Review of Gangs of Wasseypur - Part 1 (2012) by Pavan C — 11 Sep 2012

Picture this: you've walked into a cinema possessing the absolute bare minimum of information about the film you're supposed to be watching. Essentially, what you know is based on the poster printed alongside the day's cinema listings, which proclaimed Gangs Of Wasseypur to be a "savagely funny" Hindi crime drama that had been a massive critical and popular smash in India. Fast-forward about an hour, when the film still seems mired in the minutiae of the story it's telling - and you'd be forgiven for wondering just what the big deal is.

That was certainly the case for me. What seemed like a fairly straightforward premise - one act of violence and the accompanying need for vengeance kickstart a clan war that lasts for generations - seemed to get constantly lost in director Anurag Kashyap's narrative digressions. The film meanders through its set-up, taking its own sweet time in introducing us to Shahid Khan (Jaideep Ahlawat), whose attempt to poach train hijacking duties from the local muscle sees him exiled to another town... where he promptly steps on the toes of local mining industry overlord Ramadhir Singh (Tigmanshu Dhulia) and is killed for his troubles. Turns out the protagonist of Gangs is actually Shahid's son Sardar (Manoj Bajpai), who vows never to grow out his hair as long as he has not avenged his father - trouble is he, too, takes an awfully long and circuitous route through turbulent times, allowing the British to decamp from India and Ramadhir to rise to political prominence.

My only advice, if you find yourself as frustrated as I did with the lack of judicious editing that's plainly a hallmark of this movie, is to hang in there. Good things, as the tired old clichà (C) goes, really do come to those who wait - though the more cynical might argue that it's really a case of having your good sense battered to death by sheer attrition. Perhaps there's an element of truth in that, because Kashyap is so relentlessly unapologetic in the way he assaults the audience with his story that it's better to just give yourself over to the experience and let it take you where it may.

If you do emerge after the first hour or so with a good enough idea of the vast canvas on which Kashyap is feverishly painting his masterpiece, you'll find yourself drawn interminably into the lives of the characters. Although there are still a couple of moments that could have done with heavy editing (like the hyper-sexual Sardar's attempt to start up an affair with Hindu maid Durga (Reema Sen)), the second half of the movie rewards you for your patience. Plot threads start to come together, with characters clashing in brutal and unexpected ways as the cycle of violence begun so long ago by Shahid tangles his son and grandchildren in its wheels. It's also refreshing to watch a crime thriller in which women aren't merely set dressing - in fact, Sardar's first wife Nagma (Richa Chadda) is a rich, full-bodied creation, and serves to illustrate perfectly the difference between Sardar the crime-lord and Sardar the family man and womaniser.

There's no denying that Gangs is absolutely dripping with stylistic panache. Kashyap steers resolutely clear of big Bollywood dance numbers - which might have been a welcome way to enliven proceedings given the film's immense running time - but he keeps that characteristic rhythm and feel pulsing throughout his film with quick cuts, flashy lighting and pounding music. The soundtrack is excellent, if a little horrifyingly vulgar, but a perfect fit for the film's heady blending of family drama with huge dollops of crime, politics and history. The unexpected bursts of gallows humour peppered throughout Gangs - making light of such typically ordinary things as visiting the doctor and going on a first date - are leavened by characters you find yourself suddenly and surprisingly loving.

I'm not going to pretend that Gangs is an easy movie to sink into and enjoy - it's a huge, sprawling beast of a film, somehow managing to teeter between being frustratingly dreary and hyper-violently frenetic over its 160-minute running time. But it pulls off the crazy feat of dragging its audience along with it until you can't wait to find out what happens next... and so it is with me.

----.

PART TWO.

After the first hour of Gangs Of Wasseypur (Part I), I have to admit my attention was drifting. I had fired up my phone, googled and found that the movie was listed as being over five hours long. At that point, after a lot of strangely dreary exposition, I sank into a minor despair â" I couldnâ(TM)t believe we had somehow signed ourselves up for a movie that would take longer for me to watch than to, say, fly to Thailand⦠and back. But, somewhere along the way, the movieâ(TM)s myriad characters and stories started to make sense, the action and adrenaline kicked up a few notches⦠and suddenly, it was over. Turns out director Anurag Kashyap had split the very lengthy film in two, ending the first one â" spoilers ahead, so avert your eyes now if you donâ(TM)t want to find out how the first movie ended! â" with the spectacular murder of his lead character, Sardar Khan (Manoj Bajpai), in broad daylight.

Consider my appetite whetted. The blood feud that had raged for decades between Sardar and his greatest enemy, the corpulent and corrupt politician Ramadhir Singh (Tigmanshu Dhulia), would clearly fall now to Sardarâ(TM)s sons â" and I wanted to see if Faizal (Nawazuddin Siddiqui), Perpendicular (Aditya Kumar), Danish (Vineet Singh) and their half-brother Definite (Zeishan Quadri) had it in them to keep the cycle of violence, hatred and revenge going.

The answer, of course, is hell yeah!, and Gangs II is a punchier, more darkly funny, and far better movie than its predecessor. Unlike the first film, this one hits the ground running, as the elder Khan brothers react to the death of their father and the vengeance killings continue apace. The story is every bit as ambitious, huge and sprawling as it was when Sardar was spearheading the charge against Ramadhir, but this time, exposition doesnâ(TM)t get in the way. The supporting characters â" from Khan matriarch Nagma (Richa Chadda) through to Danishâ(TM)s wife Shama Parveen (Anurita Jha) and Faizalâ(TM)s love interest Mohsina (Huma Qureshi) â" are sketched out far more quickly and efficiently, laying the groundwork for a film in which no one, not even the lead characters, are safe. Astoundingly, in a movie where it quickly becomes clear that any character could go at any minute, Kashyap somehow still manages to make the deaths shocking and completely unexpected.

Thereâ(TM)s also a great deal more fun to be had with the film circling the Khan brothers as it does â" the focus on Sardar and his building of an empire on blood and violence seemed to take a long, long while in the first film because he didnâ(TM)t really have any equally greedy, opportunistic, batshit opponents working with and against him within his own inner circle. Not so with his offspring. While Faizal is undoubtedly the protagonist of this film the way Sardar took centre stage in his, Faizalâ(TM)s complex relationship with his brothers makes for far more exciting, high-stakes viewing â" particularly after he inducts Definite, the bitter step-brother with his own agenda and ambition, into the clan.

It came as something of a surprise to me that Faizal makes for a far more sympathetic emotional figure than his dad. Siddiquiâ(TM)s weather-beaten, curiously blank features are worlds away from Bajpaiâ(TM)s more open, expressive face, and at first I found myself wondering how he could command a film as mad, loud and explosive as Gangs II. Somehow, Siddiqui rises to the occasion â" his Faizal starts out a drug-addled, perpetually stoned loser, but along the way, commits enough acts of horrifying violence to start constructing his own myth out of his fatherâ(TM)s ashes. Unlike all the other characters in the films, heâ(TM)s even allowed a moment of touching introspection on a balcony awash in moonlit blues, as he confesses to Mohsina that he never wanted to be consumed so thoroughly by someone elseâ(TM)s hatred and a blood feud that he himself wanted no part in.

In essence, Gangs II is a far more accomplished beast in terms of plot and narrative than its predecessor. But donâ(TM)t worry â" that doesnâ(TM)t mean the film becomes any less fun for having a more engaging, emotional core. In fact, this movie is laced through with even more of the same pitch-perfect black humour that enlivened proceedings in Gangs I. Kashyap delights particularly in humanising his gangsters as silly, real, dumb, very human people, a nice change from the mythologising of mobsters that goes on in so many other crime movies â" these characters are not super-cool or extra-awesome; in fact, their swagger almost invariably comes before (or at the same time as) a fall. Mohsina carries on the grand tradition of the females in the family puncturing the puffed-up egos of their male counterparts, proving again that the men might be lions on the battlefield, but are lambs in their own homes. One of the main chase scenes in the film sees Definite trying to elude Sultan (Pankaj Tripathy), Ramadhirâ(TM)s most evil and efficient henchman, in a series of comic mishaps on both sides. The same mix of human error and confusion bedevils Definiteâ(TM)s own attempts to hunt Sultan down as the latter takes his daily constitutional through a busy market.

In almost every way, Gangs II improves upon the first film â" or, to be more precise, Gangs I serves as the fulcrum for the entire enterprise, and Gangs II is the pay-off. And what a pay-off it is. Soaked in blood and black comedy, Gangs II boasts the same stylistic panache and thrumming musical rhythms that ran like quicksilver throughout the first movie, married to a tighter plot and far more engaging characters. If there are dreary, boring moments in the film (and there would have to be a few, with a run-time of 160 minutes), they pass fairly quickly and the movie is off again, loping through the electrifyingly crowded streets of Dhanbad and Wasseypur, spinning through the lives of a family built upon and torn apart by revenge, murder and blood. If you can get yourself through that first hour of Gangs I, trust me when I say youâ(TM)ll be rewarded with this film â" itâ(TM)s every bit as rich, thrilling, funny and shocking as you could hope for.