Iqbal is not exactly a award-winning work but it is definitely very well-made with the typical Nagesh Kukunoor stamp on it. After Hyderabad Blues, Bollywood Calling and Rockford this is the fourth movie from Kukunoor that I have watched and appreciated. Kukunoor has the knack of picking up the simplest possible theme and turning them into beautifully narrated stories studded with mundane incidents interwoven into a coherent theme. The key is the treatment of the story which Kukunoor executes in a truly unique style. The focus is never on the message; in-fact one can hardly draw a message from any of his movies. Instead what comes out of his movies is the joy one can draw from insignificant everyday events, the little pleasures of life. They seem to emanate the aroma of life often transporting you back into your past, reminding you of the childhood dreams, adolescent crushes, and the dilemmas of youth. The protagonist in each of his movies is an individual on the path of some sort of self-discovery. While Hyderabad Blues saw a NRI returning to his roots in India only to get more confused, in Bollywood Calling a Hollywood actor finds the strength to fight cancer while working for a B-grade Hindi movie. Rockford went into the psychology of a boy who is getting exposed to the vagaries presented by the transformation from childhood to youth. Iqbal is a similar tale though much larger than this. It talks about an ordinary young man, someone who is simply unexceptional in the normal sense except for his talent and undying passion for sports. That this game happens to be cricket is not important; the movie would have remained the same had it been built around some other sport. Though with cricket being at the center stage, the movie is more likely to attract the Indian audience. Another twist thrown in is that the main character, Iqbal (played by Shreyas Talpade), is deaf and dumb. This does not contribute much to the storyline except increase the complexity a bit. But it does sharpen the contrast between the underdog and the privileged. Secondly, while giving out the message that "impossible is possible", the 'impossible' is much more accentuated. It also challenges our preconceived notions regarding the physically handicapped people. Lastly it also adds some drollery in the storyline. Here I must stress that though from the face of it the movie appears a heavy, gloomy portray of the struggle of an underprivileged,this is far from true. The plot, the characters and the ending have a very unconventional touch and in the end it leaves one with a positive feeling. The story is about a young man Iqbal living in a village with his parents and a younger sister. Iqbal is deaf and dumb but he has inherited the determination and resolve of his father. He has also inherited something from his mother- a deep love for cricket. And this is not just empty craze. Not having been able to get good education and being forced to work with his father as a farmer, he has somehow been able to give vent to his love for the game by practicing it all alone, with buffaloes as the only audience!! His only learning has happened through eaves-dropping on the coaching sessions at the nets run by an esteemed coach (Girish Karnad), with the lessons translated by his sister into sign language. The routine continues till one day Iqbal's sister gets bored of the 'translator's job' and approaches the coach with the request of taking his brother in his academy. The coach holds an entrance test of sorts and is impressed with the young man's raw energy. This starts the grooming process for Iqbal as he starts to learn the art of fast bowling in the academy along with several other students. But as it turns out, Iqbal has an ego-clash with a fellow-student who was the son of an influential person and was thrown out of the academy. Hope turned into despair and Iqbal slowly started giving up the dreams of playing cricket. And then one day he discovered another guru (played by Naseeruddin Shah), a drunkard who at one time had been a promising player whose career never took off all because of the dirty politics played by his coach, the same person from whose academy Iqbal was ousted. He is the only ray of hope to Iqbal who insists on learning the game from him despite refusal. The coach finally relents even though he is not sure what to expect out of all this trouble. But the subsequent experience takes both of them to a challenging journey where one has to face the resistance put up by his oppressive father who is totally opposed to his son's involvement in the game and the other has a mini-battle of sorts with his habit of drinking and also has to fight with the baggage of his own dismal past. In the end after a dramatic turn of events Iqbal manages to get selected to the national cricket team, in the event beating his jealous opponent of the academy and the trickery of his former coach. The film ends at this point and I must admit that this is one of the most well-timed endings I have seen lately. The film has lot of memorable scenes and dialogs, my favorite one being when, during a conversation with the alcoholic coach, Iqbal's mother says nonchalantly that if her son is not selected for the Indian team then "I will kill you". The background score is good though not brilliant. The cast of the film seems to fit the bill perfectly. Shweta Prasad, who plays Iqbal's younger sister, is an amazing child actress. I have earlier seen her as playing the roles of diametrically opposite twins in another Hindi movie Makdi. Naseeruddin Shah and Girish Karnad are brilliant as are Prateeksha Londkar (Iqbal's mother) and Yatin Karyekar (the father). All in all a wonderful film.
