Zoya Akhtar’s teen musical comedy The Archies, an adaptation of Archie Comics, started making news long before the film dropped on Netflix. Many social media users launched a shrill assault because the star cast had names like Amitabh Bachchan’s grandson Agastya Nanda, Shah Rukh Khan’s daughter Suhana Khan and Boney Kapoor’s daughter Khushi Kapoor. One more ‘nepo kids’ controversy, in other words, was inevitable in the age of social media. And, it happened, making unnecessary noise.
Today, The Archies is available online. The storyline will not surprise anyone who knows that a fun-filled Archie comic book is not a mature Alan Moore or a Joe Sacco graphic novel. A red-haired musician in a band, Archibald ‘Archie’ Andrews is the main character of the comic book, who lives in the fictional town of Riverdale located somewhere in the United States. The film’s Riverdale, on the other hand, is a picturesque Indian town that has Anglo-Indian residents.
The film’s story unfolds in the 1960s in a picture-perfect setting. The locations, sets and costumes are eye-catching. The choreography and some of the songs are impressive, too. The writing, however, is not consistently good. What is lacking is humour, which makes the experience of reading an Archie comic book such an easy, breezy affair. Among the actors, Aly Khan as Veronica’s affluent businessman dad Hiram Lodge, Vedang Raina as Archie’s rival Reggie Mantle and Mihir Ahuja as the drummer buddy Jughead Jones shine. Khushi (the simple Betty Cooper) needs to work hard on her dialogue delivery, Suhana is as the rich Veronica Lodge should be, and Agastya, the film’s Archie, is sufficiently promising.
While The Archies does not have a layered narrative, relating to the film without a more-than-casual awareness of the comics can be difficult. The problem is that Archie comics are less popular in modern India. Other reading options have taken their place — in most cases — just as the space for Enid Blyton novels has practically disappeared in modern-day bookstores.
Growing up in a middle-class non-metro environment in the 1980s, this writer was among those countless Indian teenagers who devoured the stories of Archie and his friends. Did these typically American offerings remind us of our day-to-day lives? They certainly did not. The reader grew familiar with the unfamiliar with time, and these comics became a permanent presence on many bookshelves in urban India. The difference between then and now is that fewer modern-day Indian youngsters read Archie comic books today. Besides, almost everybody owns a smartphone, which offers limitless distractions.
Real life is challenging and complicated. The world depicted in the colourful and enjoyable comics is its exact opposite, which the film attempts to re-create and partly succeeds. The film’s best part revolves around how Archie and his teenage buddies prevent Hiram Lodge (Veronica’s father) from procuring a park to start a project. The park is the town’s soul: the shared residence of precious memories. How can a bunch of youngsters play such a crucial role and prevent the destruction of the park? They do it, simply because they are characters born in the pages of Archie Comics, who live in the fictional town of Riverdale.
Netflix informs that The Archies is a ‘Hindi’ film on the platform. Is it? The dialogues have a significant amount of English, making one wonder why. If Riverdale’s society is detached from reality — that is fine — the spoken language of its Anglo-Indian residents could have been Hindi, too. The film has been created in India. But, where are those frequent symbols of Indian-ness one might wish to see? Anybody with such an expectation will be disappointed.
The controversy accompanying The Archies hinges on the launch of ‘nepo kids’ in the well-packaged, well-marketed film. Even if one assumes that the youngsters from film families have benefited from their family connections to get work in The Archies — the assumption is unfair, one must emphasise — it is important to remember that many actors from similar backgrounds have tried to capitalise on the opportunities that have helped them start their careers in the past. History shows that the list of such actors who have failed is longer than those who have succeeded.
If the youngsters from The Archies deliver successful films in future, they will find quality work. If they do not, they will not. Right now, the film should be the focus of discussions. To know how each actor will perform as a successful professional in a competitive world, we must stop being restless and wait for the future.
The writer, a journalist for three decades, writes on literature and pop culture. Among his books are ‘MSD: The Man, The Leader’, the bestselling biography of former Indian captain MS Dhoni, and the ‘Hall of Fame’ series of film star biographies. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely that of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.
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