‘Stanley Ka Dabba’ in Kerala…

Sharaz, our php programmer, is one of those guys with whom I like going for movies. The most important reason being that he sees movies sans presumptions and is tolerant enough to like almost all kinds of films.
Yesterday he and I went for a movie, ‘Stanley Ka Dabba’, which I bet many of our colleagues here at Karmakerala wouldn’t even have heard of. The film is directed by Amol Gupte, who has put in a good performance in the recently-released Malayalam film ‘Urumi’ too. Amol Gupte is not a popular Bollywood actor, but he is an actor worth reckoning. He was the Creative Director for Aamir Khan’s ‘Taare Zameen Par’ and had given a notable performance in ‘Kaminey’. So now, it was time for us to relish Amol Gupte’s directorial venture.
We had Dosa and Omelette at MK Bakers, guys who keep us going at Karmakerala by bringing us tea and snacks on sleepy afternoons (Hope our bosses are not reading this!) (an it was drizzling as Sharaz rode us to the Oberon Cinemax Multiplex. We were on time; got in and seated just as the titles were coming to an end.
What followed for the next two hours was magic, magic on screen. It is the story of a boy called Stanley (played by Amol’s son Partho) who comes to school daily without his ‘Dabba’ (lunch box). There are some other characters who seemed to be taken right out of life and planted there, on the screen. Most notable one among these is the Hindi teacher, Babubhai Verma (played by Amol Gupte himself), a guy who is crazy after food and always goes after students to share their meals. There is also the Science teacher Mrs.Iyer (Divya Jagdale) and the English teacher Ms. Rosy (Divya Dutta) who stand out. The story, simple and straight, moves on to a climax that I won’t like to speak about here; if at all you are rendered curious, go and watch the movie and find out. We need to watch and encourage such movies.
The movie reminded me, to a great extent, of New Wave Iranian movies, those by Mohsen Makhmalbaf, Abbas Kiarostami, Majid Majidi etc. I was wondering yesterday why such movies were not happening here in Kerala; but then I remembered having seen one such movie last year in Malayalam- ‘T.D.Dasan Std VI B’, a film that reminded me of those simple, straight-from-the-heart Iranian movies. But when these films get released, people just turn their backs on them. Hey, striking indeed, that even those who circulate pirated cds of movies here in Kerala (they are very much there, in Kerala, pirated cds of the latest movies, contributing greatly to dealing deadly blows to the film industry) turn their backs on such movies. We still go after the usual star oriented, predictable and mostly mundane kind of film that cinema elsewhere seem to be growing out of. There are so many innovatively different movies coming up in Hindi and Tamil; Sharaz and I were thrilled on seeing ‘Chalo Dilli’ (Hindi) and liked ‘Vaanam’ (Tamil). Hope things will change for Malayalam Cinema too; there are some signs of this happening here too. Let’s hope for the best…
Two things that I’d like to add as sort of post-script here…

• This is what Sharaz had to say after seeing the movie- “I had always wanted to do something in films. But my thoughts were always high-flying, like making a movie with all kinds of special effects, something like ‘Matrix’ or something that would leave people spellbound. I’d think of the kind of films that Shah Rukh Khan, my favourite star, does. But ‘Stanley Ka Dabba’ is the kind of film that never featured in my imaginations. The film made me realise that we need not think big and go for big things to make movies; we can take things from our lives, from our experiences and make wonderfully different movies. I have come to realise that even small, ordinary things from day-to-day life can contribute towards making films that are really ‘big’. I was able to identify with Stanley and what all was happening there, in the school. I was touched by the message the film conveys in the end. I also have come to understand that if creative artists strive to narrate personal experiences in their personal style, it would be the best of things that can happen to art and cinema”.

• Our boss Sholto was narrating a story, an interesting story yesterday. He’d love to see it made into a cinema. He was commenting that Indian Cinema is still centered around the stars, the likes of Shah Rukh Khan and Mammootty and Mohanlal. Well I do agree to that; but at the same time, I am happy that films like ‘Stanley Ka Dabba‘ are happening… Great indeed!