Language: Hindi
Watching an actor’s film release posthumously can be an emotional experience. Just recently, admirers of the late K.P.A.C. Lalitha and Nedumudi Venu got to see both beloved artistes come alive on screen in the Malayalam film Bheeshma Parvam, days after Lalitha breathed her last and less than 5 months following Venu’s death. For Hindi film viewers, Dil Bechara (2020) will always be remembered as Sushant Singh Rajput’s last hurrah, having come to an OTT platform barely over a month after the young star’s premature and tragic end.
There is an added dimension to director Hitesh Bhatia’s Sharmaji Namkeen since Rishi Kapoor passed away before he could complete this Hindi film in which he plays/played the eponymous lead. Instead of abandoning the project or re-shooting it in its entirety with another actor or resorting to VFX or finishing it with an artiste using prosthetics to look like Kapoor, the team decided to shoot the remaining portions with a known face bearing no resemblance to him, Paresh Rawal. Kapoor Sr’s star son Ranbir appears in a preface to Sharmaji Namkeen to inform the audience of the options that were considered.
That’s how it has come about that Messrs Kapoor and Rawal both play Delhi’s B.G. Sharma, employee of a private household appliances manufacturer, who finds a whole new path after he is asked to take ‘voluntary’ retirement in his late 50s.
Sharma is a widower with two sons who love him but, like most children, take him for granted, assume that youngsters have more happening lives than the elderly and remain pre-occupied with their own work and dreams. Their Dad, on the other hand, cannot come to terms with the prospect of devoting the rest of his time on earth to TV viewing, yoga, gossiping with friends and doing sundry household chores that tend to fall on the shoulders of retired folk. That’s when his creativity and passion for cooking open a new door for him, courtesy his friend and neighbour played by Satish Kaushik.
Money is not Sharmaji’s need. What he needs and wants is an occupation to channel his boundless energy – mental and physical – and a circle of friends who appreciate his non-conformism because they too are straining at the straitjacket of social expectations. In this parallel life, he befriends the women of a kitty party group.
First, let’s get this out of the way: does the single-role-divided-between-two-actors experiment work? Answer: surprisingly, yes.
Of course it calls for a willing suspension of disbelief from the audience but Ranbir’s announcement has us primed for the switch.
While Sharmaji Namkeen is rare in this respect, it is not unprecedented. Most famously in recent years, the makers of the Hollywood film The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus tweaked their concept after Heath Ledger died part-way through the shooting, and roped in Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell to play versions of Ledger’s character in different segments of the film. That’s not how Sharmaji Namkeen works.
It is not that Kapoor Sr appears in one half and Rawal takes over in the second – the shifts actually occur from one scene to the next, yet somehow they are not jarring. Among other reasons, there is the fact that Kapoor was not an over-stylised actor, he usually immersed himself in roles with his naturalistic acting. Rawal too deserves kudos for not stamping his personality on Sharmaji, instead adapting to the body language and gait adopted by Kapoor for this character without appearing to mimic him.
Sewing it all together is the naturalism in Bhatia’s storytelling, and the decision not to overtly manipulate our emotions either with Ranbir’s opening brief (he is warm but not schmaltzy) or with any other element.
Having spent so much of this review on this aspect of Sharmaji Namkeen, it is important to state that there is much more to the film than just this. For one, it is a joy to see an uncommon Hindi film in which the protagonist is a senior citizen, though Kapoor looks far more than the 58 years he is supposed to be at the start of the film (the actor was nearing 70) and, sadly, Sharmaji Namkeen is not so evolved as to cast an actor of the same age as a woman Sharmaji is attracted to. That notwithstanding, Kapoor’s screen presence and his well-written, likeable character, the amiable supporting cast with well-rounded roles, the sense of humour in the script and the gently unobtrusive messaging keep it going.
Written by Supratik Sen and Bhatia himself, based on a story idea by Bhatia, Sharmaji Namkeen has a lot to say but it does not rub any of it in our faces. It is a film about understanding that our parents are people too, it is about successful second innings – who better to vouch for that possibility than Rishi Kapoor? – and people who do not enjoy oblivion.
Thank heavens and the entire cosmos along with Bhatia and Sen that Sharmaji Namkeen is not written as a Baghban Redux. Although that Amitabh Bachchan, Hema Malini starrer is referenced prominently here, this film has all the nuance that one lacked. Baghban (2003, Hindi) was high-pitched and painfully maudlin; it divided its universe into suffering, saintly parents and evil, scheming, selfish children without any shades of grey; the youngsters were stereotypes; it romanticised the patriarchal nature of the relationship between the lead couple and batted for the conventional Indian notion that parents are to be worshipped.
In other words, it is the opposite of Sharmaji Namkeen, which favours a tone of realism, features credible characters with a comparatively progressive worldview and does not speak in extremes. Sharmaji’s children are flawed in a believable way, he is not perfection personified either, and Bhatia’s brush favours shades of gray. Sharmaji Namkeen also captures the atmosphere of middle-class Delhi as effectively as Do Dooni Chaar (2010, Hindi) co-starring Rishi and Neetu Kapoor.
Matching Rishi Kapoor’s comfort before the camera step for step are Suhail Nayyar and Taaruk Raina who play Sharmaji’s children, Rinku/Sandeep and Vincy, and Isha Talwar as Rinku’s friend/partner. They feel like a real family.
Like the kids and the old men in Subhash Nagar where Sharmaji lives, the other set of people who could have been easily stereotyped are the kitty party ladies. Instead, they are made out to be a fascinating, even if hilarious, lot played eloquently by some wonderful actors such as Sheeba Chadha, Ayesha Raza Mishra and Juhi Chawla.
Not unexpectedly, Chawla has the most substantial role among them. Her glowing presence begs the question why Hindi filmdom has so little to offer this beautiful, talented woman.
When that changes, we might conclude that this industry has embraced the point Sharmaji Namkeen seeks to make: life does not end until it does.
Rishi Kapoor’s endearing swan song is like the food that Sharmaji dishes out: well-balanced with just the right amount of sugar and spice, not aiming to be flashy but offering the comfort of a home-cooked meal.
Rating: 3 (out of 5 stars)
Sharmaji Namkeen is streaming on Amazon Prime Video
Anna M.M. Vetticad is an award-winning journalist and author of The Adventures of an Intrepid Film Critic. She specialises in the intersection of cinema with feminist and other socio-political concerns. Twitter: @annavetticad, Instagram: @annammvetticad, Facebook: AnnaMMVetticadOfficial
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