New Delhi: Though 'Gangs of Wasseypur' has received rave reviews but the film is not making huge money. As per trade analyst Taran Adarsh, the film has garnered around Rs 17.7 crore in the first week. He tweets, "Rock-steady GOW picked up gradually and maintained rock-steady figures across weekdays. Collects approx Rs 17.7 cr + nett in Week 1." These figures are satisfactory but nowhere close to what 'Rowdy Rathore' or 'Dabangg' collected in initial seven days. This is almost what recently happened to Dibakar Banerjee's 'Shanghai'. Both the films are said to be endorsing a new brand of cinema that focuses on harsh realities, but they haven't got the kind of opening that usual 'masala' films get.
Anurag Kashyap had praised 'Shanghai' for its content, which was expected to be a voice against blind modernisation. The film was publicised as a political thriller but politics part gets submerged into the thriller like structure of the story. The message remained that 'politicians are corrupt' rather than the 'side effects of mindless industrialisation'.
Here, 'Gangs of Wasseypur' differs from 'Shanghai'. 'GOW' never promises to be anything other than a pure revenge story. The promos were designed around this idea only. The film remains true to the basic notion and never digresses from it. On the other hand, 'Shanghai' tries to encapsulate a lot of things in a limited time period. Further, the director was not making it in two parts, so he had no other option than squeezing all the plots in just 120 minutes. Two stories run parallel in 'Shanghai' with Abhay Deol emerging the real winner of the conflict only towards the end. The climax appears like a rip-off of a Hollywood film where the honest man wins, but where is the debate about the globalisation and its effects on slums.
Shooting and recording techniques show some similarities in both the films. Dark lighting and claustrophobic spaces are aptly used. The camera moves through narrow streets in 'Shanghai' as well as 'GOW'.
However, both the films are very different when it comes to realistic representation. 'Shanghai' is superficial; it doesn't get deep into the lives of slum dwellers, while 'GOW' captures the real essence of the life in small crime affected towns.
One more common thing is the courage and faith that the two directors have shown in their films. Normally, Indian audiences are not exposed to such type of brave attempts where the character's lack of inhibitions could be so disturbing.
These films may not emerge victorious at the box office but they certainly indicate towards the changing face of the Indian cinema.
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