If we take a look at our recent trend of Indian movies, we can easily pick out new wave of historical movies based on India’s independence war against British – Ketan Mehta’s Mangal Panday, Shyam Benegal’s Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose: The Forgotten Hero, and Rajkumar Santoshi’s TLOBS (The Legend of Bhagat Singh) are standouts. Among them TLOBS is one of the most realistically treated, historical facts based, widely released movie. Most surprising note is best movie made on India’s independence war genre is made by outsider, Richard Attenborough’s Gandhi in 1982 won an Oscar for that effort.
TLOBS portrays riveting biography of Bhagat Singh’s remarkable life during India’s independence war in early 20th century. TLOBS is the tribute to man who died at age 23 for free India and reminds us of Indian youth’s scarifies, courage, and selfishness for independence, equality, and secularism during those turbulent times.
Story
At age 12, young Bhagat Singh is distressed at incidents such as the horrific Jalianwala Baug massacre and other oppressive atrocities committed by the British. As a kid, he joins whole-heartedly in Gandhi’s non-cooperation movement of 1921. He later disillusioned by Gandhi’s philosophy of non-violence after Gandhi pulled back the non-cooperation movement after violent Chori-Chora incident.
At teenage age, He joins the revolutionaries and befriend with Sukhdev, Rajguru, and Chandrashekhar Azad. When the Simon Commission arrives to Lahore, he decided to join large gathering of non-violent freedom fighters, which is led by Lala Lajpatrai. Inspite of the non-violent protest, General Scott orders a lathi charge against the protestors and Lala Lajpatrai get killed. Bhagat Singh swears revenge and plots to kill Scott. However, their daring plan fails when they assassinate colonel Saunders instead. Bhagat Singh and his fellow revolutionist escape from Lahore to avoid arrest.
Meanwhile, with both Gandhi and Nehru denouncing them as extremists who are hindering the non-violent freedom struggle, Bhagat Singh now realizes that unless the revolutionaries’ point of view is publicized, they will never succeed in awakening the masses or driving their point home with the British.
He comes up with the ingenious plan of lobbing a hand grenade in the Assembly Hall, making sure not to hurt anyone but to generate publicity in the press. Also, he decides that whoever carries out this mission must give them up and continue to voice their opinions from jail and during the court case. Everything goes according to plan. The trio of Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev and Rajguru arrested and went from hunger strikes for sympathy and support from general public. They immediately become national heroes – even rivaling the popularity of Gandhi at that time.
British come down hard on the revolutionaries and arrest the entire group. Disturbed by Bhagat Singh’s popularity, the British then secretly execute the three revolutionaries later became headline news allover India.
Soundtrack
A.R.Rahman’s music gels really well with the proceedings and one of the best patriotic soundtracks came out from Hindi cinema. All patriotic songs are situational and well blended with the proceeding especially in first half - Desh Mere Desh Mere, Sukhwinder Singh’s Bhangra number - Pagdi Sambhal Jatta, Sonu Nigam’s Mera Rang De Basanti and Sarfaroshi Ki Tamanna. Most Interestingly my favorite number of the movie is only romantic duet in the film - Udit Narayan and Alka Yagnik’s Mahive Mahive.
Scenes and Screenplay
One of the best things happen to TLOBS is its Anjum Rajabali’s screenplay, which is true to its source and covers Bhagat Singh’s life with simplicity without taking cinematic liberty and distorting the facts. Ditto for Santoshi’s research and concentration on chronological events of Bhagat Singh’s life - childhood to death without deviating far into unnecessary commercial subplots.
TLOBS’s screenplay captivates viewers with the proceeding by dissolving one scene to another scene smoothly without making it overblown as commercial cinema or dull as documentary. Movie starts with dramatic horrible event of smuggling out three wrapped bodies from the prison, chopping, cremating, and disposing them into river prior to caught by group of revolutionaries. Then Santoshi takes us back in flashback and recreates all key events of Bhagat Singh’s life as revolutionist for next 2 and half hour gripping drama.
Even though most of all scenes and sequences are masterful, some of them are mesmerizing and will stay with you for along time – Jaliawala Baug massacre, train robbing sequence, Azad and Bhagat Singh’s first confrontation, Simon-Go-Back sequence, failed attempt to assassinate Scott, Bhagat Singh’s disguise at Lahore railway station, dropping bomb in parliament, hunger strike in jail, courtroom drama, and judge’s verdict to hang revolutionist in empty court.
Critics View
TLOBS scores in every department of movie making - convincing pre-independence ambience, Santoshi’s stylish storytelling, simple and steady paced narration, sepia and brown tinged toned cinematography for period ambience, perfect casting of Ajay Devgan as Bhagat Singh, powerful dialogues, and mesmerizing evocative background score.
Ajay Devgan is outstanding as Bhagat Singh. He portrays all facets of Bhagat Singh be it the turbulent teenager or fiery revolutionist. Since history failed to give us actual image of Bhagat Singh, Devgan is successful giving us human face of legendary figure of Bhagat Singh. He proved his versatility with Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam, Company, and TLOBS. Sushant Singh as Sukhdev, D.Santosh as Rajguru, Akhilendra Mishra as Chandrashekhar Azad are successful providing human face to historical freedom fighters. Beautiful Amrita Rao as Bhagat Singh’s fiancée is likable. Raj Babbar and Farida Jalal as Bhagat Singh’s parents are excellent.
One of the biggest problems with TLOBS is its second half. It seems stretched little bit too far with courtroom drama, stupid comedic courtroom dialogues, jail sequences, and melodrama with family members, and jail songs during hunger strike and prior to hanging.
As History suggests Bhagat Singh was atheist and against fundamentalism. In one of sequence Santoshi was successful showing Bhagat as atheist with his support for Hindu-Muslim solidarity. One little controversy about the movie was its showing Mahatma Gandhi as Villain against Bhagat Singh. Personally I think it’s not a smart move. Even though we know Gandhi wasn’t agree with Bhagat Singh’s violent methods of repelling British, our history is not clear enough to tell us whether Gandhi was responsible for Bhagat Singh’s death by singing Irvin Pact. TLOBS makes us to feel that Gandhi was responsible for his death.
Conclusion
TLOBS is a powerful, gripping, exhaustive informative guide on the violent movement of Indian independence against British. TLOBS is rare Indian historical movie, which is true to its premise with sheer balance of commercial entertainment and historical facts. It’s moving saga of freedom fighter Bhagat Singh. It’s a contemporary classic and one should not miss.