Synopsis
The biggest sporting event for the school
town of Nainital is the annual cycling race.
Schools and colleges here range from those
like Rajput and Xavier's for the spoilt
rich kids to local ones like Model for the
poorer kids. For the past two years the
cycling race has been won by the arrogant
Shekhar Malhotra (Deepak Tijori) of Rajput
College. Sanju (Aamir Khan) and Ratan (Mamik)
are bothers who attend Model and run a small
local cafe. Their father (Kulbhushan Kharbanda)
is obsessed by the desire to see Ratan become
the cycling champion. Ratan on his part
is the ideal son and elder brother to Sanju,
good in everything he does and has been
the runner-up to Shekhar in the cycling
race. Sunju on the other hand is a prankster,
not taking life seriously at all enjoying
life with his friends among whom is Anjali
(Ayesha Jhulka) who loves him silently.
Sanju however turns his attention on the
new girl on the block, Devika (Pooja Bedi)
and convinces her he is rich. He uses the
money his father has asked him to deposit
in the bank to buy a costly necklace for
Devika instead. When his father finds out,
he chucks Sanju out of the house. At the
annual college dance competition when Devika
finds out that Sanju is from Model and poor,
she dumps him turning her attention to Shekhar.
All through Anjali is a silent pillar of
support for Sanju. Shekhar and his friends
injure Ratan, almost killing him to keep
him out of the race. It is at this point
that Sanju realizes he has to get serious
and responsible in life and he enters the
cycle race to do what a man must do...
The film
 After
QSQT (1988), Mansoor
Khan and Aamir
Khan go a step ahead with Jo Jeeta
Wohi Sikandar (JJWS). Inspired from
Breaking Away (1979) and the idiom
of Archie comics, the film is one of the
few sensible sports films in India and one
of Aamir's finest films. A film with a sporting
backdrop already has half its battle won,
since it deals with the triumph of the human
spirit; of the underdog who finally make
it after conquering all the obstacles in
his path. But what makes JJWS great
is that its wins that other half of the
battle as well. It is here that Mansoor
Khan really succeeeds as he makes a highly
engaging coming-of-age film that involves
you, rouses you and in the final analysis
yes, moves you.
A key factor for this is that the sports
angle aside, Mansoor effectively uses his
strengths of being an able storyteller on
film as he beautifully combines the human
elements and handles the various relationships
within the film. Be it the strained father-son
relationship between Sanju and his father
who always wants Sanju to be like Ratan
without realizing Sanju has his own identity,
his heartwarming bonding with his too-good-to-be-true
elder brother or his Archie-Betty relationship
with his silent admirer, Anjali - all the
tracks are extremely well-etched out. Mansoor
creates believable and real flesh and blood
characters that take you back to your school
and college days and make you identify with
them thus involving you in their story.
JJWS is unthinkable without Aamir
Khan, undoubtedly the life and soul of the
film. Though 26-27 by then, he plays the
collegian to perfection, getting the attitude
and body language spot on. He is absolutely
brilliant as the brattish, lovebale good-for-nothing
prankster Sanju, who turns serious and responsible
thus redeeming himself in the eyes of his
father when it matters most. Be it the scenes
where he woos Devika or orders Ratan around
in front of her in their cafe to impress
her or when he realizes his responsibilities
as Ratan lies injured in hospital, he never
strikes a false note anywhere in the film.
The rest of the cast are supporting players
to Aamir and by and large they all contribute
immensely to the film. JJWS undoubtedly
represents the best work in Ayesha Jhulka's
career, perhaps her only memorable screen
work. She has never looked cuter or acted
better. As the girl silently in love with
Sanju and his loyal pillar of support in
his time of need, she is wonderful. Ayesha
makes the role her own and it is hard to
imagine that she wasn't even the first choice
for the film. Following her stunning debut
in Mani
Ratnam's Telugu film, Gitanjali
(1989), Girija was the original heroine
of JJWS and even shot for a portion
of the film. However, Mansoor was dissatisfied
with her perfromance and had her replaced.
She is till there in the film in the college
dance competion as Mansoor was not able
to reshoot the entire song and has just
inserted relavant close ups of Ayesha as
she watches the performance off stage! Mamik
makes the ideal older brother to look up
to while Kulbhushan Kharbabnda is solidly
dependable as ever as the father extremely
proud of his ideal older son and starined
with the younger good-for-nothing even though
he loves him tremendously. Deepak Tijori
looks too old and is barely adequate as
the arrogant rich kid Shekhar Malhotra while
Pooja Bedi has been cast and used correctly
as the gold digger, Devika, rather than
her diplaying any great histrionics on her
part.
A key factor in the film's appeal lies
in its musical score by Jatin-Lalit, their
second film together. The film is their
breakthrough film and the songs Yahaan
ke Hum Sikandar, Jawaan Ho Yaaron,
Naam Hai Mera Fonseca, Sheher
ki Pariyon among others are all well
tuned and were extremely popular in their
time . But the cake, icing and cherry all
has to go to Pehla Nasha Peha Khumaar.
Beautifully written by veteran Majrooh
Sultanpuri, the song captures the bilthe
spirit of falling in love that first time
perfectly. And special mention must be made
of its exquisite picturisation shot with
lip sync in slow motion, thus effectively
giving the flushes of first romantic love
the necessary heady feeling of floating
in the clouds. Simply, suberb and magical.
Incidentally, the song was the first song
choreographed by Farah Khan. To get correct
the lip sync in slow motion, the song was
played back at double the speed during filming.
The actors had to sync the lip movements
at this high speed but ensure their body
movements moved at normal speed, an extremely
difficult task as when you talk fast, you
tend to move your body and hands fast as
well. In the final film the song was then
played at its normal speed and the corresponding
picture 'synced' to it, thus getting the
desired effect. While on the technical side,
mention must also be made of the picturisation
and editing of the climactic cycle race.
The race draws you in as you follow it with
bated breath, rooting and cheering for the
underdog, Sanju and as the suspense builds
up and Sanju finally overtakes Shekhar at
the end, you cannot help but applaud.
JJWS went on to win the Filmfare
Award for Best Film. Though Aamir's was
undoubtedly the performance of the year,
he lost the Filmfare Award for Best Actor
to Anil Kapoor for Beta (1992),
one of the most shocking decisions in Filmfare's
history. Aamir has never bothered with award
ceremonies in India since. Mansoor and Aamir
would come together for the third and final
time for Akele Hum Akele Tum (1995),
inspired by Kramer v/s Kramer (1979),
and in spite of some effective moments,
the film coming after QSQT and
JJWS was a major disappointment.
If there is one complaint, the film does
contain certain cliches and stereotypes
seen eternally in Indian mainstream cinema
. So of course the poor and middle-class
lot are the good souls while the rich are
the blackhearted. In that sense all the
main positive characters of the film- Sanju,
Rattan, Anjali, his father and friends are
finally guardians of their good old fashioned
middle class values.
It would be fifteen years before Hindi
cinema would come up with another fine film
with sports as a background - the Shimit
Amin directed Shah
Rukh Khan starrer, Chak
De! India (2007) that looks at how a
disgraced former Indian hockey player, Kabir
Khan, finds redemption 7 years later in
coaching the Indian Women's Hockey Team
to victory in the World Cup.
|
