Superboys of Malegaon Movie Review — Tiff 2024 — Sucharita Tyagi

To come to one of the biggest film festivals in the world.

And on the very first day watch a movie about making movies.

A good time was had by all.

Mahrashtra ki Nasik district ke Malegaon ka naam meri yadaasht mein do baar suna hai, iss film se pehle. Ek baar terror attacks ke chalte when this little city was in the news in 2008, and doosra when a documentary called Superman Of Malegaon was suddenly all everyone was talking about, a few years after. I never got around to watching that Faiza Ahmaed Khan documentary, but it doesn’t matter because Zoya Akhtar did, which is where the idea of the film first germinated.

Toh yeh film is based on the life of Nasir Shaikh, an amateur filmmaker who gained some notoriety in the late 90s and early 2000s thanks to his parody films, most notably Malegao ke Sholay, there was a version of Shaan, and later came his magnum opus Malegaon ka Superman. Aside from the documentary, there has some coverage of this micro Malegao movie industry in the media as well, kuch news stories aap YouTube par dekh sakte hain.

Naturally ek filmmaker ke liye yeh kahaani, yeh setup, exciting hai as an opportunity to explore a side of humanity you don’t get an insight into every day. Reema Kagti as a filmmaker has obvious curiosities she likes to find answers to through her work. Talaash, Gold, Dahaad, things she directs attempt to peel back the obvious. The scenarios she presents are wild and once people who are used to a certain way society exists, are over the initial shock and have gotten that response out of our systems, we soon become active participants in her curious intentions as well. What compels a serial killer to murder, how does a newly independent, poor, and broken nation stand on its own, what happens after you die? As her own earlier film Talaash proclaims, the answer lies within.

So Reema Kagti, writer Varun Grover and an abundance of some of the finest young Indian actors go deep within Malegaon, its film industry to look for stories of human grit, ambition, and innovation.

This search leads them to unearthing things cinema is capable of within a community. The opening montage of this film shows you different men of Malegaon, wrapping up their day’s work, and meeting at their local cinema hall to watch a film. One boy works in a mill, one is a broke aspiring writer, one assists as a wedding video maker, another runs a khajoor shop. But when they get together and grab the best seats to watch Salman Khan in Judwa, their worlds and imaginations give rise to an alternate reality where they turn into people who discuss Buster Keaton, Charlie Chaplin, the classics that birthed movies like Judwa.

Among these friends, Nasir’s elder brother runs a small make-shift theatre of his own where they show pirated versions of international films, in the hopes that the local audience will appreciate a different kind of cinema as well. Mera aur Nasir bhai ka agenda same hai life mein it seems.

Kya hota hai aage, who na bataate huye, the story reaches a point where Nasir and his group of friends come together to make their own film, so they can retain all rights and also itch a very specific itch, while staying within their means in Malegaon. Nasir and Shafique, played by Adarsh Gaurav and Shashank Arora sing in the beginning of the film about never leaving Malegaon, never being able to make something of their lives. Toh joh hai yaheen karna hai. It’s jeena yahaan marna yahaan of Raj Kapoor and yeh dosti hum nahi todenge of Sholay. Cinema is oxygen in their lungs.

In DOP Swapnil Sonawane’s frames, Malegaon’s landscapes become dreamscapes, as its inhabitants go from boys to Superboys. Adarsh Gaurav is particularly impressive as Nasir. An innovator, a provocateur, Adarsh embodies the character in his slender frame like an actor clearly on a mission to leave a mark. It is always a gift to see Adarsh perform, and Superboys is no exception. When Nasir is pacing outside the theatre during his movie’s inaugural screening, Adarsh and Reema skillfully and tenderly break a 4th wall, showing directly to their audience what goes into making a film, especially when it involves so much of the filmmaker’s personal honesty. As one of the first few people in the world to watch the film during its very first TIFF press screening, that moment took on an even more important meaning. Adarsh, as the central character and the nucleus, shoulders this and countless other scenes with stunning ability.

Not to be left behind, the remaining cast also elevates each scene they are in. Manjiri Pupala plays Trupti, the sole female actor Nasir hires to play the love interest in all his films. Trupti is a young mother in an abusive marriage, and acting in Nasir’s cinema is literal and metaphorical escape both. Like a modern day Basanti, Trupti breezes into their ilves like a girl who knows no fear, but Manjiri’s performance breathes life into this character which could have remained a Hindi cinema stereotype. The vulnerability underneath the façade peaks through at some of the more moving moments of the film.

Shashank Arora and Vineet Kumar Singh deliver knockout performances, as one would expect them to. Vineet is Faarogh, the ONE superboy who manages to leave town and get cruelly close to having a career in Mumbai, par Javed Akhtar se milkar photo khinchaane ke aage baat badhti nahi. Kisi film mein film ki patkatha likhne waale ka role likhne ki opportunity ko Varun grover bilkul nahi chhorte hain. As he gets the actor to say “Writer baap hota hai”, Vineet exhales and roars powerfully.

Superboys of Malegaon doesn’t paint a rosy picture of the reality it occupies. “Yeh dekho small town ke log kitne cute hote hain aww” waali trap ko bohot sakshamta se side-step karke film kisi false sense of comfort ya hope dene mein interested nahi hai. Malegaon jaise shehron mein upward mobility ke liye laakhon papad belne ke baad bhi success haath nahi lage, yeh possibility real hai. The tragic setting lends itself beautifully to the opportunity to explore the respite a make-believe world of story-telling can provide in a place like Malegaon. Ek aadmi ko cancer hua hai, par doctor bhi usko diagnosis samjhaane ke liye Rajesh Khanna ki film Anand ka sahaara leta hai, unironically.

There IS a romantic angle Nasir gets which is presented with the promise of becoming a much bigger conflict than it eventually does, making one question the pay-off of the investment it asked of you up-front. However, just as the sub-plot lies forgotten, soon enough your hand is held so tightly by everyone else in this cast, it ceases to matter. Anuj Singh Duhan who agrees to go bald to play an “impactful villain”, and Shashank Arora who floats away in a rubber tube apparently taking him to a different planet, It is all revealed in how delightfully unhinged reality was for these people for a few short years.

Superboys of Malegaon eventually is a despondent tale wrapped in a feel-good package. The closing credits make it abundantly cleal that perhaps until this moment when the film is being spoken about at TIFF, this story lay largely forgotten, most men and a few women associated with the pioneers of Malegaon’s film industry eventually didn’t amount to much. I would even say the writing struggles momentarily to find this balance — of giving hope and taking it away at the same time.

But because it leaves you with a feeling ki chalo kuch saal kisi ne mazey toh kiye, aapada mein koi avasar toh khoja, the eventual vibe is, to put it simply, wholesome.

Movie should be out in January in theatres, and soon after on prime video!

So, on a scale of 1 to 10, Superboys Of Malegaon is….2 films back by Excle Entertainment are at TIFF.