Lagaan: Once Upon a Time
in India
Reviewed by Anabela Voi You
Director: Ashutosh Gowariker
Music: A.R. Rahman; Lyrics: Javed Akhtar
Year: 2001
Running Time: An eternity or around 350 billion
minutes.
After seeing Lagaan on many Bollywood’s “must-see”
lists and hearing about its praise in general, I had a hard time trying
to warm up to it. I can see the technical and artistic merit of this film
– the idea is original and the scriptwriting was excellent. However, I
found the momentum and energy lacking in the film. Perhaps because the
characters in the story were flat, myopic, and uncomplicated, the movie’s
total focus was on the cricket competition, barring the viewer from getting
too emotionally involved in the experience of the characters. I don’t know
if I or Lagaan was the problem, but I was not thrilled with it. At times
the boredom was so sedative that I caught my mind wandering into another
galaxy.
Lagaan is a simple film, nothing to it. (Insert
inner voice expletive: I am dying of boredom). Rather boring, though you
wonder where all these European extras came from. They probably hail from
some backpacker hostel of joint-inhaling kids somewhere in Delhi. You sort
of guessed that the flick was going to be a snoozer once the Academy Oscar
Hollywood people get to it. Of all the great movies these frozen yogurt-eating,
yoga contortionist wanna-bes of Southern California could have nominated
from Bollywood, they had to choose this one. Lagaan is at heart a good
film but I really wonder how Aamir Khan and crew came up with the idea
of combining a story on tax and cricket with a British versus Indian storyline.
With such a far-out and seemingly inconceivable idea, you’d think the product
would be surreal and nonsensical, but the movie couldn’t be more conventional
and mainstream. Don’t get me wrong – you might enjoy it if you’re into
cricket or tax evasion.
The film was nowhere near bad and indeed it could
be classified as a good to very good film. (Inner voice expletive: Trying
to be as objective as possible). The problem was that it lacked the typical
Bollywood charisma and energy, and obviously this is a subjective statement.
The storyline was well-written and clever, and the unlikely story of cricket
and tax was very well-portrayed in such a down-to-earth manner I couldn’t
believe it. The cricket competition was also well-depicted and choreographed.
Technically, I couldn’t complain about any glaring flaws regarding the
acting, the music, plot, cinematography, etc., because all these elements
were smoothly weaved into a classical cinematic symphony. The musical and
dance aspects of the film were nothing memorable, but to its advantage,
these numbers were performed under naturalistic lighting and in the outdoors
which evoked a feeling of pastoral beauty.
Just a bit of trivia: Rachel Shelley’s song-and-dance
routine was sung by playback singer Vasundhara Das, the bride caught with
another lover before her wedding in Monsoon Wedding. Mr. Aamir Khan is
considered one of the greatest technical actors in India in the ranks of
Shah Rukh Khan. I haven’t seen Aamir Khan’s other performances so I can’t
be the final judge of his acting, although Lagaan just didn’t convince
me he was all that. I hope to be corrected in the future, as talent is
rare. Aamir produced Lagaan and it became a huge success. He’s known to
hit the jackpot of gold with not several movies a year but with one or
two, quite unusual for the frantic Bollywood assembly line of movie-making.
The reason why Lagaan was unusually long even
for a Bollywood film is that it covered a cricket match of the Brits versus
Indians over a period of 3 days plus a quadra-love-angle, having simple
villagers learn the British sport in 3 months, and some ethnic-religious
conflicts/resolutions! (Inner voice expletive: Kill me now.) You knew the
Indians were going to win but the revolving door of British wins and losses
was well-done and kept the tension bubbling. (Inner voice expletive: Purple
stars, ocean moons, diamond cakes, my eyelids are drooping.) Contemporary
cinema doesn’t like black-and-white categorization, a.k.a. bad guys versus
good guys. One of the good guys is a Brit called Elizabeth, played by Rachel
Shelley, the sister of the villain. All the actors delivered good performances,
while I doubted Aamir Khan’s performance as Bhuvan, a simple farmer with
guts and determination. (Inner voice expletive: Botox face?). I can’t tell
the difference whether he’s being macho with minimum emoting or that stiffness
is his state of being.
I haven’t seen Aamir Khan in anything else but
he’s from a strong pedigree of Bollywood greats and has won several awards
for his acting including Lagaan. I’m surprised to be honest because he
appeared rather Zombie-esque rather than a young man containing all that
inner passion inside that is just waiting to burst out. Assessing acting
ability is an incredibly subjective activity, and although many praised
Anil Kapoor for winning Best Supporting Actor in Taal, I just don’t get
it. Maybe I have a different taste in acting styles, but the same thing
applies to Aamir Khan – I don’t get what the thunder is about. It’s “safe”
to do a little emoting from time to time; it justifies your acting school
fees.
The storyline is very simple: the villagers of
Champaner are about to be required to send in their taxes and most of their
produce to the Brits who plan to double their taxation. They are already
living in poverty and drought, so they protest further taxation. However,
the British villain Russell takes a gamble with the villagers: 1) If you
(villagers, symbolic of all India) beat us the (Brits, symbolic of evil
colonialism) in cricket, then you, not just your village but the entire
province, won’t get taxed (lagaan) for 3 years. The villagers have 3 months
to prepare. Well, the problem is the villagers don’t know how to play cricket
nor do they have the equipment. The villain’s angelic sister feels sorry
for the villagers and teaches them cricket.
Aamir Khan sets out to find the perfect players
for each tactical position of his cricket team – he even finds a lame boy
who has an unusual ability to throw spinning balls. He knows how to find
talent and utilize and maximize his players’ natural abilities. For example,
the village’s chicken farmer is extremely agile with catching fleeing chickens
and he was chosen to be the catcher. Of course, the whole film is a political
allegory that calls India to overlook its differences and unite – it wasn’t
hard to guess that when one of the Muslims in the movie came out and said,
“I don’t care about our religious differences, I just want to fight our
common enemy [the Brits]!”
Gracy Singh’s Gauri performed well as a village
girl in love and stands by her man in times of crisis. She exuded feminine
earthiness and vivacity. Despite being jealous of Rachel Shelley’s Elizabeth,
she stood by Bhuvan (Khan), putting love second to the fate of her nation
like a good, traditional woman would. Even when she was jealous she was
still adorable. Rachel Shelley’s Elizabeth was light, airy, angelic, and
her presence was lovely to behold. Rachel Shelley’s Bollywood red-clad,
song-and-dance routine was rather unnatural and made me feel a little embarrassed
for her, because somewhere in my twisted mind I can see Madhuri Dixit laughing
her ass off. Of course, there’s an annoying spy that blows all the secret
information to the villain, but the community accepts him back like the
prodigal son that has gone astray, further compounding the political message
that calls for unity.
One of the deleted scenes has a tribute (unintentionally,
I believe) to "The Usual Suspects" where Bhuvan and Elizabeth are trying
to find the spy-culprit. They made them stand in a line and say, “I’ve
been no use.” It is reminiscent of how the "God of Cookery" also had an
"Usual Suspects" moment. Lagaan’s version didn’t have much humor except
when the village mystic/oracle man screamed, “Disaster is on the way!”
In the deleted scenes, the superiors of Russell even made sure they would
go to the match so that there won’t be foul play, knowing how wicked their
underling is. The superiors enjoyed the cricket match, mouthing sportsmanlike
praises during highs and lows of the game. They were quite nice and pleasant
“chaps” who restrained Russell and put him into place though often enough.
Nobody knows what was the problem with Paul Blackthorne’s Russell, but
he probably suffered a major childhood or sexual crisis that resulted in
his being a total git of pomposity, vindictiveness, and despicability as
an adult. Although the boredom didn’t quite make me hemorrhage, I do have
enough distance to concede that Lagaan is a well-made, clever, and original
film as well as harboring enough content and quality to make it enjoyable.
Rating: 7.5