The offbeat allure of cult movies

A scene from Shatranj Ke Khiladi

To begin with, movies that are instant hits at the cineplexes and chain theatres cannot be cult. There can be a cult experience, such as the queues that start from here to eternity, at theatres that are playing the Star Wars movies; or teenage lovers who throng at theatres playing Titanic. Secondly, cult movies take time, sometimes even years to achieve commercial success. However, Pulp Fiction is an exception, as the director Quentin Tarantino already had a clan of aficionados through his previous movie Reservoir Dogs. Similarly, there's a fan following for John Woo's Hong Kong action flicks.

Categorising cult movies according to their genres, is another angle such as Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon in the martial arts genre or Saving Private Ryan in the war films. Horror films are an obvious example of cult phenomenon. The horror movie icons -- Freddy Krueger (Nightmare on Elm Street), Jason (Friday the 13th) or Leather-face (Texas Chainsaw Massacre) have become quite the sub-culture. Hence, it can be easily assumed that cult movies need certain cults or devotees, such as the Trekkies of the Star Trek Universe, or Rocky Horror Picture Show Fanatics.

So, who decides what cult movies are? Certainly not eminent movie critics like Roger Ebert or Khalid Mohammed. Cult movies can best be elucidated as movies that do not necessarily have universal appeal, but have moderate fan following. Cult movies are generally eccentric, quirky, surreal, sometimes with larger than life anime-like characters with gaudy sets and they are usually thought provoking or controversial. However, this notion does not always apply. For example, according to all the attributes discussed above, quite a few would strongly argue that Kill Bill Vol 1, 2 are cult classics, but they are not. Kill Bill is at its best, a tribute to the "B rated" kung fu movies that still has a cult following. It was promoted too aggressively and had big stars like Uma Thurman, Lucy Liu and Daryl Hannah, to be considered as a cult flick.

Few Hindi movies can be categorised as cult movies. Take for example, Satyajit Ray's Shatranj ke Khiladi -- the story of an unfortunate Nawaab, revolving around the game of chess. Then there's Mahesh Bhatt's Arth -- apparently based on the dysfunctional relationships between Bhatt himself, his wife and his paramour, the late actress, Smita Patil. Apart from these, Shyam Benegal's Zubeida narrates the story of a Muslim girl who defies her uber-conservative father to pursue a career in films first and then becomes the second wife of a Maharaja in the '50s and Sai Paranjape's Saaz, which was subjected to the 'hot seat', as the film supposedly portrayed the renowned and revered Mangeshkar sisters -- Lata and Asha, The punch line is, each of us has our very own cult movie or movies.

Whichever movie you can relate to, get a huge bag of popcorn, the beverage of your choice and enjoy your "cult classic" alone or with your loved one.