The Problem With Dunki

The Problem With Dunki

This is #Outtake, a column by Amitabh Pande that looks at films and shows from an uncommon lens.

WHAT HAPPENS WHEN a great story teller, known for narrating deeply personal stories that impart social commentary in a light-hearted and emotional manner, attempts to fall in line with the prevailing winning formula of selling nationalist stories? Perhaps from here on, we can call this “pulling a dunki”.

Dunki's plot, set in the '90s and mostly relayed in a flashback, revolves around Manu (Taapsee Pannu), Buggu (Vikram Kochar) and Balli (Anil Grover), each of whom desperately wants to move to London from their village of Laltu in Punjab. Each has their own reasons for seeking a better life for their families (by migrating overseas). When the official route of passing the IELTs and getting student visas fails them, leading to a dire tragedy involving their close friend, a newly-arrived ex-soldier called Hardy (Shah Rukh Khan) vows to get the trio to London, by hook or by crook.

And so they embark (along with a few others) on the brutally infamous illegal migration route, known as dunki, crossing Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran and Turkey to finally reach the UK, suffering violence, hunger, death, a near drowning, illness and mental agony all along the way. After all this, the abject poverty and helplessness that characterise the lives of illegal immigrants in the UK further adds to their grief...a grief that never fully dissipates even after 25 years of living in London and earning in pounds, and lifting their families in Laltu out of poverty. 'Was it all really worth it?' they begin to wonder, and wish for a return home, only to meet their next adventure — illegally entering India — made possible solely by our daredevil Hardy. Finally a kind of happy ending ensues, for most of the characters anyway.

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TRITE & TESTED

Why Raju Hirani's Latest Film Does Him A Disservice

By Amitabh Pande

Now, to be fair, migration is a pressing and significant issue in the world today. It’s so important that across most of the Western world, the definition of whether or not you’re a liberal is being defined by your stance on immigration into your country. And it’s true that the biggest victims of restrictive immigration policies are the poor, and therefore bear the brunt of worsening inequality in an already unequal world. And for sure, this message needs to be given to many in India who, not knowing better, aspire to an imagined life abroad that only brings them disappointment and misery, whereas a choice to stay back in their motherland might have just worked out better in the long term.

Thus, to take up this issue in a movie is in itself quite ambitious, and for that we applaud you Raju Hirani (director) and Abhijat Joshi (writer). This is definitely much harder than championing the cause of everyday love and humanity in our lives (Munnabhai); or commenting on our flawed education system (3 Idiots); or holding up a mirror to our intolerance, superstitions, biases and religious bigotry (PK).

However, this is not what your core competence (as we would say in business language) is, Mr Hirani. Your craft is in building characters and making the audience form an intimate relationship with them. Munnabhai was the leader we never had. Circuit was the loveable side-kick with ultimate jugaad that we could depend on. Rancho was the friend who made you a better and happier person. And this was true of the entire cast — whether it was Qureshi, Rastogi, Virus or any of the others. Because of this, we felt what they felt in the film, and experienced the happenings as though in first person. Unfortunately, Dunki doesn’t help us form relationships with any of the characters. They all feel distant, unconvincing, almost caricaturish. As a result, we are watching the film in the third person, at best laughing at the jokes or sympathising with some characters and scenes, but mostly watching as the hours pass by.

Raju Hirani's signature brilliance comes from his grasp of people and society, and more importantly, the deep interconnectedness between them. It is the flawed humanity at the centre of his stories that creates room for both laughter and tragedy at the same time. It connects with us because it’s the story of our everyday lives. If “roz marra ki zindagi” became a social media influencer, that would be a Hirani movie. Dunki, unfortunately, is not about the “micro” units of people and society, but about the “macro” units of nation and politics. And therefore Hirani trying to tell an emotional people-story here makes it feel shallow, inauthentic and laborious. This genre is best left to either the Anil Sharmas (with their Gadars) or the Meghna Gulzars (with their Raazis and Sam Bahadurs) of the world, depending on your preference.

Dunki is also missing the quintessential narrative style of a good Hirani film. His style is that of satire — or “vyangya” as we describe it more aptly in Hindi. Take Munnabhai 1 and 2, or 3 idiots, or PK. Each of them uses satire as a powerful tool to make us feel, reflect and laugh all at the same time. Much like what a stand up comedian does. Take the satire out, and all you have is a bunch of trite or heard-before jokes, just made louder with a generous dose of Punjabi-ness. Like “I want to go to Lava-tory”! Ugh!

And finally, if disappointing writing and story telling wasn’t bad enough, the actors don’t manage to compensate for any part of this loss either. SRK, after a what seemed like a comeback with Pathaan and Jawaan, misses the ham-trick (I mean hat-trick!) reminding us of everything we had tried to forget this last decade or so. Tapsee Pannu is herself, like in every movie, only worse — with a fake old skin and a grey wig. The supporting cast — Vikram Kochhar, Anil Grover and even Boman Irani — is instantly forgettable. Vicky Kaushal in a guest appearance gives a brief glimmer of hope that quickly fades away.

All in all Mr Hirani, because we love your movies so much, we’re happy for you: you tried a new topic, a new narrative and a new kind of story telling to explore your creative potential and possibilities. But please, could you go back to what you do best? We could do with a good Hirani fix in our grim world today. That’s what we were hoping to get with this one, as we ended 2023 and looked forward to 2024. That’s what we didn’t get, and are so disappointed.

Here’s hoping for the (better) next one!

The writer has a blog, Viewing Room, with more of his thoughts on all things "books, booze and box office". Click here to read.

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