms and did not breathe fire and brimstone at his opponents. Basu Chatterji's Middle of the Road Cinema burst on to the scene and surprised the movie-going audience with its everyday situations and storylines that had an undercurrent of humour. Chatterji catered to an audience that he liked to call the "Balcony Class".  Anirudha Bhattacharjee, author of Basu Chatterji and Middle-of-the-Road Cinema writes an entertaining and heartwarming account of the life and work of Basu Chatterji, one of the most under-rated directors of Indian cinema. Recall of Chatterji's brand of feel-good, slice-of-life movies is perhaps highest for his Rajnigandha, Chotisi Baat, Baaton Baa...

Facing my fear - one Pitch at a time

Pitching makes me freeze up. In fact, the very thought of it makes me wanna run away.  For a screenwriter that's simply bad news. Because no matter what, if you want to get your stories out of your computer and hit the big screens, then you need to get comfortable with selling your story to potential producers and studios. And the first step in that journey is pitching.  My fear of pitching has prodded me to find different ways of overcoming the hurdle. So, for a few years I tried to work with agents in the hope that they would read my book and be able to handle the job of pitching. But soon I realized that agents were not into reading. So, I was just another name in their long list of clients. How that helps them grow their business is a different story, and one that I will perhaps share at a later point when I get around to solving that mystery! But the turning point (life does imitate screenplays!) came when I was called to pitch my book to a prominent OTT channel. This was...

Marching in the Dark - a true story of grit and resilience

  "Nothing can dim the light that shines from within." I was reminded of this quote by Mary Angelou as I watched Kinshuk Surjan's documentary feature film titled "Marching in the Dark" . The film is an evocative tribute to the widows of Marathwada who have survived the suicides of their husbands - the men driven to despair and eventually death after years of failing harvests, rising debts and the cruel play of climate change.  Surjan introduces us to Sanjeevani, an every woman who is not anyone's idea of a hero. If anything she is a victim - of her circumstances, of the unfair deal that she has got in life and of a male-oriented world that she is part of. But she has a quiet strength to her that is evident from the first time we meet her. She is grappling with grief and the burden of raising two small children after the suicide of her husband. She is a breadwinner as well as a homemaker. She works in her brother-in-law's farm who has given her family sh...