नमन नटवरा, विस्मयकारा

 The golden, ornamented frame that borders the screen at the beginning makes sure you know that, what is going to unfold on screen next is going to be grandiose. For the next couple of hours, the movie Balgandharva more than fulfils this expectation. For someone like me, who has never seen the Sangeet Naatak era in Maharashtra, the movie definitely has a charm of its own. Although its not nostalgia, because I’ve never lived in those times, it makes me want to go back there. The movie succeeds in showcasing not just the life but also the times of Naaraayan Shreepaad Raajhans a.k.a. Baalgandharva.

The movie depicts the characters, the culture and the historic details extremely authentically. The director and the movie team hasn’t fallen prey to over-dramatising any part of the script. Finding faces that match the real persons of the time is never an easy job but it has been executed with perfection in case of this movie. Right from Nitin Chandrakant Desai himself playing Lokmaanya Tilak to Prachi Mhatre as Gauhar bai, everyone seems to be just cut out for the role. I have seen some of the characters only in photos or portraits but my mother has seen many of them in real life when she was a kid. According to her, there could be no better Raam Ganesh Gadkari than Manoj Kolhatkar and Ajay Purkar as Bhaaskar bua Bakhle is just perfect!

Of course, the highlight of the movie is Subodh Bhave in the role of Baalgandharva. Or should I say the highlight is his stree party get up, his costumes and his body language. I have never seen a transvestite so beautiful! It may be that the make up and camera techniques have played a part in it but for me, Subodh actually looks much more womanly than any stree party ever, even Baalgandharva himself. However, credit goes to the director in maintaining the balance between the on-stage, female Baalgandharva and the off-stage, masculine Naaraayan. Subodh Bhave has done a great job of limiting the femininity to the scenes in which he is on stage, acting and then reverting to male behavior in others. There’s a scene where Naaraayan is seen with his wife in a stree party costume because his wife insists on seeing him wearing one. This scene could easily have become a weird romantic scene with a lesbian-esque quality to it. But it doesn’t and that’s where the expertise of Ravindra Jadhav as director and Subodh Bhave as actor, lie.

One complaint I had about Ravindra Jadhav’s previous masterpiece, Natrang, was that it claimed to show authentic Laavani performances which was simply not the case. The songs were good but the choreography was no where near real Laavani performance. Younger generation that hasn’t seen the real Laavani has come to think of the Natrang-version as the real stuff. However, in case of Balgandharva, the team has maintained the authenticity of the music, lyrics, stage performance and  costumes from the old Pada (पदं). Hence, it would be a renaissance for the Naatya Sangeet if the music of this movie goes on to become popular with the younger crowd.

Ravindra Jadhav has also done a great job at only subtly hinting at a controversial aspect of Balgandharva’s life which was his conversion to Islam. For those who do not know his life and times, this might not even figure as what is being shown. After his involvement with Gauhar bai, it is said, that he changed his religion. The mix qawwali-bhajan number, Parvardigaar, does a great job of hinting at this possibility extremely subtly. It is not made into an obvious part of the script, thus keeping the focus on Baalgandharva as a performer rather than on his personal life.

All in all, the movie is a great masterpiece, very apt as a tribute to probably the greatest performer on Marathi stage, Naaraayan Shreepaad Raajhans a.k.a. Baalgandharva.