Screen -The Business of Entertainment

Mumbai - February 16, 2001.

Wtriters & Writing

amrik gill

Dil dhoondta hai
He is in perfect understanding with Dilip Kumar who says the most deadly ailment that is slowly killing the industry is the sheer lack of good writing. " The greatest problem of our films is that we don’t have good scripts, because we don’t have the kind of writers who can bring in good stories and good ideas which will appeal to the people, entertain them and even enlighten them, the people who are craving for good and healthy entertainment which they have been kept away from for a long period of time. Writing has to get back its respectability and responsibility if the industry has to survive. The state in which film writing is today can only take us closer to doomsday, take it from me", the Thespian says when he talks about the quality of writing in the films being made these days. Writer Amrik Gill who has been writing for years but came into the limelight only with Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam in which he wrote the dialogue and won all the applause, awards and recognition which is just what he needed before he could give up in sheer frustration.

Amrik is a scholar in Punjab, who has a rare command over the Punjabi language and its rich literature. Life for Amrik has been a long walk through the various libraries in Punjab and wherever he found some source which threw new light on Punjabi literature down the years. He has been an admirer of some of the all- time greats who have created literature that is immortal. It is this endless and restless quest that has inspired him to make writing a profession. He valued great satisfaction in writing, in creating his own stories and story ideas. They brought him name and fame but very little money, the sound of which makes the world go round.

Some of his friends who knew his talent and his craving for creation had already made it big in the film industry in Mumbai, tempted him to try his luck too. He resisted for some time but then the struggle for a decent survival forced him to land in Mumbai, the city of a million mesmerising dreams. And soon it was time for the struggle to start. He first surveyed "the area of darkness” with a lot of hope most of which came back home defeated. All his fresh ideas, fresh expressions, innovative language didn’t seem to impress the men who sat in their cabins looking for scripts which sold in the market. It was heartbreaking for a man who had so much knowledge and command over what was called genuine writing. He soon saw some of his learned friends from Punjab, some big names, surrendering to what the market wanted. The demands of the market cared "two hoots" for originality. All they wanted were subjects that sold like ‘masala’, the market wanted ‘masala’ and nothing but ‘masala’ which sold. It wanted the same old stories, the same old ideas, the same old ingredients with a little twist here and there. The writer in Amrik Gill continued to resist for a while but finally surrendered when it came to a matter of sheer survival in a "sin city " like Mumbai.

A defeated Gill made it known that he was "available", "on sale". He was lucky he found some work, some friends also recommended him as a good writer. He also didn’t mind joining some good directors as an assistant. He learned from them. He learned what good film making was from some of these directors. He realised that there was no other way out but to join the "gang" of writers and directors who made loud proclamations of making great films and came up with nothing in the end. He also realised that there was a "layer" between the downright class and the upper class. He decided to give this middle layer his talent and found work where he could make more and more experiments of his own without any interference. He was soon accepted as the writer, surprisingly in Hindi first and then in Punjabi. They all said Gill was a good writer and it was high time he got his right breaks. And the tragedy was that his good writing was wanted by very few and there were hardly any film makers who were willing to take any risks with bold subjects in which Gill mastered. For the film makers all that mattered was the box-office.

For Gill all that mattered was good quality writing. It was a strange and tough tussle which Gill found difficult to fight. " It was very frustrating at times but you had to walk around the market with your bag full of work, work which you considered was very good but were time and again told that you were good but not good enough for the market. They kept telling me that and I wondered why 90% of the films made perished after their subject was written, re-written, revised and re-revised, Amrik Gill says. He however continued his struggle till the big break through came his way. Fortunately, for the sensitive writer, the breakthrough came when he was called by the young Sanjay Leela Bansali who took very little time to sign him to write the dialogue for his do or die film Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam and Gill proved that he was good right up to his gills. The dialogue of the film was one of the major highlights of the film which gave Amrik Gill a new lease of life. He was breathing free again.

He knew there were talented people who cared for good work and decided to stay and continue his struggle as a writer with the right intentions. The success of Hum Dil De Chuke Sanam has given him a place of his own as a writer and he is writing some five or six very good films, He says without caring for modesty after going through a grim struggle for all these years. Gill’s only ambition is to stop the Thespian from lamenting and lambasting writers and writing. All he needs is grou of men and women who would think like him sooner or later.

Ali Peter John

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