JOIN USMalegaon spoofs to hit 40th IFFI screens in Goa
Now, this cottage industry of filming with cheap video cameras is all set to get a platform to project itself to the world, with the forthcoming 40th International Film Festival of India (IFFI) in Goa planning to showcase a couple of these films. Innovatively titled “Spoof Cinema,” the new section will showcase films like “Malegaon Ka Superman” and “Gabbarbhai MBBS.”
Made with budgets that won’t even meet the make up man’s fees of a leading Hindi filmstar — for example, “Malegaon Ka Superman” has been made, with “special effects” and all, with Rs 1 lakh, almost double of what is spent usually by the Malegaon’s passionate bunch of filmmakers. Sheikh Nasir, director of “Malegaon Ka Superman” and also the man who started the movement some years ago by making “Malegaon Ke Sholay,” is naturally ecstatic.
“What we have been doing is just realising our passion for cinema in our own limited way. We never even dreamt that we would get such a huge platform to show our films,” Nasir, who was in Delhi to attend the 11th Osian’s Cinefan Film Festival, told Deccan Herald.
Not surprisingly, “Malegaon Ka Superman”, a documentary by Faiza Ahmad Khan on the “film industry” of Malegaon, was the biggest hit at this year’s Osian’s Cinefan Film Festival, so much so that the organisers ended up having four screenings as against the originally-planned one.
These films are not straightforward parodies of the original films, but come with relevant issues. For example, in “Malegaon Ka Superman”, the protagonist has all kinds of diseases, including asthma, as he has to fly through air that is heavily polluted. But then, he also has the advantage of flying to the top of a mobile phone tower when his cell phone signal is weak.
Having for the first time taking on Hollywood through his latest film, after spoofing Bollywood, Nasir and his group, some of whom have dreams of working in “real cinema” of Mumbai, are already planning “Malegaon Ka Spiderman”.