Karthic

BEHINDWOODS COLUMN

Songs in Movies - Can we get rid of them?, Tamil Cinema, Tamil Cinema Songs

SONGS IN MOVIES - CAN WE GET RID OF THEM?

Can you imagine Tamil movies or Indian movies without songs as in Hollywood?

Or at least can we imagine sometime in the future in which we have Indian movies without the just for dance numbers?
 
It will be really interesting, but it's a long way to go since songs have been a prominent part of our movies.
 
Last year we had a movie without any song, Onayum Aatukuttiyum, no one complained that that movie didn't have a song because it really did not need any song. Everyone praised that movie for that attempt. Also, we had many other movies which could have come out without any song, but they didn't.
 
Songs should be handled correctly. If used properly it can increase people's interest or it will end up as a disaster. Mostly it's the mindset of the directors. We cannot imagine a Gautham's movie or Shankar's movie without songs. Shankar puts in a lot of effort for making a song. He treats every song as a mini-movie itself. These kinds of songs are absolutely enjoyable on the screen. He even added an extra song in his remake movie Nanban and it still looked good. Songs cannot be simply shot in exotic location where heroines, who get to wear only mini dresses in freezing weather, suffer - it just makes people yawn. 
 
The placement is also very important, which most of the directors miss. You can't see the lead actors dancing right after someone's death like in KV Anand's movie, which he himself mocked or when the screenplay has just picked pace and everyone's waiting for the next move. These badly placed songs serve as mini-intervals for the impatient!
 
Also, nowadays people are not ready to watch a movie that's running more than two and half hours. I personally feel that two hours or maximum two hours and fifteen minutes is the ideal running length of a movie. To make this happen there should not be the mandatory five songs. Songs should be used to move the story innovatively and interestingly like "Mella Sirithai" song in Kalyana Samayal Sadham.
 
I am sure we cannot completely ignore the songs. We have many legends like MSV, Raja, Rahman etc from our land. To live without hearing their songs is impossible. But still the use of songs in movies should be changed. It should be used to move the story, simply not pictured in an exotic locale. The mandatory intro song for hero or heroine and a "kuthu" song before climax should be avoided, definitely. The extraneous songs should be used only to promote the movie in radios, TVs and YouTube.
 
Finally, either picture the songs interestingly or avoid it!

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This page hosts the views of the authors of the column. The views are generally about films, movie reviews, movie news, songs, music, film actors and actresses, directors, producers, cinematographers, music directors, and all others that contribute for the success or failure of a film. People looking for movies online, movie reviews, movie analysis, public response for a movie, will find this page useful.