Tuesday, March 17, 2020
What plagues Nepali movies?
The following opinion piece was published on August 31, 2019 in Republica. The direct link to the article is here.
What plagues Nepali movies?
Recently, two supposedly super-hit Nepali movies uploaded
in Youtube caught my attention: Anmol KC starrer “Kri” and Ramesh Upreti
starrer “Aishwarya.” These movies highlight major issues plaguing the Nepali
movie industry today.
First, Nepali filmmakers need to ditch the “star
system.” Bollywood and Hollywood movie stars held sway over audiences for
decades, but the formula is now failing. Audiences are ditching big stars for
better stories and better performances. Look at Bollywood today. Stars can no
longer phone-in their performances. Zero, Tubelight, and Thugs of Hindustan
could not even recoup their costs.
Movie-watching audience in Nepal today is more
sophisticated than what Nepali filmmakers think. Movies can no longer succeed
on a star’s looks. You need good actors and good stories. There are dozens and
dozens of good theater actors in Nepal today, honing their skills and mastering
their craft. Only a handful of them have got opportunities in movies. Why
aren’t Nepali filmmakers looking more to theatres to scout good acting talents?
Second, Nepali filmmakers suffer from the “khichdi
syndrome.” A movie gets made, the filmmaker is interviewed, and his/her
response always is: “This movie is for everybody. It has romance, action,
thriller, suspense, and whatnot.” My question to these filmmakers is: are you
making a movie or a khichdi? Kri and Aishwarya both suffer from the khichdi
syndrome. There is a reason why we have one dedicated day in the year for eating
khichdi: nobody likes eating khichdi every day. When will Nepali filmmakers
realize that the audience can only tolerate so many khichdi movies in a year?
The audience today grows up watching movies from
Bollywood, Hollywood, and other movie industries around the world. We recognize
a crappy movie when we see one, and a good movie when we see one. This is why
even a mildly decent movie like Jatra or Loot ends up receiving lots of love
from the audience. These were not great movies, but they were better than the
other 99 khichdis that were cooked that year.
Third, filmmakers attempt to mask poor story and
performance with songs filmed in exotic locales. This is great for promoting domestic
tourism, but this is not why you make a movie. Jharana Thapa recently blamed
audiences for not being appreciative of the difficulty of filming songs in remote
mountains and lakes. The audience does not care how, when, and where you filmed
your movie or song. The audience only cares whether it was entertained or not.
It only cares whether the 500 rupees it just spent on the movie was worth it.
Maybe a few decades ago, people did go to the movies
to see Bollywood songs filmed in Switzerland. That is no longer the case these
days because songs get uploaded into YouTube months before the movie releases. If
going to the movies means going to watch beautifully filmed songs, why go if
you have already seen it in YouTube?
At the end of the day, a movie tells a story. That is
where the focus should be. Most song placements in movies don’t make sense
anyway. Placements are random and often hinder the flow of the story. Kri had a
middling story, but its editing saves the overall movie. Aishwarya was all over
the place with poor story, dialogues, and editing. The first half-hour of the
movie makes no sense. Aishwarya’s songs were filmed in exotic locations, but
had overtly bad computer paint job (whatever the movie-variant of a photoshop
is) with grass and hills painted awfully in post-production.
Fourth, some think of the movie industry as the
quickest way to achieving riches and fame. This is why the industry is filled
with dreamers and charlatans. Many dreamers are often genuine movie and art
lovers. They enter the industry to fulfill their personal dreams or hope to steer
the industry towards a better direction. Some succeed, some fail. The chutzpah
of two dreamers making a movie that tops every movie critics’ best-of list is
necessary despite the movie’s failure. It shows the potential of the medium to
inspire and awe. Movies like Hari may end up making no money, but they still
need to be made.
Sadly, there are more charlatans than dreamers. How
else do you explain the industry churning out 100 movies a year? Charlatans
find a gullible financier for their movie. The movie flops, and the financier
disappears. The charlatans simply move on to find a different gullible person
with money. This “do and die” filmmaking process does not last, and the
charlatans’ crimes are coming home to roost. Financiers ran this year. If news
reports are to be believed, we will see only half the number of movies this
year than last year. The industry needs to get rid of these charlatans.
Just as most Nepali movies today are “love stories,” most
of the 200 or so movies made annually in Hong Kong during the 1990s were gritty
action thrillers. By 2000, Hong Kong was making only 40 movies a year because
audiences got tired of watching the same story over and over again 200 times a
year. Nepali audiences are tired of watching the same story 100 times a year. If
Nepali filmmakers want the audience to pay 500 rupees to go watch their movies
in a multiplex, they need to raise their filmmaking standards.
Finally, there is a reason why the industry is called
the “movie business.” Filmmakers are in the business of making their customers
happy. If 99 movies flop every year, isn’t that the clue that you are not
meeting customer demand? If you produce three movies in a row with the same
story and characters, with the only change being songs filmed in London this
time instead of Mustang and Manang, the audience quickly wises up to your
tactic.
Nepali filmmakers have a variety of excuses for their
failure. The only question they should be asking while making a movie is: “Is
this entertaining?” Sadly, for 99 movies every year, the answer is a resounding
“No.”
Labels: aishwarya, kri, nepali movies
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