Hum

1991 184’ col/scope Hindi d Mukul S. Anand pc Romesh Films s Ravi Kapoor, Mohan Kaul dial Kader Khan lyr Anand Bakshi c W.B. Rao m Laxmikant- Pyarelal lp Amitabh Bachchan, Kimi Katkar, Rajnikant, Anupam Kher, Danny Denzongpa, Kadar Khan, Govinda, Deepa Sahi, Shilpa Shirodkar, Romesh Sharma, Annu Kapoor

Beginning with silhouetted scenes (cf. Sam Fuller’s Underworld USA, 1960) in the Bombay dockyards recalling Deewar (1975) and ending with the star’s bloodshot eyes advancing towards the quivering villain, Mukul Anand’s hit provides a lexicon of Bachchanalia. Tiger (Bachchan), a petty collector of protection money, changes sides when his friend Gonsalves (Sharma) leads the exploited dockers against Mr Big, Bakhtawar (Denzongpa). The perfidious Inspector Giridhar (Kher) and his sidekick (Kapoor) manipulate the bloody confrontations so that Bakhtawar is jailed for Gonsalves’ murder, his family is exterminated and Tiger, together with his two brothers (Rajnikant and Govinda) and their families, is banished from the city. Years later, after idyllic family scenes and a complicated plot involving high-level scams in the Indian Army, the Bachchan clan has to go into action against a bunch of terrorists in pseudo-hippy costumes and equipped with an assortment of armaments. The high point of the film, refurbishing an ageing Bachchan image, is the big musical number Jumma chumma (taken from Mori Kante’s Akwaba Beach album) with Kimi Katkar performing in a bar filled with sweaty, beer-swilling and foot-stomping dockers whose collective ejaculation takes the form of spraying the star with whatever liquid is available. The scene is repeated, as the gang-rape connotations are replaced by those of movie-star mania, when Katkar becomes a star and both she and Bachchan are mobbed by crazed fans. The film received an unprecedented saturation release in over 400 cinemas.

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