Dear Mr.Kukunoor,
The whole world and its mother are raving about your latest movie IQBAL. I however, have some questions for you.
I won’t comment on the story, so simple yet told in an interesting and gripping manner, and I will ignore the way in which you have made the characters in the movie seem so believable that they could have walked out of real life.
I’m not here to discuss the sensitive way in which you have portrayed the deaf-mute hero; here he is not the object of our sympathy and his disability is not the focus of attention, his ambition and drive is! Remarkable, but let it go for now.
Others might wax lyrical over the stunning camerawork that infuses every scene with a glow (ah, the image of Iqbal running through the fields in the early morning light…), the subtle understated performance by every single actor and not just the ’biggies’, the rapport between the brother and sister team, the way in which you have captured little details like the mother ‘talking’ in sign language to her son over the phone out of sheer force of habit, the way you took pains to make Iqbal look as normal as any other teen in spite of his handicaps - yes, I noticed the girl who waited to see him as he drove the buffaloes by her house, and noticed the secret smile they exchanged, the way in which the women in the movie (the force behind the men really) stand up for their beliefs – so important especially today when the image of the Indian Muslim woman could do with some bolstering, the tongue in cheek naming of the buffaloes, and so many other ‘positives’; not me.
I’m here to split hairs with you.
Isn’t there a problem of plenty in the little village as far as cricket is concerned? One terribly good cricket coaching academy AND an ex-cricketer who is the resident drunk just waiting to be shaken up and pointed down the path of glory again!
Why do the two coaches have to be stereotypes?
The first a seemingly drunk beyond recovery ex-cricketer, persuaded into finding redemption by helping his protégée over hurdles he himself stumbled over, and the second, a villain who placed those very hurdles in the once drunk coaches path, and will not hesitate to place them again in our hero’s path too.
Just like black and white are colours, so is grey!
How does the ‘always drunk with no signs of having/visible means of earning money’ coach get the money for floodlights and net?
Did the evil coaches rich (oh god, a rich vs poor drama here too?) protégée have to sneer and mouth his ‘goongi’ dialogue so many tiresome times? A terribly jarring note in your otherwise subtle film!
While you think of answers for these questions which are non-issues really, let me get my friends and their families together and make plans to go watch IQBAL one more time.
Yours in gratitude for making a near perfect movie,
MagicalSummer