By Vikas Yadav
Amar Singh Chamkila died on 8 March 1988. He was just 27 years old when he left this world. This is not a big mystery, and Imtiaz Ali’s Amar Singh Chamkila doesn’t save the assassination scene for the climax. He opens this biopic with Chamkila and Amarjot’s death, and this scene shocks you with its abruptness. Ali doesn’t use this shock factor as cheap sensationalism. He communicates how Chamkila’s demise was a shocking event. People in their late 20s either try to find themselves or start a new career. Who expects to meet their maker at such a young age? By beginning the film with the titular character’s death, Ali converts this biopic into a eulogy for a musician who shook an entire state. Characters remember the successful, controversial life of Chamkila, and the movie uses their words as a springboard to launch flashbacks.
Ali, at first, shows Chamkila as a young boy who is confused by the adults’ double standards. His mother slaps him for asking the meaning of “khada.” He then notices her cheerfully clapping at a song that contains this K-word. Ali, with cinematographer Sylvester Fonseca, accentuates this child’s confusion through a disorienting lens. During the opening credits, we see people talking about Chamkila by singing about his life or what he meant to them. What a fantastic way to remember someone who gave his life to music! I loved the song’s rhythms. They have an energy that’s almost sexual. The sequence has a thrusting pulse that penetrates your senses. It might be the closest thing a Hindi movie has given to us in terms of sexual spirit.
In other words, Ali distillates the essence of Chamkila’s music in these opening scenes. People who simply focused on the vulgar lyrics were missing the point. Chamkila had a large fan following, not because of his song’s vulgarity (they also enjoyed his devotional music), but because that vulgarity had a powerful, mischievous force in it. His music talked to the venereal side of his audience through its pulsating beats. People got high during Chamkila’s performance, and Ali understands this. This is why Amar Singh Chamkila is always ecstatic and consistently high on its charged momentum. The scenes never become too sad or sentimental, even during moments like the one where some “fans” come to meet the protagonist. The movie only becomes sentimental near the finish line, when Chamkila, while sitting in a field, calmly smiles and looks at the screen (this “in memoriam” type of images, with their weepy emotions, are the worst part of this restless film).
Ali uses Chamkila’s story to talk about the relationship between the fans and the artists. The former want the latter to be bold, striking, and entertaining. Fans can sometimes demand risky things. Chamkila announces he cannot sing vulgar lyrics, but the audience insists on listening to the old music, even though they must be aware of the controversies and the death threats sent to him. People on social media often moan when their favorite actors don’t speak up about a sensitive topic. Let’s say they do talk about a social or a political issue and then receive personal harm or injury. Who, apart from the perpetrators, can be blamed under such circumstances? The artist who spoke up or the fans who demanded him/her to speak something about the topic? Can you lay blame on Chamkila’s fans, who craved his “dirty” tracks, for getting him killed? This was an artist who couldn’t say no to his audience.
For the most part, Amar Singh Chamkila is so good that some of its bad choices prompt eye rolls from the audience. The DSP character, for instance, is meant to be the audience stand-in. He goes from being a detractor to being an unashamed enthusiast, which is the sort of reaction Ali wants from the viewers: He wants us all to admire Chamkila and be teary-eyed like the DSP by the movie’s end. It’s a very obvious device in a very creative film. You also hear TV serial-level sound effects in some places, like when Chamkila talks to Amarjot after meeting his “admirers.”
Nonetheless, Diljit Dosanjh always sucks you in. When it’s his turn to sing, he grabs the mic like a lion pouncing on his victim’s meat. Dosanjh gives his character gentle shades and a thrilling spontaneity. He doesn’t seem to be regurgitating words from the script; he appears to be writing his own fate on the screen like an ambitious artist who wants to be heard, who wants to be loved, who wants to be seen. Parineeti Chopra’s acting has traces of exertion. She works extra hard to sell simple emotions. Still, she never becomes unwatchable. Amar Singh Chamkila has comic book-like touches. Some of its frames are animated. The choice makes sense, considering the singer’s life was as colorful and tragic as a remarkable piece of fiction. His sparkly lyrics awakened the concealed desires of his audience, and the movie reminds us that the people who censor voices or hide their libidinous passions in the name of maintaining the world’s purity are corrupt, impure, and filled with vulgarity.
Baradwaj Rangan 
vijee
April 26, 2024
Your view makes me want to watch this.
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