‘I’m allergic to awards’
For me awards and their corresponding events are at best entertaining events. At worse, they are worthless ,not vis-a-vis who is given which award but in terms of their structure itself.
Filmmaking is a team effort. The director may win an award although it was a technician on his team who did the good work. Similarly, a technician may win an award although the director may have actually covered up all his silly flaws.
Ironically, there was plenty of euphoria when Resul Pokutty won an Oscar. But most people didn’t know about the work he had done earlier in 50 films ranging from the good, and the bad to the ugly. As soon as he won an Oscar, sound design became trendy. But does anyone know who all have won the Best Sound trophies at our desi award functions all these years? By the way, I had not met a single person who talked about the sound design of Slumdog Millionaire till he won an Oscar for it.
Coming to actors’ performances, if the comparison for instance, is between Aamir Khan for X role and Salman Khan for Y role and Shah Rukh Khan for Z role, my question is what if SRK had played the Y role, Aamir the Z and Salman the X? How can one know whether they would have done better than the other actor or not? So are they giving awards to actors or to the characters they have portrayed?
The impact of any character depends on several factors such as the screenplay, the co-actors, the editing and the direction. An actor cannot take sole credit for his performance. Unlike as in theatre, cinematic acting can only be judged by what happens between the beginning and the end of a shot. It is during this time span that the actor draws upon an emotion on cue and stops it when the director calls, “Cut!”
Again, at times a performance can be completely screwed up by the director on the editing table or if it is wrongly placed in the screenplay or because of the ineffective reaction of a co-actor.
I have always maintained that my successful films are due to my team and my failures are due to me alone. When a film of mine works and I am praised for it, I know in my heart which specific individual has elevated a certain moment, scene or the entire film itself.
All those closely or remotely associated with awards have to understand that technicians and actors work towards satisfying the director. And the director works towards satisfying the audience. The very concept of those who don’t have the ABC knowledge of cinema, deciding and presenting awards, is ridiculous. Whenever I hear of film award fuctions or see their telecasts, I get an allergic rash.
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