The Price of Fame

In a scene in Satyajit Ray’s Nayak (The Hero), the protagonist arrives at a pre-determined location, at his old friend’s request. When he reaches there, he sees that what his friend wants him to do is to be a part of a protest being held in front of a factory. The obviously uncomfortable, to the point of being embarrassed, protagonist backs out in his car, as he puts on his dark glasses, unable to meet the eye of his friend.

In the words of Fred Allen, 'A celebrity is a person who works hard all his life to become well-known, then wears dark glasses to avoid being recognized.' The dark glasses appear on the faces of both the protagonists in Nayak and Halla Bol—not as a protection from being recognized, but as a means to hide their own conscience. 

And both films deal a lot about conscience.

While Ray’s class act dealt with a single individual leading a screen idol into a journey of self discovery while both are traveling in a first class compartment on board the Rajdhani Express; Rajkumar Santoshi’s film is more about the rise of the fallen.

It was an individual oblivious of the screen idol’s image and charisma that acted as a catalyst in Nayak; while it is being witness to a murder that makes Ashfaque, aka Sameer Khan (Ajay Devgan) question himself. But that’s more or less where the resemblances end.

Before the release of Halla Bol, there occurred a glut of films about films, each dealing with one aspect or another of the entire process of movie making. In Halla Bol, however, the focus is not so much on the process of film making, but the aftermath of joining and making it big in tinsel town—the loss of innocence, for example, made amply clear by the contrast between a despondent Sameer holding a 'Youth Icon' statuette and a jubilant Ashfaque when he is handed a small trophy by his mentor Sidhu (Pankaj Kapoor).

It is said 'The higher they rise, the harder they fall'. But that’s not the only reason that a film star is a perfect character for a film like Halla Bol. Film stars, while they have these legions of fans, are the ones who we all know as people who mouth words written by others, act out stuff directed by others—in other words, being a film star is the epitome of lack of individuality.

It is the crowd who makes a hero, carries him on their shoulders, taking him that much closer to the silver screen on which his movie is being projected. It is the same crowd that tears down the posters of heroes and burns effigies.

So, the ‘hero’ of the film is not really the screen idol, but the masses. Because they are the ones the film is directed at. Call it film activism, if you like. Nothing wrong in that. However, the film goes kinda haywire in its objective.

While Sameer’s rise to fame and simultaneous fall as an individual are depicted by him climbing a staircase; and his fall as a star and rise as a human being are similarly shown by him sitting at the bottom of that very stairwell, the same is reflected in the film, too.

When the film could have reached its zenith, it plummets to a nadir with stereotypical characterizations, trite dialogue and cliched sequences. It’s when Santoshi’s protagonist realizes the true meaning of a ‘hero’, which is off-screen, that he starts becoming a caricature of an on-screen hero.

There was not a single cringe-worthy sequence during Sameer’s rise as a filmstar. In fact, Santoshi has made a fair share of digs at how the cine stars literally sell themselves to sell commodities. But when it came to making his own protagonist rise above such pettiness, both the director and the character fail abysmally. It is during the onset of his self-awareness that Sameer walks the walk and talks the talk of so many so-called ‘heroes’ of the silver screen.

And that is precisely why Halla Bol looks and sounds as fake as the claims by the filmi superstars when they endorse hair oils.

Oh, and one more thing, Mr Santoshi. The fourth ‘P’ after ‘Power, Public, and Paisa’ could easily have been ‘Price’ – the price of fame, that is. Did it really have to be what it turned out to be?