Supermen Of Malegaon Hindi Documentary
About 280Kms away from the dream city of Mumbai lays a small industrial town Malegaon that churns out as many as 300 hundred films a year. Some remakes of Bollywood while some aimed higher to bring Hollywood concepts down to Mollywood as their industry is termed. To escape the harsh reality of their world, its people seek refuge in the fantastical world of cinema giving way to super hits of the town such as Malegaon Ki Sholay. Filmmaker Faiza Ahmad Khan brings to light one such film by documenting its making.
Supermen of Malegaon is a short and sweet 60minuter documentary on the making of Malegaon's most ambitious project Malegaon Ka Superman. The film not only captures the making but also takes you into the bylines of this movie crazy town where everything surrounds cinemas and celebrities. Where a Shah Rukh's image embossed kite would cost 4Rps while Amitabh Bachchan's Don will make it for 6Rps sale, where audience would enjoy a Hindi dubbed Hollywood film as much as they would enjoy a Bollywood film.
Nasir Shaikh is one such cinema buff who breathes films. His passion leads him to direct Malegaon Ka Superman, a first ever film using Chroma technology. The man narrates his bafflement on learning that filmmaking isn't a one man show that the technique he used slice up scenes and place them in order actually meant editing. To bring about some lightheartedness into the grim lives of the residents of Malegaon, Nasir considers a comedy rather than a serious drama and calls his film a technical comedy.
He ropes in a lanky worker Shafique Shaikh to play the superman to bring a certain comic element to the film. His character is also of the sorts who suffers from asthma in air pollution, a superman who does song and dance sequences in lush green farms with his love interest. He is also made to fight with a baddie played by Akram who is also the editor, the singer, the songwriter and narrator of the movie.
Filmmaker Faiza Ahmed Khan portrays the sheer passion of the people towards cinema, their bitter-sweet stories, their struggle for survival where a daily wage of an employee has gone down to 400 rupees a week.
Supermen Of Malegaon is one of the rare endearing gems to make it to theaters. A definite watch for all the aspiring filmmakers who yearn for big budgets, big banners and big star cast. Hats off to PVR Director's Rare for releasing this film!
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