For many, Bollywood is a lost cause. An industry beyond redemption. Even the few decent works which form a part of Indian cinema cannot be tagged as films belonging to ‘Bollywood’ per se. On similar lines, Irrfan Khan’s son, Babil Khan took to Instagram to provide Indian audiences with a reality check. It is perfectly fine to question and even lambast scions of Bollywood and their parents, and those who have facilitated the consolidation of a cult-like nepotistic industry in Mumbai. However, the buck stops, after all, with us, the audiences. And we have been ignorant, and far too accepting when it comes to cheap Bollywood trash being paraded around as “work of art”.
Irrfan Khan told his son that he would need to prove himself abroad, while studying films, as Bollywood was considered not a serious topic of deliberations among those who knew films. Babil, taking to Instagram, wrote, “Bollywood was not respected, no awareness of 60s’ – 90s’ Indian cinema or credibility of opinion. There was literally one single lecture in the world cinema segment about Indian cinema called ‘Bollywood and Beyond’, that too gone through in a class full of chuckles. It was tough to even get a sensible conversation about the real Indian cinema of Satyajit Ray and K Asif going. You know why that is? Because we, as the Indian audience, refused to evolve.” Irrfan also told his son to inform people around him about Indian cinema which is above and beyond Bollywood.
That Irrfan Khan shone in Indian cinema like a guiding light for others is a fact known to all. The man picked the choicest of films, which would impact the audiences. Each time, he left his fans awestruck and immortalised the character he played. Yet, Babil revealed how his father was defeated by people who gathered audiences solely on the basis of their bodies. “My father gave his life trying to elevate the art of acting in the adverse conditions of noughties Bollywood and alas, for almost all of his journey, was defeated at the box office by hunks with six pack abs delivering theatrical one-liners and defying the laws of physics and reality, photoshopped item songs, just blatant sexism and same-old conventional representations of patriarchy (and you must understand, to be defeated at the box office means that majority of the investment in Bollywood would be going to the winners, engulfing us in a vicious circle).”
With every film, Irrfan Khan stunned the audience. An audience which had been deprived of quality and classy acting suddenly found a messiah in Irrfan Khan. Such was the man’s dedication to the art, that he completed the shoot of the film Angrezi Medium despite battling the rare neuroendocrinal tumour. But this audience does not form the bulk of Bollywood’s audiences. A majority of Indians, unfortunately, are still diehard fans of the usual ‘superstars’ and their joke of performances. This has led to the maintenance of a cheap status-quo in Bollywood, and the purpose of cinema has been defeated in India perhaps like in no other country. As such, while we can go on until eternity questioning the industry, there is also a growing need to address the fanfare and devotion of Indians to ‘superstars’ who have taken it upon themselves to make Indian cinema the clown of the world. Truly, if people have no qualms about watching actors disregard the laws of physics and reality in their performances, a bulk of the problem lies with the audience as well.