Maqbool Director: Vishal Bhardwaj Country: India Year: 2003

CAST:
Irfan Khan, Tabu, Om Puri, Naseeruddin Shah

Who woulda thunk it?

From the pages of Shakespeare's folio to the silver screen of Bollywood. From the Scottish highlands to the streets of Mumbai. From Macbeth to Maqbool. The thought seemed ridiculous at first.

How would the dark Shakespearean play translate into a Bollywood film? How would the characters from a tale four centuries ago fit onto the contemporary Mumbai? How would a battle for a throne be adapted into a mafia flick? But director Vishal Bharadwaj managed all that, and more. Maqbool, centred on the Mumbai underworld scene, played at the 28th annual Toronto International Film Festival, which took place from September 4 to 13.

Bharadwaj isn't new to the film industry. His first feature film Makdee had a successful run at the box office last year. A children's film, which Bharadwaj produced, co-wrote and directed, Makdee was selected by the adult jury as the second prize-winner among live action features at the Chicago International Children's Film Festival in 2002. But Bharadwaj's first stint in the music industry was as a composer. The son of lyricist Ram Bharadwaj, Vishal had composed music for movies such as Gulzaar's Maachis, Ram Gopal Verma's Satya and Vinay Shukla's Godmother. He also won the Filmfare R.D. Burman award for Maachis in 1996.

He's primarily a cinema lover, says Vishal. "Cinema is my beloved," he says. "I knew I could enter the film industry composing music, since I've been composing since my childhood. With the success of Maachis and Satya, I came in touch with many other filmmakers. And when I met them, I knew I could make films 100 times better than them.

"And I thought, why should I make films for people I don't respect? It's only when you respect the director, you can become a composer. I have respect for Gulzaar sahib, and Ram Gopal Verma. "Then I decided, I would have to make my own films. Else I would be sidelined, like so many great film composers. Jaidev was a great composer, and he died in a small, dingy room, with no money even for his last rites. Mr. Madan Mohan, such a great composer, but he died in frustration. "I didn't want to die in frustration." To hone his directorial craft, Bharadwaj directed a few short films for Indian T.V. channels such as Zee T.V. He also collaborated with other scriptwriters and read several books on screenplay writing and filmmaking. And he was set to roll camera.

His Bollywood connections helped him land big names for his own directorial ventures. Having worked with Bollywood and Indian art house cinema queen Shabana Azmi, Vishal asked her to play the role of the witch in Makdee. He'd asked another acting heavyweight Naseeruddin Shah to play the part of the butcher, but Shah had prior commitments. But when Vishal came up with his next feature Maqbool, the Tony Soprano of Bollywood, Shah was readily available.

Maqbool tells the story of the title character played by Irrfan, the second in command in the mafia army of Abbaji, played with Marlon Brando-esque wheeze by Pankaj Kapoor. Only Maqbool commits the sin of coveting his boss's mistress Nimmi, played with seductive prowess by Tabu. Prophesied to get Abbaji's throne, Maqbool makes his destiny come true by shooting Abbaji. Thereafter follows the downfall of Maqbool, rankled with the guilt of killing a man he considered a father-figure. Initially, Shah was to play the role of Abbaji. "I'd given the script to Naseer," says Vishal. "He chose Abbaji. But then he changed his mind. He'd already played so many dons. He brought Om Puri on board and they played the cops, the witches."

In Vishal's delightful interpretation of the gory Shakespearean play, the three witches are transformed into two corrupt cops, Pandit and Purohit. Both make predictions, which somehow turn to be rather accurate. Like Maqbool's Bollywood take-over.

Of course, this is a brilliant reference to Bollywood real-life nefarious associations with the underworld. What came first then? The underworld setting or the Shakespearean inspiration? He'd been itching to make an "underworld theme" movie for ages, says Vishal. "All the underworld movies I've seen, in second half they tend to become gang war films," he says. "The war between two gangs. And the human element is left far behind.

"The underworld has made a great impact on films across the world - so many great films have been made by masters from Coppola, to Scorsese, to Tarantino. "And underworld films, with all the guns and the romanticised violence, there's scope for heightened drama." Although Vishal gives credit to Shakespeare for bringing out the human element of the story, Macbeth wasn't the apparent choice. While researching the role of the witch for his previous movie Makdee, he'd come across the witch reference in Macbeth. And then, while travelling with his son, he once again encountered the Shakespeare classic.

He took it as a sign, says Vishal. "I saw Kurosawa's Throne of Blood, and it blew my mind," he explains. ìIt stayed with me. And the underworld thought was going in my mind. "Macbeth is such a story that you can place it any time. The story is something else. It's not about the war of two countries, or about a kingdom, or a time. It's a timeless tale." However, Vishal did make some subtle changes to the plot.

In the play, Macbeth and his wife Lady Macbeth plot to kill King Duncan and usurp his kingdom. In the movie, Maqbool falls in love with Abbaji's mistress Nimmi. The cops' prophecies and Nimmi's wish to "spend all nights" with him, instigate Maqbool to kill his mentor Abbaji. The usurpation of a throne in an ambiguous underworld hierarchy wasn't a viable plot, but the pursuit of love was, says Vishal. "In the original okay, 400 years back, Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are plotting to kill King Duncan to take over," he says. "But taking over a gang isn't as clear as that. I needed an objective that was as easily understandable. The only thing I could find to parallel that objective was love.

"While the King was alive, Macbeth couldn't have the crown. And while Abbaji was alive, Maqbool couldn't have Nimmi. So, (Nimmi) becomes the crown."

For his part actor Irrfan says playing Maqbool was an opportunity for him to get away from the usual Bollywood drudgery. "You want to make (acting) interesting, and it's interesting for me when I can see a human point, when I can relate to (character) as a human being," he says. "In Bollywood, they try to typecast. They don't have the different shades. They just have one shade."

A brooding look and demeanour, and a rich bass voice to boot, Irrfan has come to be associated with a silent and sexy image. It's an image he's used to his advantage before in movies such as The Warrior, which won two awards at the 54th BAFTA (British Film and Television Awards) this year. Even in Maqbool, he got another chance to explore the silences of his character. The film has a minimalist approach to dialogue, he says. And in some ways, it's almost poetic. It's got rhythm. Although Irrfan (he prefers to use just his first name, as he doesn't want to be compared with the Khan triumvirate) had read all of Shakespeare's works in school and through his dramatic training at the New Delhi based National School of Drama, he hadn't acted in a Shakespearean play.

"And I didn't even read the play, or watch Kurosawa's movie before I did Maqbool," he says. "I thought the script should work on its own. This isn't a class of Shakespeare. This film has its own soul."