Biographical Films Made on Popular Personalities Including Victims, Comment
A biographical film, or biopic is a film that dramatizes the life of non- fictional or historically based person or people. They use the names of real persons as the central characters.
Since society have always been interested in other people' s lives these biofilms have been the genres to be watched well. A significant increase in biopics has been seen in 21st century. These movies have actually been dated back to 1900' s like on subjects like Joan of Arc, King David etc. since then these films have been very influential. These films earlier were made to show the heroic qualities of the character. But later on in the modern era it has become more commercialized. In most of the biopics you know what has happened but still you just wait for the actors to show.
Unfortunately most of the times the truth may be hidden within for the simple fact that "biopics are the reconstruction of a person's life, so the dialogue is also a reconstruction". Various questions and answers about a famous personality are cleared through the biopics. But are all of them the truths. This lies within the director and scriptwriters. A good scriptwriter can maybe summarize the thoughts of a real life hero.
With the improvement in the technology the better said "golden era of technology "the number films being made on real life famous personalities whether it is the popular real life hero or the victims has been increased. But are they able to reel it in a correct way? This is the question that arises in everyone' s mind. Media being almost the fourth pillar of the democracy bares the responsibility of the consequences of a biopic.
There are many instances where the biopics have turned an "iron into a gold" and have played a major role in the child's life. Lives of great humans have been portrayed so well in films. But a simple film of 3 hours can obviously not decide what has taken place throughout the subject's life. There is more to it.
A film is -or should be - more like music than like fiction. It should be a progression of moods and feelings. The theme what's behind the emotion, the meaning, all that comes later. Filmmaking like any other art, is very profound means of human communication, beyond the professional pleasure of succeeding or the pain of failing, you don't want your film to be seen, to communicate itself to other people. This is the good part of it guiding us towards the light showing how our past heroes have lived. The true treasure lies within. It is the underlying theme that changes the mindset of a person to an extent that he can quit certain habits or start some.
But in recent times making films on victims has been so common that horror has been engrossed within people's minds. A stage has come where a person is used to so much of violence which makes him think that it is natural. This might lead him to commit a mistake. In most instances the victim doesn't get a fair judgement which proves again and again that anything can be done. So this impact remains in people.
Of course a person's moral and ethical values are directly dependent on his environment which means the films that he get to see are so influential in shaping a personality.
As a vehicle of expression the media and the film makers should make good films and reduce the victim based violent film. It is good to show the reality but consequences and the way each person perceives it might be different. Vehicle never quite seems real, but rather an ornate film set suspended on water. Imagine if a single speech based movie like "king's speech" could make a revolution in people's thought, the power of film can change anything if it is made well.
"Either you embrace the richness of turning as a character rand trust the audience to follow you there, or you simply capitulate, by reducing him to a caricature of the tortured genius"
You make a film to distract people, to interest them perhaps to make them think, perhaps to help them be a little less naive, a little better than they were -Claude Chabrol
Humans are also just like weapons, whether to turn it into useful one that serves oneself and the nation or to turn into a deadly crime committing one is up to ones perceiving of the films and also the responsibility of the film makers.
Suhrudwamsi Musunuri
