Making 'epic' history

With Hindi cinema’s new-found yen for varied themes, historicals are seeing a resurgence, writes Rajiv Vijayakar

A ‘historical’ is a film that takes a slice of history and presents it in an scintillating manner. What differentiates it from a period film is that it is not entirely a work of fiction, like a Lagaan and the Baahubali series. It is also different from a mythological, which draws upon epics like the Ramayana and Mahabharat, or the sagas of other deities. Then, since we are in 2020, we even have stories based in the late 19th and early to mid-20th century that have a real base, like a The Legend Of Bhagat Singh or Rustom.

But when we mention the term ‘historical’, by convention we go back to stories that are at least 200 years old, as they provide room for specific settings and an atmosphere, with costumes and splendor to match. The mounting can be huge, the scale lavish, and again by convention, the music can be strong. It is here that we find that in Hindi cinema, just five films have truly made history. The year 2020 began with the success of Tanhaji: The Unsung Warrior, based on Emperor Shivaji’s favourite foot-soldier Tanaji
Malusare, and films as big as Takht and Prithviraj are coming up, besides more
films in Ajay Devgn’s proposed series on India’s 'unsung warriors’.

Tanhaji: The Unsung Warrior (2020) Director: Om Raut

To defend the vital Kondhana Fort from Aurangazeb’s army, Tanaji left his son’s wedding despite his emperor’s pleas. He succeeded, the Mughal emperor was prevented from thus annexing the Maratha kingdom and the rest of South India, but Tanaji lost his life even as he killed the enemy chief — Udaybhan, a renegade Rajput who led Aurangazeb’s army. The film was a perfect blend of content and technology. Homespun 3-D,
wonderful visual effects and computer graphics complemented the emotions (the
opiate of film-going masses in India) and the inbuilt drama of valour and patriotism. A strong villain, a crackerjack pace, thriller ambience and a crisp length of 135 minutes made the crucial difference. Ajay Devgn, Kajol and Saif Ali Khan were perfect. And strong word-of-mouth made for exponential growth after a strong opening. In what is a rarity, especially for an Ajay Devgn film, the critics, for a change, were one with the viewers, and the single-screen and multiplex audiences were in tandem.

Padmaavat (2018) Director: Sanjay Leela Bhansali

This was the story of Rajput queen Padmavati of Chittor and stories of her legendary beauty that reached the ears of Turko-Afghan invader Alauddin Khilji.
Khilji attacked Chittor and killed her husband, Raja Ratan Singh (Shahid Kapoor) by subterfuge just to possess her. But the determined queen (Deepika Padukone)
immolated herself and Allaudin could never even sight her. Mounted on a mega scale, the battle scenes were as intense as the emotional ones between the royal couple and the depiction of the steely determination of the widow. Showing a villain as a depraved megalomaniac (Ranveer Singh was astounding), even in his songs, the film, despite the controversies it faced, was a whopper at the box-office.

Mughal-E-Azam (1960) Director: K Asif

This landmark colossus remains among the highest-watched movies in history. The film, made 60 years ago, again became historic in 2004 by getting a crisper, colourised version (the first Hindi film to be thus converted fully indigenously both in visuals and sound from a damaged original negative). This version too clicked among three other contemporary releases when released in Diwali. Mughal-E-Azam was the well-known tale of romance between prince Salim and the beautiful court dancer Anarkali, and how they faced opposition from his father, Emperor Akbar, because of their economic divide. The tremendous writing made Prithviraj Kapoor (Akbar), Dilip Kumar and Madhubala (as the lovebirds) put in towering performances. The songs were a rage. For those times, there were awe-inspiring battle scenes. The film was not only a ‘regal’ tale but told in a regal manner.

Mughal-E-Azam ranks among the biggest hits of Hindi cinema of all time. The film’s latest moment of glory was a technically state-of-the-art stage presentation in 2016.

Anarkali (1953) Director: Nandlal Jaswantlal

The same story of Salim and Anarkali was treated differently by Nandlal Jaswantlal, with the rich-poor angle as focused upon as much as the Hindu-Mulsim one. Pradeep Kumar and Bina Rai essayed the lovers whose story became legendary, with Mubarak playing the emperor. Again, the music (C Ramachandra) became a rage, and the film becomiung the highest grosser of 1953. However, since then, the film has been outclassed in memory (except for the songs) completely by Mughal-E-Azam.

Sikander (1941) Director: Sohrab Modi

The film remains a classic. The story followed the legend of how he invaded India and encountered Porus (played by director Sohrab Modi himself) and his famous first encounter with an imprisoned Porus. With its fiery dialogues written by the legendary Pandit Sudarshan, the film became a blockbuster for its time.

Back in time

When we see the trail of historical movies in Hindi cinema, we see a definite abundance in the 1930s and 1940s, and obviously before that when films were silent. It was not difficult to envisage fiction built around a real event or era, as was the case in the huge musical epic, Baiju Bawra (1952), that merged the story of musician Baiju and his rivalry with Tansen (who had a separate film on himself — Tansen in 1943) with the Mughal empire and emperor Akbar. With the Mughal era providing rich fodder for spectacle, we had a fictional incident placed in Shah Jehan’s reign in the 1946 K L Saigal swan song
Shahjehan. We then saw films as varied as Taj Mahal (1963), the 2005 Taj Mahal — A Legend Of Love, Pukar (1939), Jahan Ara, Jodhaa Akbar and Noorjahan among others. There was also Razia Sultan (1983), the biggest disaster of the 1980s, despite featuring Dharmendra and Hema Malini, on the love of Delhi’s only female Sultan for a slave.

Hindu history even went as far back as Amrapali, a tale set in the Buddhist era of 500 BC to Asoka—The Great (3rd century BC) produced by Shah Rukh Khan and Juhi Chawla in 2001, and we had other stories down the decades, like Chitralekha (1941 and 1964) and Meeraa (1979) directed by Gulzar.

Freedom struggle and other tales of valour were depicted in Jhansi Ki Rani (1953), that flopped miserably and its 2019 version Manikarnika: The Queen Of Jhansi that did indifferent business. Last year, Kesari was the lesser-known story of the Battle for Saragarhi against the Afghans — perhaps the only Hindi film wherein Indians were shown fighting for the British empire against Afghans. Panipat (2019), on the third battle of Panipat, was a disaster despite being well-made, and again saw a battle against the Afghans, while the 2015 Bajirao Mastani, the love story of Peshwa Bajirao despite being married to Kashibai, connected with the audience on the basis of its script, music and star value.

Having disappeared from the 1970s till now, historicals seem to have made a comeback. Coming up is the Yash Raj Films’ opus featuring Akshay Kumar — Prithviraj on Prithviraj Chauhan. And in an ingenious spin, director Neeraj Pandey will narrate Chanakya, a modern story that incorporates the strategies of the legendary strategist and administrator. Finally, set to be the biggest of the lot will be Takht, which will revisit the Mughal era under the direction of Karan Johar.