Victory In Cinema: How far will you go for your “it”?
This month, we explore the myriad of emotions that make cinema what it is today, one article at a time.
How far can we go for victory? Is the destination alone called victory? Or the journey is equally creditable?
Success is best served delayed, to be devoured slowly relishing every pint traded for our blood, tears, and determination to reach our overarching destination.
In our second featurette about exploring emotions, we move through the subtleties of successes as shown in cinema. If you have not checked our first featurette on love yet for this month, what are you waiting for? Go on, click here!
We will be traveling through three widely different movies on how they conceptualize success, visualize it and connect to the audience with it.
1. The Commoner
A definition of success is not universal, especially for the common man. They are small, gratified, and fulfilling.
The relatability factor with the audience helps to make a connection with them. Realism always is a tried and tested formula to portray success stories. Not just the characterization, the mise en scene gives the stimulation for the audience to empathize with the protagonist. The experience is a reflection. The audience considers the protagonist to be their alter ego working in the movie. His sorrows are their grief, his success is their victory, and his tears of joy are their cherished happiness.
Pursuit of Happyness
Need I say more. A whirlwind of bad and good decisions, serendipitous networking, and sheer grit helps a commoner get a job in a stockbroking firm. Chris Gardner, the protagonist, played excellently by Will Smith elevates the storyline. The last walk, after which Chris Gardner weeps his way out to the road, no one stops to ask the reason for his tears, similar to how no one lent a helping hand when he was in spots of bother. What more, Chris never cries so much in his difficult times.
The first teardrop of ultimate victory moves the audience.
The Standout
There are no lengthy dialogues, no victory speeches. There are no tell-tale signs of the financial windfall that is depicted. Only one thing is sure- Chris will never have to run to charity housing communities to live, he need not worry about the next meal for his young son, or daycare penalties.
These resonate. The mundane house, frequent brawls with his wife, cluttered living room, landlord menace, and finally deception, resonate. The world is predominantly made of such people. The color palette is mundane which uplifts the entire cinematography. Nothing seems way too artificial for reality. There are no rhetorical dialogue delivery or dramatic emotional outbursts. Chris’s cramped apartment, the rat race of the workplace, and California’s buzzing streets enhance the realism of the movie.
The protagonist’s victory is not the one defined by “normal public standards of success”. Victory is completely personal as it should be.
The victory is shown in the even footing as the failures. Gardner takes both of them with the same level of comfort.
The typical underdog
The cliché of movies that blare the horns of success, deal with an underdog, who relentlessly pursues his passion to achieve success. The storyline is run of the mill. However, every time this thread of thought is used, the film succeeds.
Why?
The script line is inspiring. Though the end outcome is known, the path towards is always unique. Hassles are different and the situations around them are widely contrasting. Human emotions that revolve around the plot are never the same.
Slumdog Millionaire
Slumdog Millionaire captured the true essence of the underdog’s rags to riches story. The screenplay did everything it could to elevate this repeated storyline. Non-linear story-telling, over-the-shoulder camera angles to assert dominance and quaint costumes gave the right background to Jamal’s character sketch. Whenever Jamal was answering a question, the frame focusses on his face with the blurring of background intact.
In my opinion, Jamal is the epitome of every underdog in the background. Every time he goes one step more in the game, there are high chances he can go down in the mud every time. There is intense competition from the bigger sharks. They cannot digest the fact, that a new, smaller shark is getting a better deal to success. In Jamal’s case, Irrfan Khan and Anil Kapoor play the thugs. There is intense jealousy coursing through the veins of every lord Jamal worked under. There are high tension internal conflicts among Jamal and his brother, who once was a confidante.
The path to success is mired with conspirators and traps to bring down the protagonist. There are diverse mouse traps set along the course keeping the audience on the edge of their seats. They want their messiah to win. Their good Samaritan is tortured, they cannot take it anymore. A few shed tears, others sit horrified in anguish.
The rhetoric is of a higher tone in these movies. The mise en scene is carefully scripted to show that the protagonist cares a lot about the outcome of his dream. The serendipity of meeting the right people, often at the wrong times and the call center antics reflect them.
The Standout
Though relatability is significantly lesser in an underdog story, there is universal popularity and accolade for this. Whenever we see a commoner reaching great heights, the inspiration and strength derived from them keep the storyline successful. A common man feels he too can scale his wildest of dreams.
In a world replete with sadness and sickness, these movies come as a sign of hope and happiness.
The inner peace
Association of victory with an unexpected windfall is just one side of the story. Here, all the middle and lower-income classes feel the intent. However, in a story that deals with a protagonist finding the err of his way and walk towards the higher purpose, a unique standpoint is born.
Iron Man
Robert Downey Junior’s(RDJ) characterization of Iron Man in the Marvel Cinematic Universe is unparalleled. In the first installment of the series, Tony Stark also known as Iron Man is shown as a typical Hollywood “bad boy”. After an unfortunate turn of events, which results in an eye-opening experience, where he realizes the mistakes he and his corporate are responsible for.
He undergoes a massive inner transformation to purge himself. He finds a way out of the mess left around by his company, albeit antithetically. Espousing arms regulation, RDJ uses equally violent weapons to bring down enemies of people. He transforms into a good Samaritan from a bragging playboy.
The camera scenes are strikingly different. When Stark displays the new arms system, he asserts dominance, with the panoramic camera angle showing bombs blasting in the background, with Stark in the center. It clearly tells us, Stark is a self-centered human being relishing just technological success rather than good for the people.
After the metamorphosis, he goes to save the people of Gulmira, the village enslaved by the weapons from the Stark industries. When he blasts all the armory and the monsters yielding them, he stands on one side of the panoramic shot, proving that he alone is not the cause of all change, that there is indeed a greater good. He is just the catalyst to get the change working faster.
The Standout
In cathartic experiences where the bad man realizes the err of his ways, the victory is eternal. There is no going back. When compared to other storylines, the storyline often begins once success is achieved. Hurdles are thrown in the protagonist’s way. They wield the wand of stubborn righteousness which destroys the evils on their paths. Their adamant insistence and energetic persistence pump vitality into the audience.
The audience’s reactions to this case, I feel can be widely different. There can be conflicting emotions that can justify or oppose the storyline. Sometimes a level of aversion can meet the film. Otherwise, a huge adulation can be in the offing if the audience is mature enough to understand no one is perfect.
Here are some movies that had “victory” as its baseline-
1. Soorarai Pottru — Directed by Sudha Kongara
2. Lagaan — Directed by Ashutosh Gowarikar
3. English Vinglish — Directed by Gowri Shinde
4. Coach Carter — Directed by Thomas Carter
5. Wolf of Wall Street — Directed by Martin Scorsese
This is an article celebrating emotions in cinema. Follow Thinnai Talkies for more such insights about Cinema.
About the author: Viji Swami is a bored engineer crushing on old films and hypothetical situations.
