Democratic and fair Indian film awards

On Friday, CNN–IBN had conducted a live chat with their Entertainment editor Rajeev Masand where the topic of discussion was need for fair and democratic Bollywood awards.Yours truly was also a part of the chat.During the one hour chat Masand was queried by cinéastes about the problem and his thoughts on it . Some have also begun a initiative of Twi-fi awards based out of Twitter dismayed by the hopeless proceedings.

There are a lot of things going wrong right now. Filmmakers whose film are in contention are part of the jury, people with no credibility are the judges, sponsors and channels appease stars by creating award categories for all and sundry.

One chatter even suggested sarcastically that why not we have categories like ‘Best actor having weight above 80 kilos’ or ‘Best actress with first name starting from A’ ?

Filmfare, the oldest and seemingly the most prestigious of all awards holds no credibility. There are a host of supporting reasons for this. Among other things, primarily, how can Filmfare be credible if they hold it YashRaj studios? We don’t have indoor studios in India?

What is the deal with best couple and power awards? The number of awards being handed out is insane and is unashamedly sycophancy. The glory and the importance of an award is lost, if everyone goes home with one.

I agree to an extent that equal weightage should be given to public opinion and critics' opinion. But sometimes the public doesn’t know how good a film is until actually told by someone of its ingenuity. I didn’t appreciate Citizen Kane before I came to realise the multiple layers in that film. I didn’t fully appreciate Jean-Luc-Godard’s Breathless in one viewing either. It’s the job of a learned critic to give critical insights so that the audience knows and appreciates better. Ultimately opinions are subjective, but an opinion has to given its voice too.

Look at the nominations in Filmfare for Best Director.

The question to be considered should be what new has the director offered directorially? A new cinematic vision maybe? That way, ideally Dibakar Banerjee for LSD, Vikramaditya Motwane for Udaan and Habib Faisal for Do Dooni Chaar should be the strongest contenders. Sadly,only Motwane had been nominated.

That is a problem; the award is given to director and not direction. Some directors like Sanjay Bhansali are considered auteurs even after they make bad films and term it as a secret remake. What the heck is a secret remake? Take a Spanish film, and set it up in Indulgent Street, Over-rated Corner, Bhansali Land?

His nomination has discouraged some new director who had made a better film .

Masand answering to a question said ‘I am just saying - are Salman, Shahrukh, Hrithik, Ajay Devgan, Ranbir the only best performances in the year? Why hasn't anyone nominated Rajat Barmecha and Ronit Roy for Udaan, or Arshad Warsi for Ishqiya, or Manu Rishi for Phas Gaye Re Obama, or Rishi Kapoor for Do Dooni Chaar? Why the shameless pandering to stars?’

And why Neetu Kapoor is not nominated for best actor female for Do Dooni Chaar is beyond me. Why, because she has crossed 50? Why is Neha Chauhan, who played the night-shift girl at the supermarket in LSD is not nominated ?

India has a host of award shows, but each has their own pressures and compulsions. We need an award that isn’t determined by a star's presence or by sponsor's demands. India needs a credible film academy awards and Bollywood needs website like www.rottentomatoes.com, where reviews are from authors that are certified members of various writing guilds or film critic associations. No 3-4-5 stars for films, let the review on the film be aggregated and made a percentage of, like rotten tomatoes. It gives better range and idea of how good or bad the film is.

This will take a couple of years to digest for a star crazy fan base, but the art of cinema needs to be respected with credible people voting. Sorry to say but the industry doesn’t have many. Winning an BAFTA/Academy Award means something, even being nominated should be a challenge and an honour. The new Film Academy awards should

• Respect performance not name
• Don’t stretch the list be, fearless.
• Reduce the number of nominees, five at maximum.
• If there are only 3 performances worth mentioning, then there should be only 3 nominees.
• Reduce all these ridiculous categories like best villain, comedian etc.
• No shared awards.Someone will lose that doesn’t make the film/person that lost any poorer
• Lifetime achievement awards should not be restricted to actors. Why not give them to film-makers, technicians, music composers, etc?
• Two categories for music – best original song, best original album
• Two categories for story – original, adapted (from literature, not Hollywood)
• Best short film, best documentary
• Like OSCAR/BAFTA keep sponsor's away and let awards be fair and neutral and hence it will become reputed

I am optimistic, that if enough people get together, there maybe a visible change and a free democratic award set by a Film Academy would take place. January 29 Filmfare awards would suggest otherwise though.