Anatomy of a Salman Film

What is it about his appeal that we have all missed?

I take my life’s lessons from Salman Khan’s films. Okay, I don’t, but surely many young boys must have when they whistled aloud as love-guru Salman Bhai offered them gyan on wooing women in Wanted (2009): “Ladki ke peechhe bhagega, ladki paise lekar bhagegi. Paise ke peechhe bhagega, ladki tere peechhe bhagegi (Run after a girl, she’ll run away with your money. Run after money, she’ll run after you).” Applause!

Wanted, a remake of the Southern hit Pokiri, was a turning point both in Salman’s career and for Bollywood in the short-run. At a time when cinema audiences were split between multiplexes with super expensive tickets and semi- urban ‘single screen’ theatres, the commercial success of Wanted through single screens alone surprised most producers over how much they could still rake in by merely eyeing the cheaper seats. Big budget productions thereafter with loud dialoguebaazi, athletic dance numbers, along with songs of brooding romance with a redundant heroine and a ready-made script aesthetically inspired by the South gave many middle-aged heroes and even younger ones a chance to resurrect their careers: Akshay Kumar (Rowdy Rathore), Ajay Devgan (Singham), Shahid Kapoor (R…Rajkumar), Shah Rukh Khan (Chennai Express)… Such films work on us like comfort food. Audiences enjoyed these ‘formula films’, with or without Salman. Although, given the genre, nothing succeeds like Salman.

The urban middle-class would have ignored these movies altogether. But they ran the risk of being branded snobs. By the late 2000s, they were getting used to watching mainstream movies in plush multiplexes with realistic, vulnerable characters delivering dialogues that were more conversational than bombastic. Credit for this change is often attributed to Dil Chahta Hai (2001), which was Farhan Akhtar’s first film as writer-director. Farhan is also an actor now. Salman’s first story idea as a writer was Baaghi: A Rebel for Love (1990). His last script was Veer (2010). As an actor, Farhan can’t look beyond Robert De Niro. In an interview, Salman came across as a Sylvester Stallone fan. He’d just watched and been floored by The Expendables.

Bollywood’s bodybuilding revolution in some ways is a throwback to 80s Hollywood when Stallone and Schwarzenegger ruled the scene. Salman Bhai’s most discernible contribution to popular culture is the creation of a male fan-base that aspires to hit the gym and build a body like his, slipping into T-shirts that fit like bras around the chest. I suppose this is admirable for a nation of paunchy men. These fans are often called ‘Bhai-sexuals’. Observing the strangely homoerotic hysteria generated in the theatre when Salman takes his shirt off in Ready (2011) and Bodyguard (2011) was by itself worth a movie ticket for me. Those films defied description. Salman’s newest offering, Kick, defies a review, which would be true of all his movies of late, barring Dabanng (2010) and Ek Tha Tiger (2012).

Salman, by self-admission, is not much of an actor. His body movements and expressions are rather stiff. But that’s not even the point. Most Salman or Rajinikant fans are as much proper film-buffs, in a purist sense, as most Sachin bhakts in India are genuine connoisseurs of cricket. Mass entertainment works a lot like organised religion that way. It’s led by collective feelings and personal faith.

On screen, Bhai projects himself as a well meaning but wronged and misunderstood hero who has anger management issues and is prone to breaking into violent somersaults and punches. But he’s a nice man. I can see this being particularly alluring to a hot-headed young man with self-image issues. Off screen, he appears as an unpredictable sort of public figure—full of swagger, often erratic, even funny in his responses, totally unmindful of the attention on him. This is instantly appealing to a middle-class that is tired of public figures who seem either politically correct or publicity hungry. He’s cool because apparently he doesn’t care. No doubt, he has a strong female following. All good-looking male stars do.

But I’m sure he derives his greatest respect from his male fans for being the enviable, eternal bachelor boy at 50, having dated some of India’s most beautiful women and romancing women half his age on screen. This is the ultimate male aspiration in a country that weds in its twenties. He gives them precious advice on love. Dumping his girlfriend (Jacqueline Fernandes) in Kick, because she wants him to “settle down” and lead a boring life, he tells her, “Main tumhare saath boodha hona chahta hoon. Tumhari vajah se nahin. (I want to grow old with you, not because of you!)” Priceless!

About The Author

Mayank Shekhar

Mayank Shekhar runs the pop-culture website TheW14.com