Never Let Go Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro

This weekend, re-releasing for the first time since it first hit screen almost 30 years ago is a cult classic that came to define comedy and satire in Hindi films: Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro.

      Arguably one of the best films of the 1980s, JBDY emerged from the collective helming the parallel cinema movement that was mostly funded by the NFDC at the time. Kundan Shah opted to use satire and wit as his weapons of choice to depict the human condition, a running theme of the New Wave.

    The story of two bumbling photographers who inadvertently get involved in a case of corruption and scandal between a builder, a municipal commissioner, and a magazine editor is timless and perhaps even more relevant today. One comic sequence after another builds up towards a hilarious, extended climax that will have you rolling with sidesplitting laughter, a high point reached during the Mahabharat performance on stage where  corpse takes on the role of Draupadi. And even as you recover your breath from all that chortling, the irony of the dark culmination will drown you in despair.

    Superlative performances from the ensemble especially Naseeruddin Shah, the late Ravi Baswani, Satish Shah, and the entire ensemble ensure that the genius script gets its due.

   Shah takes a dig at evry institution – government, media, private enterprise – with thinly veiled allusions to people and circumstances of real life. The film has now come to signify a sense of artistic freedom that seems so lacking in movies today. Shah’s personal tributes to his friends and film heroes – protagonists named Sudhir Mishra and Vinod Chopra, a park called Antonioni that is the settling of a blown up photograph – complete the masterwork.

    The film hasn’t aged. Made in a paltry 7 lakh, its place a classic of Indian cinema is forever indisputable and will continue to serve as inspiration – as it has in the last three decades – for many more films to come. Shah has even hinted at his own possible sequel. Can’t wait.

   Most of you have probably already seen this films. If you haven’t , you’re probably under-25 and it might take a moment or two for those who saw their first film on a computer screen to come to terms with a 130+minute film with a slighty washed out look set in the 80s; but be assured that ultimately Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro will win you over. Again and again. An all time classic, not to be missed on the big screen.