Why I have a grouse against Mohanlal

Over time, movies have become part of my identity.

A second generation Indo-American, I have relied (perhaps too much) on Indian cinema to keep me culturally anchored to the subcontinent, specifically Kerala.

I remember watching films from different parts of the country as a child (mostly Malayalam, Tamil and Hindi movies) and, coupled with growing up in the heart of New York City, I found myself drawn into a storm of languages. I admit that I have almost always preferred the cinema of the West to what I have encountered in India, at least on the level of cinematic grammar.

Growing up between two cultures, comparisons cannot be helped sometimes. I grew up paying more attention to the performances of actors in Indian cinema than to the actual productions.

Among my favourite actors are Om Puri, Naseeruddin Shah, Soumitra Chatterjee, Mammootty, Karthik and Kamal Haasan.

But of every regional language I was exposed to, Malayalam films became regular fare for me not only because I spoke it with the greatest amount of fluency but also because the actor who most captivated my attention:
Mohanlal

Mohanlal is now celebrating his 25th year as an actor. For nearly 20 years, I have been enthralled by his magnificent talent. I can easily say it is solely because of his ability as an actor that I began to take note of Malayalam and, in the long run, Indian cinema.

This is my humble tribute to his lasting contribution and his influence on this viewer.

First, I actually have a bit of a grouse against Mohanlal. I believe he has brought me as close to tears as I have ever been watching a performer. Barring some of the best in the West.

I remember after watching Kireedam, I was left wondering when the queasy sensation in my stomach would subside and when the lump in my throat would ease its swell. The same effect came over me after watching movies like Sadhayam, Kamaladalam, Bharatham and Chenkol.

I suppose I forgave him for hitting me so hard with these performances because of his lighter work in movies like the sidesplitting Chitram, Kilukkam, Gandhi Nagar Second Street, Sanmanasullavarku Samadhanam and Naadodikattu.

The greatest thing about Lal is not how much he can move you to tears or how many laughs he can score, but the marvellous balancing act he achieves by combining both the tragic and comic. The result - as seen in movies like Dasharatham, Varavelppu, Thalavattom and T P Balagopalan M.A. - is nothing short of a multifaceted, brilliant performance.

In whatever manner Lal has moved me over the years, I knew it did not have so much to do with the filmmakers behind the production but more with the actor's tremendous presence and utterly natural portrayals.

I mean no disrespect towards the countless Malayalam filmmakers who have hung in with Lal over the years and given him decent material to work with.

Often, I watch a Mohanlal film and marvel at how the subtlety of his craft helps blunt the edge of the melodramatic elements a filmmaker would throw into the picture. He could literally lift a film out of the depths of mediocrity.

Of course, there are several progressive filmmakers who have exploited his ability with élan. Among them are Hariharan (Panchagni, Amruthamgamaya), G Aravindan (Vasthuhara), Mani Ratnam (Unaroo, Iruvar), Shaji N Karun (Vaanaprastham) and Ram Gopal Varma (Company). His performances in these films have earned him the right to be compared with the likes of Robert De Niro.

I, however, think of him more as the Gene Hackman or Jack Nicholson of India. Take your pick.

No matter whose league you choose to place him in, nowadays, Mohanlal is on the ropes. In his home state Kerala, Lal is seen playing roles with about as little variety as any other moustache-twirling, villain-thrashing, Southern action star. Lal is now either playing the roguish hero (a role he already perfected in Devasuram) or the youth in search of a love and/or a livelihood.

Perhaps the scale that symbolises Lal's career -- balancing crass commercial on one end and meaningful cinema on the other -- has been tipped in favour of the masses.

Whatever the reason, the truth is clear: as sentimental as it sounds, I miss the Mohanlal who experimented with a plethora of roles and looked like he was having fun doing it.

Last year, I noticed that fire in him when he enacted the role he was given in Varma's Company. His first role in ages with any serious amount of depth and dimension. No one can tell me that this actor has seen his day, especially since every time he seems to be down and out, he comes out with an Iruvar or a Vaanaprastham or a Company.

Talent cannot be contained. So long as a master like Mohanlal exists, there will be a reason to keep going to the movies for another 25 years.

My favourite Mohanlal films:

• Iruvar (based on Tamil movie legend M G Ramachandran's life)
• Vaanaprastham (a Kathakali dancer)
• Dasharatham (a tragicomic rich man)
• Kireedam (a brutalised youth)
• Chithram (a husband for hire)

Varma gets dates of Mohanlal

Mohanlal has given forty days to Ram Gopal Verma for the remake version of Sholay, which is in the news for quite a time.

The film which starts rolling by the end of September will also feature Abhishek Bachchan in the lead role. Mohanlal will play the role that Sanjeev Kumar has done in the original.

Know who is going too play the role of Gabbar Singh? It’s none other than the one and only Amitabh Bachchan, who has played the lead in the original.

The super hit song of the movie Mehbooba will be remixed again and Urmila will dance to the tunes of the song.

Mohanlal is a photographer in his new film !

Ranjan Pramod former advertising executive and writer of super hit mega hits like, Meesa Madhavan and Naran is making his debut as director with Photographer featuring Mohanlal in the lead. It will be a realistic film within the commercial format and is produced by Howli Pottur under ‘Dream Team Productions’ banner.

Mohanlal will be completing K.P.Kumaran’s off-beat Akasagopuram in London and is rushing to Kozhikode on August 3 from where he will proceed to the jungles of Wynad where Photographer is being shot.

Mohanlal plays Dijo John, a press photographer who gets entangled with Wynad’s adivasi problems. The film is said to be loosely based on Muthanga killings where seven advasis were killed by policemen. Mohanlal was so impressed by Ranjan’s script that he gave him priority dates.

In real life Mohanlal loves photography and has an array of state-of-the art cameras and lenses. If you browse through his personal albums, you will find some extraordinary pictures clicked by the star himself. Photographer will be shot by ace cameraman Azhagappan and has music by old timer Johnson.

Mohanlal disappointed with release of Aran

Mohanlal has reported that he was very disappointed when he came to know of the release of Keerthi Chakra in Tamil as Aaran. He says that he knew that a Tamil adaptation will be made, but he was not aware of the fact that Aaran was dubbed in Tamil, using a different artist to voice his role.

He says “I have spoken in pure Tamil in `Iruvar' for one of the best directors, Mani Ratnam. I could have done a better job in this film also but no one told me about it. Through my friends in Chennai I came to know some scenes are added in Tamil featuring Jeeva and Prakashraj”. Sources say, Rajeev has dubbed Mohanlal’s voice in Tamil.

Besides these issues Aaran remains a huge grosser both in Tamil and Malayalam.

It just happens to Lal ettan

MOHANLAL strides out of his room at The Club, Mysore Road, onto the sets of Kannada film director Rajendra Singh Babu's, `Love'. Whiskers obscure his chubby face, and he wears a black suit, red shirt, and black turban. Is he playing a Sikh in the film? "No, this is a disguise," he says, adding with a gentle laugh, "For love, you sometimes have to disguise yourself."
In the film, Lal plays a Malayali taxi-driver in Dubai who brings two lovers together. In the scene about to be shot, he takes on another identity in order to rescue the heroine.
He is wearing disguise upon disguise, really, for his screen persona is itself a camouflage. Life `just happens' to Mohan Lal. Speak to him long enough and you're bound to hear the refrain: "It just happened." He takes on assignments `because of friendship' rather than as a challenge. His role in Love came his way because the director approached him. Ramgopal Varma sought him out for a brief but compelling part in Company. He didn't plan to act in a Hindi or a Kannada film. "It just happened."
Similarly, when he went to Delhi to collect a National Award, he visited the National School of Drama, and its director, Ramgopal Bajaj, asked him if he would act in an English-language play. He confessed that he had absolutely no experience in theatre. "From English, it became Malayalam, and then Sanskrit! It just came to be."
When Kavalam Narayana Panicker offered to direct him if he would enact Bhasa's `Karnabharam', he could not refuse, although he knew no Sanskrit. Getting such an opportunity was "a blessing for an actor", although it was also "like a trapeze without the net" since he had to memorise pages of Sanskrit verse and hold his own on stage.

There's more on the "it just happened" front. As part of Malayala Manorama's ongoing `Ente Malayalam' project for preserving Kerala's language and culture, film director T. K. Rajeev Kumar conceived `Kathayattam', a travelogue, and thought of none better than Mohan Lal to enact it. The stage, he has come to realise, requires sustained involvement. "For two hours, you become that character." The role remains with you when you go off-stage, in a way that it never does in cinema. "The instant I get off the set, I'm back to normal." Such is the nature of the medium, he explains. Emotions are fleeting and disconnected, and scenes are shot in random order.
A film shoot is a series of interruptions. He vanishes intermittently and then reappears to complete his reply. Steeped in cinema, when is he truly himself? With family or friends, perhaps? "With friends," he says without hesitation. "I have a closer relationship with the technicians, with my driver, than my family. I don't feel suddenly homesick or say, `Oh, I want to see my children now'." He remains detached from personal bonds and focussed on work. "If I miss my family so much, I should quit cinema."
Why does every male Malayalam actor, lean when he enters cinema, swell up in no time like a pappadam in hot oil? He seriously ponders all possible reasons: irregular eating habits due to hectic schedules, "something in our genes, being Indian", one's constitution ("If I drink a glass of water, I put on weight"), fans being "ready to accept us although we put on weight", and the absence of a health club culture. He finally stops sounding apologetic and declaims, "The Indian concept of beauty is flesh!" Er — that's only for women, isn't it?
A man walks into the room to give Lal his lines in Hindi for the next shot. He copies them out, transliterating in Malayalam. The first of the seven sentences reads: "Mujhe paanch biwi hain... " He reads out the dialogue twice and comments: "This is unusual." The lines being in Hindi? No, the situation — his having five wives! He is answering my next question when he is interrupted yet again. He gets up, checks his beard in the mirror, and as he reaches the doorway he says aloud: "Mujhe paanch biwi hain... "
When he returns, I ask if he has contemplated the end of his career. "It's very strange," he muses, "but no planning has been done." Once again, he explains how "things happen" to him. He was just helping out friends who wanted to export Kerala cuisine, and he got so involved in the venture that there is now a restaurant in Dubai which bears his name: Mohan Lal's Tastebuds.
One comes away with the feeling that if, one day, Lal loses all he has, he will simply open a paan shop and manage to survive. With sanity intact. As Mohan Lal, Everyman.