The Society for the Prevention of Abuse of Frida Kahlo Posters got in touch with me the other day. The call came from Mexico City and woman’s voice meant business. “Señor! Have yu seen this film playing in your city, this Bengalee film called…Aunty Heen?” Tacitly correcting her pronunciation, I replied that I had indeed seen the Bangla film Antaheen. “Well, there was a gross violation in the film, did yu notice it?” I had to admit that, yes, I could not but notice what she was referring to: yet another gratuitous mis-use of a printed reproduction of the work of the late, great Ms Kahlo in a context of extreme mediocrity. I was on the Society’s committee and I knew I was being asked to act; all of us on the committee had promised each other we would fight the trashy use of Kahlo’s work wherever we came across it in the world. “But, look, please,” I interjected, “I know some of the people who worked on the film, they meant no harm!” “Compañero, how can yu say this?” The woman’s tone touched a polar cap of despair and contempt, “’djyu know very well that all abusers are always, always great ‘lovers’ of Frida’s work, but this does not mean they can be allowed to get away with this!”

I tried explaining that the art director of the film had once made a very good film himself, one of the best Bangla feature films of the last 20 years, Kahini, with no trace of Frida-reproductionitis; I tried explaining that the scriptwriter of Kahini, besides being a good friend of mine, was also the scriptwriter for Antaheen, so, no matter what the final film, the script must have had some good things, including, possibly, a good reason for the Kahlo poster; I tried to provide mitigating context and social milieu, but I was interrupted.

“Do yu love this…Onto-hill film?” My comrade from the land of Pancho Villa was implacable. “Djyu yu know how much we sweat here in Meykhhiko?” I replied that by all reports Mexico City was a very sweaty place. “And djyu yu know that yu in Calcutta are closer to the ecuador than us in Mexico Ciddy?” The pollution of Mexico City and Calcutta co-mingling in my psychic lungs, I coughed assent, yes we were closer to the equator. “Then, por favor, amigo, tell me — why do people in that film sweat only in the gym or while playing squash? And why is there no one speck of dirt or grime in the entire film???” I kept silent for I had no answer. “How can a poster of Frida Kahlo repeatedly show up in a film like this? She was about going deeper into reality, even through her fantasies and dreams, she was sharp, like a knife! This…this film is like a hamburger from McDonald’s, in fact, it’s no even that, is like a picture of a chicken burger from McDonald’s!” I had to defend my people, so I interjected, “But look, it’s got some very good actors in it — Sharmila-di, Aparna-di, Rahul Bose, all very strong —” The woman snorted a Hispanic expletive, followed by “Actors! Yes, it has some strong actors, the mobile phones of one company, the computers net-connected by that same company, the financial schemes of again that very company, and these great human actors are all in reliance, I mean supporting, roles in this long advertisement! As is the poster of our beloved compañera Kahlo!” Desperate by now, I had to find a way of punching back. I tried a desperate but cunning gambit: “So, comrade, which Indian films do you like in Mexico?” I asked.

“Well, we thought Slumdog Millionaire was a very powerful story of the barrios of Mumb—” My machine-gun laughter slaughtered her sentence before she could finish it, but tough woman that she is, she came back at me, “Why you laugh? Are you offended like Salman Rushdie about this film?” I explained to her that a) it wasn’t an Indian film, and b) no, I wasn’t offended like Salmanfog Questionnaire; for instance, I had no problem with the ‘plausibility of the plot’ — from the moment the small boy dives into a potty-hole and comes out caked with faeces, from the moment this kid makes his ka-ka-covered way, unchecked through a crowd and into A. Bachchan’s presence, from the point where he actually scores an autograph from the B-man, the whole film itself becomes inundated in implausible shit and all expectations of ‘plot’ and ‘characterization’ get flushed down the toilet. “Since you mentioned virtual hamburgers,” I said with relish, “you should realize this whole enchilada was loaded with very real merda.” As my co-member fell quiet, I listed all the things wrong with Slamdunk Millionaire, the stupidity not so much of the plot as the vision of the director, the faecal slickness of ticking off, one by one, all the sensationally ‘horrifying’ things about Bombay and India without even a wind-release of insight, the stale music, the bad acting, and, throughout, the turd-parade of clichés.

“You wrote somewhere that you hated Meera Nair’s Salaam Bombay. Does this film give you the same kind of feeling?” Mexico Lady was now curious. I tried to explain: No, the difference is with Salaamdog Bombay we had a nominally Indian film-maker pimping local clichés for Western consumption whereas here it’s a Brit tourist collecting those cliches, and the result is quite different: with Salaamdog you could see the corpse of a really good, really truthful film lying dead under the thing you were watching and it made you angry, whereas here, with SdM, there was nothing but superficial absurdity to start with, and that just leads to hilarity. “By ghost of a good film, do you mean the Brazilian film Pixote?” No, I mean a really good Indian film which doesn’t plagiarise from any other film. “Aah, claro…so what about one of your favourites — Ciudade de Joya — I mean City of Joy?” I began to enjoy myself: I explained to the señora compañera that this film was indeed a classic of its genre, which consists of Hollywood stars performing before an exotic backdrop; it’s also a classic in the sense that rarely has a film caused so much upheaval and sensation during its making before disappearing completely from minds and video-stores; I explained how much pleasure and Schadenfreude I felt every time I thought of CoJ. “What-freud? Cómo?” The pleasure that comes from watching disaster befalling others, I explained, a German word but designed, it seems, specifically for Indians and even more so for Calcuttans. “Why?” asked my interlocutor and I put to her that perhaps Antaheen could be seen as a riposte to City of Joy: you gave us a film shot in Calcutta in which we couldn’t recognize our city, so here is our film shot in Calcutta and you won’t recognize the city in this one either, but in a different way!

“That’s still no excuse for the misuse of Compañera Kahlo’s poster! But, so, tell me, you say you can’t recognize Calcutta in City of Joy or Antaheen, and same with Mum — Bombay in Slumdog Millionaire, yes? So what about this new film by Anurag Kashyap, Dev D? Do you recognize in it Delhi?” “Dev D? Oh, you mean Millionaire Slumdog?” I asked. “Pardon? What?” I remained patient: Dev D is a film in which a millionaire scion becomes a dog of the slums, isn’t it? “Ah! Okay! Si!” Well, yes, it’s a much better film than any of these others, but again, if you take Delhi as a state of mind rather than a place, DD/Mill-S-d catches a certain Delhi beautifully, but much better in the sequences set outside Delhi. As compared to something like Dilli 6, which drops you deep into a vat of fake Old Delhi. “So between this Dilli 6 and On to Him which do you prefer?” This was easy: oh, no question, the music is much better in Dilli 6 and…there are no Frida Kahlo posters!

“Compañero, let’s get back to the matter at hand!” I knew I was trapped and I knew I had to find a way out of having to chase after the producers of Anta-hill who, if not friends, might turn out to be friends of friends. “Señora, one question,” I said softly, “as a philosopher of the arts, what do you think? You know that old saying, people get the leaders they deserve?” “Si….so?” “Well, don’t you think people also get the cinema they deserve?” “Maybe…” “So, if in the middle of two hours of not being able to recognize your own city on the screen, maybe we in Calcutta deserve, from time to time, to see a wonderful self-portrait of Frida, which is something many of us do recognize.”