As a student, I'd make a point of watching every single film playing in my city, without ever having to worry that I was wasting my time. I had too much of it. Spending a whole day flitting between screens, from one dreadful Punjabi comedy to another tasteless Tamil masala film was an important ritual for me. I didn't enjoy the films, but I was learning. Learning what makes a bad film so bad. Learning about the defining tropes, technical and thematic, that define different regional film cultures. Learning by thinking about what I'd do differently if the same script landed in my director's chair. I justified what was essentially a huge waste of time by imagining that I was tracing the evolution of popular South Asian cinema - it's not like anyone else was willing to sit through Pattathu Yaanai for the same cause - and that one day when I sat down to make my masterpiece, or write an epic thesis, it would all come in very handy.
I'm yet to find out if I was right or not, but for the time being my mission has ground to a halt. I have a job. Time has run out. It's become currency and this has changed my viewing habits totally. I still endeavour to watch all the important films, whether they tickle my particular fancy or not, but I now refuse for example, to buy a ticket for Vadivelu's Eli or sit through any of the hundreds of crude Khalistani propagandas that release all-too-often, where I once would have gladly lapped them up under the pretence that they were important cultural documents. But then sometimes you don't know which are the importantfilms. Prior to Bin Roye, I'd seen a number of Pakistani movies, the vast majority of them being the exact type of thing that would make an evening away from your 9-to-5 feel wasted. When you're not at your desk, you want cinema to make you live, not merely observe, and definitely not yawn. But Pakistan doesn't yet have a defined cinema culture. The film criticism isn't analytical, it can't be trusted, and the vocabulary of the craft isn't yet characterised enough for a discerning viewer like me to figure out if a film is worth watching or not simply from skimming the promo material or looking over the production credits. So I gave this a chance. It was Eid, it seemed to be running well in the theatres, and I hadn't watched a movie in a while. But I was still pretty sure it would suck.
It's been seven days since I saw it, and I still haven't decided if I was right or not.
In terms of film-making, Bin Roye is amateur. The staging is flat, scant regard is paid to the logic of space and movement, and the script is riddled with incoherent melodrama and unnecessary clich. There are car crashes and some long-lost siblings; all it needs is some amnesia and a double role. I recall being bored numerous times. These twists and turns in the drama distract your emotional investment in thereal story - the emotions of the characters. There is a juicy concept at the film's core - the love of your life chooses to marry someone over you, but then through a twist of fate is left with no choice but to end up with you regardless. Do you rejoice, finally fulfilling your lifelong desires, or do you admit to yourself that you are second best, a charity case, a logistical necessity? These interesting psychological questions are not explored in the detail that a real writer/director could have given them, and the film is mired down in ridiculousness. This is the feeling I left the cinema with. Along with some slight relief it was over.
But over the coming minutes, hours and days, I began to miss these characters and their world. The production design is gorgeous (if not a little too reminiscent ofAsian Bride magazine), all candy colours and glitter and tinkling fountains of warm rose-petalled water. The idealistic scenes of everyday family life amidst teeming street markets and hazy traffic jams are strangely evocative. This is old fashioned Bollywood-esque film-making taking advantage of digital technology in quite a lovely way. To experience the broad strokes of tragic romantic melodrama painted against such a sumptuous canvas was something I truly enjoyed.
But then surely that makes the film superficial? The cinematography itself lends nothing to the proceedings, its essentially theatrical - a very expensive looking television soap opera. All the sets and locations are doing is distracting from this. Right?
I am now inclined to disagree. It is to the credit of the emerging Pakistani film industry that it has not aggressively "nationalised" itself in the way Punjabi cinema has. The locality of the film is subtle and natural. Islam is an important way of life for these characters, but it never defines them. They are human beings before they are Muslims or Pakistanis, while still firmly rooted in their traditions. The mood of reverence as the family and the city around them prepares for Eid is palpable, and a scene of family and friends catching up at a Masjid shows the community of prayer and faith in a remarkably human light. In a week whereBajrangi Bhaijaan shoved it down our throats (wholly necessarily if I might add) that we are all essentially the same, Bin Roye does the same without even trying. The film just has a vibe.
Then there is the star of the show - Mahira Khan. Her character is an undeniable brat, and could have easily have been a total annoyance, but she manages to pull it off. A pre-interval scene where she breaks down seeing her lover get married is terrific. The handheld camera takes in her performance with the stillness it deserves. This is frenzied, hysterical melodrama, reminiscent most recently of Deepika Padukone in Cocktail. Likewise, her expression as she witnesses a fatal accident that she believes was caused by her nazar alone is stunning. Fear, regret and hatred. She is at once remembering the past, shocked by the present and contemplative of the future, and it's all in her eyes. Perhaps its just that her type of perfect gori face and bee-stung lips in an eternal pout are more often seen in vapid item songs and cosmetics adverts than smashing vases in a heartbroken tantrum behind closed doors and baring the pain of human longing. Maybe its this incongruity, as it was with Deepika who pulled aperfromance suddenly out of the bag when we were so used to seeing her doing absolutely nothing with her face. Or maybe Mahira is just a brilliant actress. If it wasn't for her, I may never have even noticed that this is a film about women, their assigned domesticity, their lack of choice in carving their own destinies even within their predetermined roles, and just what it feels like to be forced to live through this crap and still be expected to put on a brave face. Quite remarkable for a movie from the national film industry of a territory defined by its "fundamentalism".
I googled Mahira (and no, I didn't add the infamous Desi-unlcle suffix of "hot pics") and discovered she represents something of a minor cultural movement, in the same way Vidya Balan came to embody a certain type of female role a few years back, and Kangna Ranaut seems to be doing now. I'd heard of Humsafar before, and was aware that it began a resurgence in Pakistani TV dramas. I watched a few episodes and got hooked. I skimmed through some other of Mahira's TV projects (the most interesting being the slightly mystical Shehr-e-Zaat) and noticed a stylistic trend. Mahira is the centrepiece of each, and while Indian TV soaps also focus on the domestic woman, holding a mirror to the lives of their target audience, these Pakistani counterparts have an added depth. Perhaps its something to do with the fact that they have fixed story arcs(Iss Pyaar Ko Kya Naam Doon ran for 398 daily episodes, Humsafar for just 23) or that much of the action takes place in view of the outside world, not on closed artificial sets. Either way, these shows transcend being soaps and become dramas. And like the movie I'd just seen, the twisty-turny plots were uninspiring, but the small everyday details of the character's lives, the vivid personality of their surroundings, and the quiet and stillness that lurked between spurts of melodrama left me craving more. It's all in the after-taste.
So the more I chose to see Bin Roye less in the context of Pakistani cinema and more as an extension of the new-age small screen Pakistani female drama and Mahira Khan's on-screen persona as its figurehead, the more interesting it became. It did have a visual vocabulary, it did have cultural reference points, and it most certainly fits into a canon of popular art, celebrating its past and developing its future. So I guess I was right all along! My mission had a purpose. I yawned my way through an unsatisfying cinematic experience, but walked away with an appreciation for a whole history. Not a waste of time at all.
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