THE LEGEND OF MAULA JATT

I was going through some comments on youtube days back when a unique comment demanded my attention; I immediately provided him mine and it went on like,” Just like India has got SHOLAY, Pakistan has got MAULA JATT”. I was amused, bemused and confused by it as what movie it is,why in the name of mother earth have I never heard of it and I struck a bolt that what kind of movie industry Pakistan has. I realized that after watching the world cinema and movies from nearly every country, I narrowly missed the cinema of our neighboring country. I you-tubed the movie and start to watch it and though it took me nearly a month to watch it, I completed it; also during that month I googled the movie and tried to gather as much information about Pakistan film industry as I can. Watching that movie was a victory for me because it was not my type of movie or anything that I had ever watch. If anyone would have had suggested me this movie earlier and had I seen it without reference I might have laughed, had taken my tea, closed my mouth and never talk about it to anyone else till my last breath. But so not the case it was this time as I watched it and re watched it and now, like other millions of Pakistani people, too think that it is a good film. Bummer. I know for those who have already seen it. Actually the movie also helped me change my outlook towards cinema. Watching over and over European and Holly cinema, we think that this is what cinema is all about. A thought, a situation, cinematography and other skills but I now believe it is more than that. South Asian cinema is all about entertainment and it cares about audience opinion, after all for whom are we making movies, for audience only. So now I think that our movies aren’t that bad, it’s just our cinema is different from theirs and hell we are no way inferior to anyone in any of the ways of film making, last of it we don’t need lots of Oscars to prove that( not that there is anything wrong with getting some but still). Well, coming back to the track, now something about the movie. The movie stars late legendary actor Sultan Rahi and the Gabbar Singh of Pakistani movies, Mustafa Quereshi in a role of life time, both of them in a powerful role and carrying great acting’s, unfortunately apart from which movie offers nothing. The story is all about rivalry between two powerful people who likes the conventional weapons of hand and gandasa to fight in the times of gun and tope to save bahu-betis of hero, Rahi sahib, from the clutches of villain, dear Mustafa ji. Mustafa Quereshi steals the show by using extremely slow but haunting voice with dynamic Punjabi accent and handsome personality. I have come to heard of that just like Gabbar Singh’s three word opening dialogue “kitney aadmi they” became one of the most famous lines in the history of Indian cinema, similarly Noori Natt’s (Mustafa Quereshi’s name in the movie) three word dialogue “nava aaayahan soniya” became history in Pakistan cinema. The movie also contains abundance of powerful ‘u said it now my chance’ dialogues between Noori and Maula (Rahi saheb) in a kind of funny way in which they stand before camera at the starting of every fight and roar something in Punjabi to each other by moving their one leg in front of the other, chest out and head high, then another dialogue with another leg superseding the position of previous leg, and ultimately fighting after long mechanical exchange of dialogues. Don’t worry about the blood if you are blood thirsty fight addicted movie manic, there is lots of it but no scare because it could be easily identified as paint. I didn’t understand the movie completely because it was in Punjabi but I watched it nonetheless and I enjoyed it. I still don’t know what the heroines were doing there as I expect they serve some useful purpose in the movie, I guess they were used for the perfunctory reasons of putting the songs, which if I may add had good tunes especially one in which an anonymous jatt dances in baniyaan to irritate the vamp of the movie, which I guess ended up marrying Maula Jatt in the end. Another good song is when both Maula and Noori are taken to court for trial and their supporters are singing their praise songs, a not to miss song. Then there is one scene in which Maula and Noori and both trying to move a bullock cart except instead of bullocks, it’s them trying to move the cart out of a ditch; it’s one of the legendry scenes of the movie where hero meets the villain and it is shown that both of them are equally powerful, it was really again a must see scene. The movie is said to be the sequel of another Sultan Rahi blockbuster “Wehshi jatt” and has spawned number of sequels like Maual Jatt and Noori Natt”,“Maula jatt in London” and “Maula Jatt and James Bond ” and many others. I don’t know how anyone else digests this great movie but to me it was good, though I agree it was not good cinematography, still watch it with a point of view that with the limited resources and particular people mindset, it is no doubt a great movie. The fact is itself established when you know that it ran for three years continuously for house full boards until the then active government of Pakistan decided to remove it due to some reasons. For more information you can visit Wikipedia or can follow the links. http://www.jatland.com/home/Maula_Jatt http://www.thehotspotonline.com/moviespot/bolly/reviews/m/Maulajat.htm And if you want to watch it, it is available on you-tube under the channel name, ”Weshi Jatt” as it is virtually unknown and unavailable in Indian markets.