Retro Reel by Sreepathy, Volume 20

Retro Reel is a column about movies — not the latest box-office releases, but a retrospective recommendation of good films of different genres. Sreepathy is an unabashed movie buff who loves a well-told onscreen story. He has a list of about 450 must-watch movies, and this column is an attempt to share some of his best movie-watching experiences. He lives in Naperville with his wife and two sons.

Real to Reel to Real Life (Part 2 of 2): Is Raat Ki Subah Nahin

If you haven't read Part 1 yet — The Story Thus Far

The movie with my name on it

Now that the name of the movie is out of the bag, let me start Part 2 with the results of the guessing game from Part 1. Many of you made interesting guesses about the movie's name and about why I froze a second time (was it because the thug at the ticket counter was starring in the movie?). But only two people guessed it right: my sister Rukmini in Hyderabad — and believe me, I had kept that horror story under wraps with my family till Part 1 was published, to avoid alarming them — and my good friend Gopal in Naperville. I will not paraphrase him; here is his email in its entirety:

"Dear Sreepathy: I could not sleep till the morning (no pun intended) and the night seemed endless and it seemed as though morning never would come — until a friend helped me out! Your real life story and the movie story... Awesome parallel! Thanks for the mystery."

Gopal couldn't have done any better than by unlocking the mystery with a mystery response!

What are the odds?

Back to the story. I froze, and sweat trickled again. Because — what are the odds that you pick a movie completely at random, go to the theater, and experience an incident that numbs your whole being, only to discover that the central character in that random movie goes through an incident eerily similar to what happened to you just minutes ago? Being the wrong man at the wrong place at the wrong time, in front of the wrong man. Every once in a while, an incident like this makes the cliché "life is stranger than fiction" come alive.

But hold on — Is Raat Ki Subah Nahin (1996) was inspired by a true story! And so it came full circle: a story went from real life onto celluloid, and then came back to bite me in real life.

One night in the seamy suburbs of Bombay

The entire narrative of IRKSN spans a single night, with two parallel storylines — one of mafia rivalry, one of marital rivalry. Minions of Don Ramanbhai's gang use brutal methods to placate their boss's anger and ego by going after a disloyal member, Vilas. Every exchange between Ramanbhai's mafiosi and Vilas becomes a display of naked power and perfidy.

Unconnected with all this is Aditya, a middle-class ad executive, whose wife is livid about his affair with a singer. She throws him out of the house. He goes to a bar for a drink, and keeps trying to placate her on the public phone. In one of those calamitous coincidences, Ramanbhai and his flunkies are right there in that very bar on that very evening.

Inevitably, the dreaded moment arrives. Even as Aditya is frantically trying to talk to his wife on the phone, one of Ramanbhai's men wants the phone too. A scuffle ensues, and Aditya pushes Ramanbhai to the ground — without knowing who he is. The don falls not just on the ground, but in front of a couple of rival gang members. From where his ego has fallen, Ramanbhai has only one way to redeem it: revenge. And when Aditya realizes what he has done, he does the only thing he can: run.

The true story behind the reel

The story of IRKSN was written by Sudhir Mishra's brother, Sudhanshu Mishra, who died in 1995. Sudhir has said the plot grew out of a real incident: in the mid-eighties, Sudhanshu slapped a man who was misbehaving outside the Pune Film Institute gates; the man turned out to be a gangster, and Sudhanshu "went through 2 days of hell." Real to reel to real life — and as for me, I am thankful that life's lucky turns ensured there was no catalyst to spiral things out of control during my own contretemps at the ticket counter.

Writing that sizzles

From the chase, IRKSN's plot gallops through superbly written vignettes and action-driven subplots, ending at the stroke of dawn with a one-on-one showdown between the middle-class man and the mafia kingpin. In a first-of-its-kind thriller in Hindi cinema, the movie keeps you on the edge of your seat with its action while engaging you with lively dialogue. It reminds me of the more recent Delhi Belly (2011), whose writing sizzles with brilliant plot sequences. IRKSN cleverly weaves polished humor and wit even into a story populated by underworld characters — no surprise from Sudhir Mishra, who co-wrote the all-time great Hindi satire Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron (1983).

Back in 1996, Mishra was largely unknown, but he had already written compelling scripts like Mohan Joshi Hazir Ho! (1984) and Dharavi (1992). He went on to make such thoughtful films as Hazaaron Khwaishein Aisi (2003) — in my opinion, the best Hindi movie set against a historic political milieu — and Khoya Khoya Chand (2007), a passionate pastiche of the 1950s–60s Hindi film industry.

The music and the faces

The background song Jeevan kya hai, koyi na jaane flows through the entire movie, rooting the surprise hidden in each of life's myriad moments. The screenplay segues the other songs in so seamlessly that, unlike most Hindi films, you never wonder, "Where the heck did that come from!"

The credits feature names that were completely unknown then, starting with the director. But the film unearthed a lot of talent: Nirmal Pandey as Aditya; Tara Deshpande as his wife Pooja; Smriti Mishra as the mistress Malvika; Saurabh Shukla as Vilas; and above all, Ashish Vidyarthi as the mafia don Ramanbhai — all superb actors. And for the music, plaudits go to M. M. Kreem, the South Indian music director also known by his original name, M. M. Keeravani.

Lastly, I was so struck by the movie that I took my wife the very next day to Sapna to see it again. Though this time, I should confess, I asked her to buy the tickets from the counter...