Golden Silences

Ram Gopal Varma - a lover of basic instincts (Powerful Men; Sexy
Women) has said that he uses background score to heighten the impact
of his story telling. One of the reasons that Phoonk did not scare was
the loud use of BGM (background music). Remember the scene in Bhoot,
where Urmila wakes up in the middle of the night, goes to the kitchen,
takes out a bottle of water from the fridge and drinks, and returns
back to bed. We see the ghost for the first time in that scene. It was
a truly scary scene and everything including the camera angles,
lighting worked out well in its favor. One of the main reasons why it
worked out so well was the BGM, or the lack of it! The silence was
deafening in that scene making the audience squirm in their seat in
anticipation. How well Salim and Suleiman understood the effect of
silence! And how I wish Amar Mohile understood it…

Anyway, the objective of this post is not RGV bashing…it is about
some of the randomly picked golden moments created in Tamil Cinema due
to (amongst other aspects) Golden Silences.

Mahanadi: Kamal goes to prison and on his return finds out that his
daughter is sold off and is a sex worker in Sonagachi. He goes to
Calcutta, finds her and brings her back. He handles his emotions quite
well during the entire episode but after his return, when his daughter
starts blabbering in her sleep ” Vidungada Thevadiya Pasangala…Oru
Naalaiku ethanai Customeruda” (roughly translates to ‘Leave me alone
you bastards…how many customers can I handle in a day’), he is
unable to control his emotions and breaks down…and what a moment it
is. One of the classical scenes in Indian films where everything falls
into place. Kamal Haasan’s acting, the lighting of the scene, the
dialogues…and above all, the absence of music during the entire
scene. After talking about his personal tragedy, Kamal starts talking
about the state-of-affairs of under aged sex-workers in Sonagachi and
then he starts talking about how the world accords respect to the ‘bad
guys’. At this point, Kamal Haasan’s emotions change from being
helpless and to that of anger and it is here Ilayaraja starts the
music. It remains the best scene I have ever seen in my life.

Mozhi: A fabulously conceived scene - When Prithvi falls for a
deaf/dumb girl, he wishes to understand how her world would be. So he
seals his ears with a bandage and tries to spend a day without hearing
anything and speaking anything. The scene occupied about two minutes
of screen time, and Vidayasagar just let the silence be in those two
minutes…What an impact it had. (I do remember a few cat calls when I
watched it for the first time, but in the second viewing “ after about
a week of the film’s release" there were none).

Sigaram: After the death of SPB’s wife, he conducts the last rites
and returns home, after which he suffers a stroke. Ananthu, the
Director, showed SPB performing the last rites for about a minute and
again silence was beautifully used (Music Director - SPB).

It is unfortunate that many Music Directors today do not understand
the strength of silences. I do not remember watching any film in the
last year or so, where silence has been used effectively - Of course,
I hope to be proved wrong.


Originally posted in www.passionforcinema.com