New Delhi: The thirst of Indians for their own superheroes was quenched to some extent in ‘Krrish’. The popularity of the film was so high among the distributors that the rights to its sequel are sold at a record price even before the formal start of shooting.
‘Robot’ achieved another level for superhero films in India. The digital effects shown in ‘Robot’ were far greater in every respect than the earlier films of the same genre. It simply brought Indian films at par with the Hollywood.
Now, ‘RA.One’ promos are giving us the glimpses about what kind of superhero film can we expect. The techniques look fine and cinematography appears world class in these teasers, but there was a time when Indian superhero films meant highly stupid copies of Hollywood films.
Puneet Issar, a man with huge body and deep husky voice, was among the earlier Bollywood actors to give superhero roles a shot. His ‘Indian Superman’ featured the same basic story of a baby boy sent to earth from the doomed planet Krypton, but rest of the story was made indigenous.
This time, Clark Kent had changed name to Shekhar who has to stop Verma from enacting evil plans with help of his girlfriend Gita. Scenes of natural disasters fall flat due to the unavailability of proper techniques. Superman’s take offs and landings were pathetically funny which Issar tried very hard to control with the showcase of his physical prowess. He looked amazingly weird in red underwear, which seemed to be not holding his weight despite hardest efforts.
Then, Govinda and Kimi Katkar were seen dancing as Superman and Spiderman in ‘Dariya Dil’. The chroma technique, which the makers had used to illustrate them flying, showed bizarre rays and shadows attached to their feet.
Besides this, nobody knew why the Superman is dancing in such suggestive manner. Jackie Shroff’s ‘Shiva ka Insaaf’ was a regular revenge tale where Bhola alias Shiva had to avenge the murder of his parents with the help of some supernatural weapons.
Credited as India’s first 3D film, ‘Shiva ka Insaaf’ became bearable only due to Ashok Mehta’s superb cinematography. This was the first serious attempt to create an Indian superhero. However, the public rejected the film.
‘Ajooba’ was Amitabh’s take on superheroes, in which he failed miserably.
‘Ajooba’ looked like a film straight out of the director’s dream. A cross between western superhero flicks and eastern Alif Laila sort of stories, ‘Ajooba’ made people cry more than the villains. The story of Baharistan and Fauladi Shaitan left audiences crave whole heartedly for some respite from Amitabh Bachchan and his horse. Some even wished the horse to crush them.
Junior Bachchan also did not lag behind in making fun of superheroes in ‘Drona’. Probably worst superhero film till date, ‘Drona’ provided KK Menon ample chance to made fun of his talent. Menon as Riz Raizada would not like to count ‘Drona’ among the films that he signed in complete sense.
So far, most of the attempts to come up with a good Indian superhero film have been in vein. Now, when we have better technicians and more funds to invest, it would be interesting to see how we use them. Let’s see if ‘RA.One’ ends our wait or not.
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