Readers Write In #738: Trigger based cinema and the fall of Shankar and Hirani

By AB

When watching the atrocity that is Indian 2, the million dollar (or thousand crore?) question that kept popping in my head is: Why are we so mad at Shankar?

It’s not that his recent films have struck a chord with me. The last film of his I enjoyed was Enthiran. But even Shankar would not have anticipated this level of public disapproval in his wildest dreams (or maybe he did – every second scene in Indian 2 is a nod to a former Shankar film, it’s almost like he is reminding us “I made these movies that you love. This movie is also similar to that, but see, I think I fucked it up. But since I made those movies, please love this also.”)

I realized that another director with a great track record is facing the same issue. Rajkumar Hirani’s Dunki might have crossed the border of Cancel Culture Land unlike Indian 2, but there’s no doubt that people in general were underwhelmed and felt the filmmaker somehow didn’t seem to click as much anymore. So it got me thinking.

Both their films work on the basis of triggering the viewer.

All films do at some level, but Shankar and Hirani use precise skills of manipulation. And this manipulation largely worked in the past:

1. Tragic flashbacks that make us sympathize (Gentlemen, Indian, Anniyan, Sanju)

2. Deaths that drive home a point(parents in Mudhalvan, poor girl in Enthiran, Sanjay Dutt in PK, Ali Zafar in 3 Idiots)

3. Ample instances of struggle being gone through by relatable characters (every film)

4. Families bonding closely that are either broken (Jeans, Boys) or mended (Munnabhai MBBS, 3 Idiots)

SS Rajamouli is another highly successful director who operates on the principle of manipulation. While we’ve got to wait till his next film to see if he can still hold tight, RRR worked well enough for me. Pushing buttons? Yes. But the writing is so good. Take for instance, the scene where Ram Charan and Jr NTR meet. The scene is about saving a kid. What’s the whole film about? Saving a kid!

The problem with Shankar and Hirani has been:

1. These skills have offered diminishing returns. And they’re both greater screenplay-constructors than good filmmakers, so the dependency on their formulae is high.

2. The audience is exposed to a lot inside and outside cinema. Movie knowledge is no longer at its innocence – people have seen far more complicated takes on social topics.

3. There are clones who have done similar movies that became successful (AR Murugadoss and Atlee for Shankar, Ayushmann Khurrana and many more for Hirani)

4. We can see the manipulation, and we’re upset that the film thinks so less of our intelligence.

So these two haven’t been able to have the same effect that they used to.

Moreover, SSR continues to be backed by the great collaborations he’s had – while Shankar no longer works with Sujatha and Hirani no longer works with Vidu Vinod Chopra, both of whom were considered very big influences on these two filmmakers.

Being someone who grew up watching and being impacted by their films, I am naturally rooting for them. But they really, really need to take a step back and change the formula. Otherwise, the memory of their good films might be a thing of…tragic flashbacks.