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Indian Express
27-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Indian Express
Bunty Aur Babli turns 20: Abhishek Bachchan, Rani Mukerji's crime caper is a sharp, spirited portrait of middle-class ambition in post-liberalisation India
It was the early 2000s. Aditya Chopra had seen failure, and not just once; the industry had started to lose faith as well as some within his own family. He was no longer the golden boy, and that silence around him was growing heavier. Hence, he made a decision. Not to retreat, but to move and to try something unexpected. He wanted to make a crime caper, with Abhishek Bachchan in the lead. He handed the reins to a young director, known only for a remake, and gave him a story that set out to change the syntax of commercial storytelling. For Yash Raj Films, this was unfamiliar territory. It had none of the soft-focus charm of their romantic sagas. There was no moral compass pointing north. Not even NRI nostalgia to cushion the fall. At its heart, it was about thieves, beneath the ever-watchful eye of capitalism's glimmering tower, stealing not for malice, but for meaning. Many might think this is about Dhoom, with its bikes, its pace, its swagger. That's another story for another day. This is about something else. Something gentler, but sharper. This is about Bunty Aur Babli. On paper, the film read like a loose riff on Bonnie and Clyde, but the comparison falls apart on contact. The conflict, the characters, even the tonal register, everything diverges. There's a deliberate lightness here, a sense of joy that's not accidental. What distinguishes it, though, is its grounding in a newly liberalized Indian economy. What resonates most is the social and generational context from which Bunty and Babli emerge. They're children of a transitional India, where aspiration outpaces infrastructure, where dreams travel faster than opportunity. Their world is shaped by cable television, their life is defined by endless stories of success featuring people like them, but never quite about them. They come from the moral certainties of the middle class, yet no longer find themselves entirely at home in them. So unlike Bonnie and Clyde, their rebellion isn't just romantic or criminal — it's existential. They're not simply running from the law; they're running towards meaning, place, and identity. Bunty (Abhishek Bachchan) comes from Fursatganj. Babli (Rani Mukerji) runs away from Pankinagar. Towns like these don't figure in the imagination of India A. They are not destinations, just glimpses from a moving train, places you pass through on your way elsewhere. The kind of small towns, which Gulzar described as 'chhote chhote shehron se', towns that appear as two-minute railway halts, or as dhaba stops on long, anonymous highways. It's no accident, then, that the film is filled with trains and roads. They're more than just setting, they're the spirit. Movement becomes metaphor. The story sways towards the form of a road movie, but what it really tracks is the velocity of desire, the shape of a search. Bunty and Babli's journey begins with the pulse of 'Dhadak Dhadak', introduced separately (notice Babli, dancing in an akhada, subverting every expectation of the YRF heroine). By the interval, they're together, dancing to 'Nach Baliye', on a set that feels like Broadway filtered through Mumbai, brought alive by Sharmishta Roy. It's more than a spectacle, it's a declaration. They've arrived. Not by permission, but by defiance. Because for towns like Fursatganj and Pankinagar, the law does not build ladders. It builds maps that forget them. Also Read | Bunty Aur Babli 2 review: Saif Ali Khan-Rani Mukerji kindle the old spark At the interval point, another shift takes place, not just in the story, but in the film's very form. This is when Amitabh Bachchan enters as Commissioner Dashrath Singh, tasked with hunting down Bunty and Babli. And with his arrival, something changes. Until now, the film had moved along the undercurrent of contrast, between different Indias, between aspiration and limitation, but that tension remained largely subtextual. With Bachchan's entry, the polarity becomes tonal. The first half of Bunty aur Babli is grounded. It belongs to the soil. Its language, texture, and rhythm echo the realism of Amol Palekar or Basu Chatterjee movies. But post-interval, the film shapeshifts. It leaps into the zone of a Manmohan Desai caper: louder, faster, glossier. The satire gets broader, the stakes more stylized. What was once rooted starts to float. The chase becomes theatrical, the con jobs more elaborate, the narrative more self-aware. And by the end, the homages are unmistakable. This is Catch Me If You Can, filtered through a Bollywood lens, stitched with spectacle and swagger. The film wears its love for the '70s on its sleeve. Look closely, and a Hath Ki Safai poster slips into the mise-en-scène like a memory. Listen carefully, and you'll hear 'Dil Cheez Kya Hai' floating in the background, as Bachchan's voice reflects on lost love. Ranjeet plays Ranjeet. Prem Chopra appears, but not as himself. And Sholay? It haunts the form. Bunty and Babli don the jackets of Jai and Veeru, not as parody but as inheritance. And in the end, there's a moving train, a face-off between an honest cop (read: Thakur) and two outlaws. But the most pointed homage is the casting of Bachchan himself. Once the face of rebellion, the original angry young man, he now stands on the other side. No longer the drifter, no longer the spark, he is the law, the system, the state. He chases what he once embodied. The film, without ever raising its voice, offers a mirror. A deconstruction. Bachchan as Dashrath Singh isn't just a cop chasing thieves, he's really time chasing itself. He's a myth returning to watch its own unravelling. You can almost sense that director Shaad Ali is working from a place of deep fascination. His enthusiasm doesn't just sit on the surface, it feels visceral, alive in every frame. But at no point does this passion overwhelm the story. Instead, it powers it from within. His gaze is packed with ideas, and what's remarkable is how effortlessly he brings each one to life. There's also a clear and genuine love for the song-and-dance tradition of Bombay cinema. Shaad doesn't treat music as decoration, he uses it to its fullest potential. Each song becomes a narrative moment, revealing themes, emotions, even entire storylines. But the real giant here — the cultural juggernaut, is Kajra Re. It's the song that defined a decade. Shaad Ali never directed a bigger musical moment. Alisha Chinai never sang a more iconic hit. Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy never produced a more crowd-moving track. And Aishwarya Rai never danced with such massy charm and controlled fire. Even Gulzar, always philosophical, hit a rare balance here between the everyday and the eternal. Just look at the lines: 'Surmein se likhe tere waade, aankhon ki zubaani aate hain': a love promise written not in ink but in gaze. Or 'Aankhein bhi kamaal karti hain, personal se sawaal karti hain': as if eyes alone could interrogate intimacy. These are the kinds of lines you might find scribbled on the back of a truck, but in Gulzar's hands, they take on something almost existential. Speaking of memorable lines, you simply can't talk about Bunty Aur Babli without bringing up Jaideep Sahni's writing. As always, he returns to the themes he knows best: middle-class morality, amidst the changing fabric of post-liberalised India. And yet, even within this familiar terrain, he manages to craft a story that feels both fresh and utterly relatable. You could easily go on at length about Sahni's sharp writing. But often, just one scene, or even a single moment, a single line, is enough to reveal the depth of his craft. Take the wildly audacious moment when Bunty and Babli con a foreigner by 'selling' the Taj Mahal. Just moments earlier, a corrupt minister is confronted by a furious crowd chanting, 'Tanashahi nahi chalegi!' She snaps back, 'Arey kiski?' And the crowd replies — 'Kisi ki bhi.' That's it. That's Sahni for you. His writing doesn't shout, it slices. With one line, he can expose an entire system. With one exchange, he can turn satire into truth.
Indian Express
27-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Indian Express
‘Never imagined Aishwarya Rai, Abhishek Bachchan's wedding would be Kajra Re's outcome': Vaibhavi Merchant recalls Aditya Chopra predicted song's iconic status
Today marks 20 years of Shaad Ali's 2005 blockbuster romantic comedy Bunty Aur Babli, and also two decades of arguably one of the most popular 'item' songs of Hindi cinema: 'Kajra Re'. Featuring Amitabh Bachchan, Aishwarya Rai, and Abhishek Bachchan, the track, composed by Shankar-Ehsan-Loy, sung by Alisha Chinai, and written by Gulzar, was choreographed by Vaibhavi Merchant. In an exclusive interview with SCREEN, she opens up on her memories of filming the song. Do you remember the brief you got for Kajra Re? I'd already shot for 'Dhadak Dhadak' and 'Chup Chup Ke'. After that, I was in for a surprise when they told me they want to do a song with Mr. Bachchan and Abhishek. They wanted to do a fusion qawwali-meets-mujra, if I can call it that. I remember I was also called for the song recording. It was one of the first songs to be recorded at Yash Raj Studio, so that turned out to be lucky. Everybody thought Kajra Re was a slow-burn. But Adi (Aditya Chopra) and Shaad thought it was very rooted and had the perfect ingredients of a mass song. When Adi saw the entire choreography, he said to me, 'This is going to be a song revered for a long time. It's going to be extremely popular and going to go down in history.' So he had the vision to predict it would be a chartbuster. But it wasn't entirely accessible, thanks to Gulzar's lyrics, right? How did you work around that? He gave some unbelievable lyrics! When I heard the line, 'Ballimaran se Daribe talak,' I asked Gulzar sahab, 'Ye kya hai?' (laughs). I had to really acquire the taste of Gulzar sahab. I had to do my homework and go back to the legendary work he'd done in the past, like Aandhi (1975). Of course, I had already worked with him in (daughter) Meghna Gulzar's Filhaal (2002, her directorial debut), and briefly in a film of Vishal Bhardwaj. I could spend hours and hours of listening to his anecdotes. I even had the audacity to ask him to make the lyrics simpler (laughs). Can you walk us through the shoot? How thrilling or chaotic was it? When I began choreographing, I had my two lucky mascots — Abhishek and Rani Mukerji — they arrived for my rehearsals on Day 1. We'd become great friends through Bunty Aur Babli. We were pals, would hang out at Shaad's place, have the most amazing kebabs and biryani. When I choreographed the beginning, 'Aisi nazar se dekha uss zaalim ne chowk par,' Rani and Abhishek would go all 'wah wah, wah wah!' We started shooting on Abhishek's birthday. We were cutting his cake, and I said, 'Guys, when are we shooting the song?' I have only four days. Adi had given a very tight deadline. We started only post-lunch. I told everyone, 'Let's give Abhishek his best birthdays shoot and do this song well.' Kajre Re also turned out to be an iconic song because of its casting coup, right? Yes, it was the first song of the father-son duo, Bachchan sir and Abhishek, together. Abhishek was quite nervous. But I told him not to worry, and that I'd balance it out well. When Mr. Bachchan is on set, he's not a father. There are no personal equations coming in the way. He's a thorough professional. He'd remain in character. He'd even appreciate the costume designer for giving nice costumes to the back dancers. Meanwhile, Abhishek is a different temperament on set. He's all about fun and pranks. Then Adi broke the news to me much later, about a month before the shoot, that the female lead in the song would be Aishwarya Rai. That was like life coming a full circle because I'd worked with Aishwarya in Dholi Taro Dhol Baaje (Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam, 1999, for which Merchant won a National Award). I'd also worked with her in Devdas (2002), Kuch Naa Kaho (2003), and Kyun! Ho Gaya Naa… (2004). Aishwarya had not done anything like Kajra Re before, so she asked me if she'd be able to do it. I said, 'Of course!' Aishwarya was also a surprise for the audience, right? Yes, Aish was on a sabbatical before Kajra Re. This was her coming back. She came back with a different energy. So I worked on her ada and nuances. We almost had to announce her return. Non-social media days had their own advantages. We've forgotten the joy of being swept away by the euphoria in a cinema hall. People were dancing in single screens! They felt they were a part of the film. The industry also sat up and took notice. I won all the awards, except Filmfare. I'm still terribly upset with them (laughs). I think 'Kaisi Paheli Zindagani' from Parineeta won the award that year. Aishwarya is wooing Amitabh Bachchan as Abhishek tries to woo her, where did that come from? I hadn't gotten any brief on that, but they shot the scene before that on the set. So when Aishwarya says, 'Aye handsome,' and it's directed towards Mr. Bachchan, that set the tone for the song. So we shot it like a proper musical, which follows the staging of a scene. So, all the fun and masti in the song comes from Abhishek, the ada comes from Aish, and of course, the swag, style, and let-me-show-you-how-it's-done business comes from Mr. Bachchan. So you had three different characters working together in the song. A couple of years later, when Abhishek married Aishwarya, did you give yourself some credit? This is my story with a lot of actors, who start out as friends and turn into lovers on my set. I'm happy these divine interventions do happen, and I get to be a part of them. Sometime, I could even write a book on this (laughs). But obviously, nobody thought of it then. I never imagined this as the outcome of that moment. They were all thorough professionals. Did Rani not have FOMO that she wasn't a part of Kajra Re? No, not really. Her character was pregnant in the film during that scene, so she couldn't have danced. And Rani is a team player! She's like a co-director on the film. She understood this song was extremely important for the film at that point. Imagine the cop, who's chasing the thief, is dancing with him! This can happen only in Indian cinema! My favourite song from Bunty Aur Babli is 'Dhadak Dhadak'. How did you crack that one? Since Shaad comes from the Mani Ratnam school, he structured the song very differently. Usually, in a duet, the male and female voices jam with each other. But in 'Dhadak Dhadak', we first see Bunty's world, then Babli's, and then we see them intercut with each other. We shot across the ghats of Varanasi, lanes of Kanpur, and a palace in Lucknow. Shaad is from Kanpur so he knew the city inside out. Then we also experimented with the back dancers so that we get the faces of small town right: there are panwalas, hawkers, Naga Sadhus. The train was the connection between both the characters. So we had to time our shots in a way that we caught the train coming in the background. Also Read — Shaad Ali reveals Amitabh Bachchan was initially hesitant about 'Kajra Re': 'Yeh gaana shoot hi mat karo, yeh nahi chalega' Finally, 'Chup Chup Ke' is a tribute to the Yash Chopra brand of romantic songs. What are your memories of making that one? Shooting with Shaad Ali is like 70% of madness on set. He'd think of going where no one has. We shot the song in Ladakh, where none of us had filmed before. Abhishek had shot at these tough terrains for Refugee (2000, debut film) so he had come prepared. Rani was also doing fine. But a lot of crew members were falling sick. We didn't see the sun for days, there was an overcast. It was freezing, but Rani and Abhishek had to touch the stream water and look all pristine. We just survived on cup noodles on that shoot (laughs)!
