Subhash K Jha, in a new installment of the This Day That Year series, looks at Rajiv Rai’s Asambhav (Impossible), 23 July 2004, starring Arjun Rampal, Naseeruddin Shah and Priyanka Chopra.
It may take you a while to figure out why the film is called Asambhav. Out of the blue—or is it purple? — In the second half, the mystery is solved when the 60-plus Indian high commissioner to Switzerland (Sharat Saxena) catches hold of a severely underdressed, suspiciously underage staffer and smooches her torridly in full camera view…all 6 or 7 of them. We’re counting the number of cameras, not the smooches.
Rajiv Rai is in many ways the guru of hi-tech potboilers in Hindi. He shoots this gun-gals-gizmo film on international terrorism with a multitude of cameras. Often, we get split-screen views of the conflict at hand with different cameras capturing the characters at different places simultaneously as they tackle the drama and politics of terrorism. At times, we don’t know where to look. After a while we give up.
Rai doesn’t lag behind in technique. The techno-driven soundtrack gives a jagged edge to the mission-Asambhav format of the plot, as our strong-and-silent commando officer Arya (Arjun Rampal) goes about the task of rescuing the India president (Mohan Agashe) from a chaotic clutter of villains.
Oh, the rogues come in all sizes shapes and age. From the blonde bomb-shrill Shawar Ali to the super-blonde Naseeruddin Shah who exerts his cool demeanour on a script that allows an actor of his stature no breathing space.
There are no porous surfaces in Rai’s stifling thriller. He clutters the plot with more characters than participants at a rock concert clamouring for attention in various wigs, get-ups, and attitudes. Tu cheesy badi hai mast mast?
There are three clearly demarcated levels of villainy. In one corner, we’ve Pakistani ‘general’ Milind Gunaji and terrorist Mukesh Rishi plotting to relieve India of Kashmir. In another corner of the crowded plot, there’s Naseeruddin Shah and soul-brother Tom Alter running a kind of mercenary ashram for the wannabe millionaires of the world. And then there’s the Indian high commission in Switzerland, over-loaded with caricatural characters, including a Brahminical poet who recites the worst couplets we’ve ever heard.
To decode the motivations of the different diabolical factions is an asambhav task. Let’s just say the villains and their under-dressed molls have a field day, grunting and gyrating to the invisible sound of a drumbeat that takes the narration closer to catastrophe with every passing beat.
On some level, Asambhav could’ve served as a thrill-a-minute indigenous Mission Impossible with the Kashmir issue at its backdrop. But the crowded carnival of clamorous characters (a trait common to Rajiv Rai’s oeuvre) and a certain inherent tiredness in the telling of the terrorist’s tale robs the film of its basic stock-value.
Some of the action scenes by Mahendra Verma are conceived cannily. When the villains, the hero and his Bihari sidekick (Jamal Khan, who gets to mouth one of the pearls, “I want to build my bungalow next to Lalu’s”) head for the prolonged climax, shot in a picturesque castle which has surely seen better tourists, Arjun Rampal comes into his own as an action hero. His controlled body movements and his overall penchant for understatement in a film that shrieks for attention, is a relief.
Priyanka Chopra playing the archetypal crooner-cum-club-dancer (didn’t she do it in her release Plan too?) has grown more confident before the camera. If only filmmakers would use her glamour more temperately instead of scattering it all over like confetti at a rowdy boys’ reunion party. Curiously, though the film swarms with slithering senoritas, no one registers as a real entity. Viju Shah’s music and Remo’s choreography are, at best, bland. The cinematographer Sukumar Jatania scampers after the impatient narrative. No shot lasts for longer than 10 seconds. No character on the run ever gets to complete his task. The cameras do the needful.
What’s truly astonishing is the absolute and unquestionable absence of emotions and melodrama. Asambhav is arguably the only mainstream film ever with no mother-figure on the hectic horizon. Absence of melodrama cannot in itself be a virtue unless it is compounded by a wetness in the overall design of the storytelling.
