Film-sy Publicity

Being a Maqbool well-wisher (I liked the film and the music), I've been observant of its publicity strategy, for it's not the run-of-the-mill film and would not be a natural contender for box office success. I find that most people had not heard about it. A leading Pune bookstore had no idea about the music album of the film. Almost everyone else I've mentioned the name to have had such blank expressions that I tried to reason why that would be the case. So I tried keeping a close eye on film trailers and saw a couple of interesting things. Maqbool's recall value is likely to be limited: the music isn't the low-life temporary junk food that it is surrounded by. The actors are top class, but not one who would have a great mass following. Even Tabu seems to suffer from the tag of aaj kal woh aise hii filme.n kartii hai. Until very recently, there haven't been any anticipatory articles in the print or web media (which are the ones I frequent). Probably, there aren't too many funds to spend and they're holding it back for the last week before the release (Jan 30). Vishal was on MTV Fresh with Cyrus, Tabu's article appeared in the Pune Times of India, and the trailers have increased in frequency of appearance and in variety. It does seem likely that Maqbool won't, barring a surprising assertion of latent appreciation for quality among people, do that well. Still Vishal has two new projects coming up, one of them with Shekhar Kapur.

From my close watch of trailers: the Dharma Productions' Kal Ho Naa Ho still has many spots, and is probably the most frequent of film trailers. The ghastly looking Aetbaar also enjoys strong marketing backup from Cutting Edge Entertainment (their maiden venture), it seems.

*** Raghu Romeo made by FTII grad Rajat Kapoor (more known for playing assorted uncles in Dil Chahta Hai and Monsoon Wedding) is another film that is facing oblivion, even before a proper release. Which is a shame, for the film starring Vijay Raaz & Maria Goretti has received a lot of acclaim and awards (got a top prize at the MAMI festival in Mumbai). The film has been ready for a long while now and Kapur is understandably despondent that he hasn't been able to get distribution for his labour of love. One hopes he will have some luck this year.

Trivia note: Rajat Kapoor who is often mixed up with Rajit Kapur (of Byomkesh Bakshi fame) first made his presence felt in the Bhatt camp's TV production Zameen Aasmaan which also starred Rajit Kapur.

*** Rounding off my little troika of disappointments at lack of awareness of quality entertainment, I was very surprised to hear a bunch of people claim that they had never heard of J.R.R.Tolkien. The profile of these people was English-speaking, software types who have definitely watched the LOTR films. Whether this "ignorance" was for the purposes of a game of 20 Questions (where Tolkien was the person to be identified, to which that team got to a "dead British fiction-writing author who writes stories based on the themes of war, but isn't strictly a children's writer, and whose books have turned into films") was not clear, but I still don't think it was such an obscure choice as all my teammates had heard of it.