Superboys Of Malegaon Review: Must Watch

Superboys of Malegaon is a delight to watch, raves Deepa Gahlot.

Today, anyone with a cell phone can make a film but passion for cinema was tougher a few years ago.

When Faiza Ahmad Khan made her wonderful documentary, Supermen Of Malegaon, in 2008, it was the time of video technology that gave rise to video parlours in places where cinema reels could not reach, or scratched prints landed after doing the run of big city movie halls.

In the dusty, handloom centre of Malegaon, Nasir Shaikh achieved what nobody could have imagined -- he made films for the men (sadly, no women were allowed) of his town, with his friends as stars and supporters.

It has taken a while for this story about the love of moviemaking to reach mainstream Bollywood but it has finally made it with the film, Superboys Of Malegaon, directed by Reema Kagti, who co-wrote it with Varun Grover.

As a character in the film says to the fictionalised Nasir (played by Adarsh Gourav), he ensured a page for Malegaon in the history of Indian cinema.

Subsequently, similar amateur film enterprises sprung up in other towns too but it is Malegaon that has been immortalised on screen.

Kagti’s film begins in 1997.

Nasir’s dour brother, Nihal (Gyanendra Tripathi), runs a video parlour, which fuelled his cinephilia.

Disappointed that his audience does not appreciate Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton, Nasir tries to attract people by splicing action and comedy scenes from various films, only to have the cops raid the parlour for piracy.

Nasir decides to make his own films, with a small budget, his buddies as actors and a whole lot of ingenuity.

'If we can’t go to Mumbai,' he tells loyal friend Shafique (Shashank Arora), 'then we will have to bring Mumbai here.'

A local journalist and aspiring writer Farogue (Vineet Kumar Singh) is recruited to write a parody of Sholay, a wedding videographer Akram’s (Anuj Singh Duhan) camera is borrowed, a small-time stage dancer (Manjiri Pupala), with all the airs of a star, is recruited to play the female lead, Basmati (no local Muslim girl would be permitted to act), and Malegaon Ke Sholay is produced on a tiny budget.

The film earns back its investment many times over, and more such parodies are created.

Farogue tries his luck in Mumbai and all he has to show for it is a photograph with Javed Akhtar.

He is told nobody wants to see realistic films about the suffering of loom workers.

Back home, ego hassles break up the happy-go-lucky bunch of actors, and Nasir’s enterprise comes to a halt.

The video parlour is converted to a restaurant, Nasir gets married to a sympathetic woman (Muskkaan Jaferi), who understands his heartbreak over the loss of his beloved Mallika (Riddhi Kumar), wedded to a more suitable man.

Years later, a crisis in Shafique’s life brings the group together again, to make Superman Of Malegaon with him in the lead.

By 2010, there has been considerable evolution in computer technology and Nasir manages primitive special effects to make Shafique fly over Malegaon. This is the film Faiza Ahmad Khan captured in her documentary, and a lot of her visuals are recreated in the new feature film.

Kagti does not go deep into the economic or communal problems that affect Malegaon. Her film is about the love of cinema, the where-there-is-a-will power of creativity and the sheer joy of making movies.

But most of all, it is about the strong bonds of friendship.

The premiere of Superman Of Malegaon is a great, lump-in-the-throat scene, with priceless expressions from Shashank Arora and Adarsh Gourav.

The ensemble of new and known actors perform with such abandon that even the ridiculous scenes that they shoot are a delight to watch.

In an ideal world, Nasir Shaikh would have been invited to make films in Mumbai, failing that, at least Khan and Kagti have given him his due.