Haila! What an anniversary

Twenty years after it released — and flopped — Andaz Apna Apna’s unique brand of insanity has a diehard fan club that swears Amar Prem
The graveyard of flops in Bollywood is a crowded one. Every year, approximately 80% of the films released fail to recover the money spent on making them. In the industry , ‘flop’ has a finality to it that no amount of critical acclaim, awards or fake ‘success parties’ can erase.But sometimes, very rarely, films branded ‘flops’ are resuscitated by satellite rights, YouTube and DVD copies. Their memorability vastly supersedes their box office grosses. Long gestating but ultimately enduring, they are loved in a different time, by a different audience than the one for which they were made. Almost as if to make up for the years of ignominy, they are then given the consoling label of ‘Cult Film’ . In this select club of films that received much belated appreciation, belong Kaagaz Ke Phool, Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro, Parinda, Mera Naam Joker, Andaz Apna Apna, and more recently, Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye!
It’s an illustrious gathering of critically acclaimed masterpieces , except for the odd man out — Andaz Apna Apna. Now even the most loyal AAA addict who would gladly name their firstborn ‘Crime Master Gogo’ will acknowledge that in on the heavy duty parameters that great films are usually judged by, the film falls a bit short. Salman Khan’s hair during the course of the film basically shows a giant middle finger to any notion of basic c o n t i nu i t y. There is no prescient commentary on the state of affairs like Jaane Bhi Do Yaaro. It’s not a high-stakes magnum opus like Kaagaz Ke Phool or Mera Naam Joker. And neither is it the groundbreaking film of a new voice like Parinda or Oye Lucky! Lucky Oye!
But what the film does have is a lightness of being, brought to life by leads Aamir Khan, Salman Khan, Raveena Tandon , Karisma Kapoor and a talented supporting cast comprising Paresh Rawal, Shakti Kapoor, Viju Khote, Deven Verma and Jagdeep. Thanks to them, names like Crime Master Gogo, Teja , Amar, Prem, Raveena, Karishma, Raabert and dialogues like : ‘Teja main hoon, mark idhar hai!” ‘ Khandaani chor hoon main, Mogambo ka Bhateeja... Gogo!’ or even the mere uttering of ‘Haila!’ and ‘Oui Ma’ are now common parlance for any film buff.
This level of immediate recognition belies the fact that when the film released in 1994, not many showed up to watch it. It was a year which saw audiences flocking to applaud the blood-spilling rhetoric of Nana Patekar in Krantiveer, the nadapulling antics of Shakti Kapoor in Raja Babu and of course, the tidal wave of saccharine and canine goodness that was Hum Aapke Hai Koun. Clearly the whacked out zaniness of Andaz Apna Apna was a hardsell in this lineup. It was the first time that director Rajkumar Santoshi , fresh off the success of Damini, was attempting a comedy. The leads Aamir Khan and Salman Khan were famous for their romantic persona. Even Paresh Rawal was not known as a comic actor at the time. And then of course there was the fact that the humour itself was a tough-to-classify brand of madcap.
Was Andaz Apna Apna ahead of its times or did it lose out simply because of lack of awareness? Santoshi says, “The film didn’t get enough marketing support prior to its release. The concept was new, and this was the first time that Aamir and Salman had come together for a comedy. It got released in a hurry and people didn’t even realize it was in theaters.” Talking about how the film came to be, Santoshi says he met Aamir Khan at the late photographer Gautam Rajadhyaksha’s house where he discussed the idea for the film. Salman Khan came on board shortly after. He remembers the shoot as being a complete joy. ‘‘ Aamir and Salman were so involved that they would give suggestions for each other’s characters as well. In some scenes, the camera-person would be laughing so hard that the camera would shake and they would have to reshoot or Aamir and Salman would break into laughter while saying their catchphrases “Haila!’ and ‘Oui Ma”.
Starting from the opening credits, where the principal cast’s names are intentionally misspelled with extra consonants , to songs like ‘Ello Ello’ which are composed and sung to an old-world style, AAA is not a film which is very conducive to the question, ‘Why?’.
Why, for instance, does the evil Teja aka Shyam launch into a monologue about wanting to be the king of bread and poultry while confronting his twin brother who he has imprisoned for an enormous ransom? Why do Prem aka Salman Khan and Crime Master Gogo break into an extended hybrid of breakdance and fighting in the middle of the action sequence in the climax? To examine these quirks with the lens of logic is near impossible. Yet it works. And quite brilliantly.
AAA is not anachronistic in the way that classics like Guide or Kaagaz Ke Phool are. There are no great human truths that are revealed in this tale of two slackers who set out to win the hand of a rich heiress. But what makes the film unique and loved is its high-pitched anything-can-happen fervor. AAA is also a film which is tailor-made for YouTube because it is structurally a series of great gags held together by directorial prowess and comic alchemy. As a result, even people who have not seen the entire film are familiar with the most played out key comic scenes, like the climax.
When one revisits the film now, one realizes that the performances of lead actors Salman Khan and Aamir Khan were a throwback to times when the actors were not entirely imprisoned by their superstardom and could afford to let loose on screen. Try and imagine Salman Khan doing a diarrhoea scene with similar elan now. Or, Aamir playing a character whose nightcap falls and rises according to his emotions in the song ‘Yeh Raat Aur Yeh Doori’. Face it, it’s never going to happen (despite many rumours of a sequel). What a pity.