AAMIR KHAN SAYS IT WITH HIS EYES IN THIS SHE FILM THAT WILL MAKE YOU STAND THE TALLEST AND FEEL THE PROUDEST'
DANGAL (U)
Director: Nitesh Tiwari
Cast: Aamir Khan, Sakshi Tanwar, Fatima Sana Shaikh, Sanya Malhotra, Zaira Wasim,
Suhani Bhatnagar, Aparshakti Khurana, Girish Kulkarni
Running time: 161 minutes
It was a night show at Priya in end-June back in 2001, when for the first time I had seen a movie theatre turn into a cricket stadium with every run being cheered and clapped right till the winning hoik. More than 15 years later, the audience at the packed morning show of a Mumbai multiplex, were similarly jumping up and down in their seats. For a wrestling match!
While the exuberance and the ecstasy seemed to have been born out of the same place, there’s absolutely nothing common between Lagaan and Dangal besides them being sports films. Then, 11 men from a fictional Indian village were playing a game of cricket against the British. Now, based on a true story, one Indian girl is fighting the system and herself to win the first gold for her country in women’s wrestling at the Commonwealth Games.
The one little common link, though, has made all the difference. Aamir Khan, who had stroked that final six for Champaner and hit his first home production out of the park, has again put his (rippling) muscles behind a film that makes you laugh and cry in joy, that sends out all the right messages and that makes you so proud to be an Indian.
Aamir plays Mahavir Singh Phogat, a national wrestling champion from Balali in Haryana, whose dreams of winning gold for his country evaporated when he was forced by lack of money to take up a job. He hoped to pass on the baton to his son but despite his and his wife’s (Sakshi Tanwar) best intentions, they become parents to four daughters. Only when Mahavir sees his two elder ones beat the tar out of a couple of neighbourhood boys, he decides to channel his ambitions into turning his daughters Geeta and Babita into wrestling champions.
That’s just the first act of Dangal setting the akhara for the training of the two girls and the transformation of the father into “Hanikarak Bapu” — no junk food, no recreation of any kind, hair cropped short and endless hours of running and wrestling — reminiscent of the tyrannical sports dads who would go to any length to see their kids win. Like Steffi Graf’s father Peter was dubbed “Papa Merciless” or Andre Agassi’s father “Mad Mike”. In his defence, Mahavir has one of the film’s best lines: “Ek waqat mein, main uska guru ho sakta hoon ya uska baap.”
The young bodies ache and all of Balali laughs, but as soon as Geeta starts taking down bigger boys in local wrestling tournaments, the Phogats are in business. Thus rolls the winning juggernaut which would not stop till she becomes the national champion. And it is here that we enter Foxcatcher zone with the resident coach (Girish Kulkarni) at the National Sports Academy in Patiala making Geeta unlearn everything Mahavir taught her and concentrate more on technique.
Taking in the big city, Geeta also starts looking at the mirror much more often as the hair grows back, pani puris pop back in the mouth and movies become a regular affair, starting with SRK going “palat” in DDLJ. The younger wrestler daughter Babita, who’s always played second fiddle to Geeta, decides to continue under Mahavir’s training. And just when you are certain that the two sisters will have a showdown in the ring, a phone call changes everything and propels Dangal to the big last act.
The film’s biggest strengths are the writing (director Nitesh Tiwari plus Piyush Gupta, Shreyas Jain and Nikhil Mehrotra) and the casting (Mukesh Chhabra). Despite the very serious themes of gender equality and empowerment and the father vs coach conundrum, Dangal has an infectious light-handed tone that keeps you smiling and chuckling right through the two-and-a-half hours. That is when you are not wiping your tears at the emotionally charged father-daughter moments.
Populating the film with new faces (Fatima Sana Shaikh and Zaira Wasim as Geeta big and small, Sanya Malhotra and Suhani Bhatnagar as Babita big and small, Aparshakti Khurana and Ritwik Sahore as “close cousin” Omkar big and small) is a masterstroke, giving the performances a raw edge which work so well for the characters. Yes, some of the politics in the film is oversimplified, some of the plotting a tad too spoonfed but that’s really nitpicking a fine narrative.
And what does one say about Aamir the actor? I have been fat all my life but how does a man who put on 22kg just for the role get the body language of an overweight man so right? Watch the scene where his daughter pummels him to the ground and he physically struggles to keep up. Compared to his screen time, Aamir has very few lines in the film because his eyes convey so much more than his dialogues in that Haryanvi dialect. Like in that all-important phone-call scene in the second half where he doesn’t say a single word and yet turns the film around. This is clearly the best performance of the year alongside Manoj Bajpayee in Aligarh.
The national anthem will play twice in every screening of Dangal. The first time is the mandatory pre-show playback and the second time towards the end within the film. And it is that second time when you will really stand the tallest and feel the proudest. I don’t know about you, but I am going back a second time for another round of Phogat & Daughters.
Pratim D. Gupta
Dangal is the movie of the year for me because.... Tell t2@abp.in
