Gully Boy : Only Characters , No Actors, a Divine Experience

There are times when one goes into a Lunch home and orders an ordinary Thali. One gets served and while the reputation of that restaurant / lunch home is good, that particular day, each item in it is made with such loving care, it is simply spectacular. One doesn’t look around but simply at ones plate and keeps eating and only after one is finished does one gazes around with a slightly dazed look, a smile creeps up on ones face and an involuntary burp is expelled. This is the connect one makes with the Divine .

Did I just say, Divine ? Call it simply a divine providence. This is what happened when Zoya Akhtar introduced me to the hitherto unknown underground rapper Divine, by telling a story around his art form ; Hip Hop and Rap, his story and that of his fellow artiste Naezy. Zoya Akhtar, is a scintillating movie director and with every offering has only raised the expectation bar. From her very honest first offering “Luck By Chance”to “Zindagi Milegi na Dobara” and”Dil Dhadakne Do” the lady has only gone places but with “Gully Boy” she lays it bare, stepping into the world of underground music into an entirely new ethos in which her story resides, Dharavi, the eponymous slum heartland of this megapolis, Bombay or Mumbai.

Murad is a drivers son who stays in Dharavi and is hooked upwith an aspiring doctor , a firebrand, chit of a girl, Safeena. Theirs is a love story that simply exists, he is hers and she is his. No running around the trees, songs, dropping books after a proverbial collision kind of preamble to it. They are each others and that is understood. Murad’s father is a typical misogynist who into this slummy paradise gets another girl as a wife to grace his new mattress relegating Murad’s mother to the was status. Murad watches all this and is stifled with frustration at his situation yet it his stoic quiet demeanour that reaches out and touches you more than any bombast could. He pours out his angst into fiery words. In his sojourn with his girl he runs into a rapper Sher and is hooked to the art. This is what he wants to do and Sher is the kinda secure artiste who encourages Murad to find himself. In steps an evangelical girl making a project on street music with funds to spare and a song gets made. It is launched and goes viral. Yet in all of this the unsure character of Murad remains unsure, some insecurities don’t die away that easily but a tipping point with his father is reached and he tells him rather quietly. I will not change my dream to accommodate reality, I shall instead change my reality that it is in line with my dream. And just as simply an artiste is born. 

When one only remembers the character, sees only the character and hears only the character and never really looks at the actor playing him or her, it is the absolute pinnacle of a performing artists act. Ranveer Singh has delivered just that kind of a wallop with a performance that simply rocks or should we say raps. He is the soul of the movie and carries it along with the other chameleon Alia, one of the most instinctive performers of recent times, to such another level that one is made a part of the plot. The viewer may have been physically in the cinema hall but the heart has traversed that portal which is the screen that separates the seat from the world created by the director as she tells a story. Vijay Raaz as his father, Amruta Subhash as his mother, Kalki Koechlin, Vijay Verma and every single one of the supporting cast has delivered and how, yet the standout support comes from Siddhant Chaturvedi who plays Sher. This actor is so naturally charming that one sees only the rapper M C Sher. Ranveer Singh has stayed so magnificently in character that there is no pomp or bluster, he just is Murad.  

The camera work and cinematography presents Mumbai in its myriad moods and forms so eloquently and beautifully it is superlative. There is absolutely no disconnect in the distance covered between Dharavi to South Mumbai whether by road, bus or train, Bombay throbs as Bombay does at its various time and geographies.

Zoya Akhtar deserves not just a pat on the back for a job well done she has also got her father the talented Javed to write rap and he does that in style. If I have to summarize in a line, one would be missing an experience if one misses this movie. It is that kind of an ethereal experience.