A better rendition of a timeless classic

The mere mention of ‘The Godfather’ (1972) brings to mind the Hindi remakes like ‘Dharmatma’ (1975) and Sarkar (2005). While one readily connects these two to the seminal Francis Ford Coppola directed classic, there have been two more prominent remakes that are rarely recalled.

The Aamir Khan-Rajinikanth version called ‘Aatank Hi Aatank’ (1995) is still talked about to some degree but the other, ‘Zulm Ki Hukumat’ (1992), a somewhat better rendition of the timeless gangster drama than the former, has gone under the radar.

One of the reasons for this Bharat Rungachary directed film to be forgotten could have to do with the fact that it featured Govinda as Michael Corleone and came at a time when the star was undergoing one of the worst phases of his career.

The film released after ‘Shola Aur Shabnam’ (1992), which had initiated a resurrection of Govinda, but being nestled between his biggest flop ‘Radha Ka Sangam’ (1992) and forgettable fare such as ‘Baaz’ (1992) and ‘Jaan Se Pyaara’ (1992), ‘Zulm Ki Hukumat’ lost favour with the audience. Moreover, Govinda embarked on a funny man spree once the career-defining hit ‘Aankhen’ (1993) released following which nothing else but comedy could be associated with him.

The film begins with the police commissioner of Bombay requesting Pitamber Kohli (Dharmendra) to make his presence felt at a place, where communal riots have broken and he would rather have the benevolent don broker peace than resort to using force. Pitamber might have resorted to illegal activities he is conscientious enough to ensure that things like drugs are kept away from children.

When the others ask Pitamber to bless their drugs business he seems interested but only as a cover-up to ensure that no one makes a move on his family till his sister Kusum (Amita Nangia) is married. Pitamber’s younger brother the hotheaded Yashwant (Shakti Kapoor) seems keen to explore the money in drugs but won’t go against his brother while his youngest brother Pratap (Govinda) refuses to be a part of the syndicate.

A forest officer by profession Pratap visits the family with his girlfriend Kiran (Kimi Katkar) during the wedding and that’s the time when the rival gangs led by a Swami (Paresh Rawal) take Pitamber out. Pratap doesn’t want any bloodshed but when they attack Yashwant and his sister-in-law (Moushumi Chatterjee) he takes over the reins.

Swami likes Pratap for he feels that he can brainwash the baby-faced don but what he doesn’t know is how Pratap is playing him to eliminate his own gang. One by one Pratap makes Swami kill all his rivals and unknown to everyone also becomes an unidentified police informant enabling his one-time police inspector friend (Salim Ghouse) to take down the syndicate.

But when Swami comes to know he kills Yashwant and their brother-in-law, Prakash, leaving behind a bevy of widows – Pitamber’s bhabhi, Kiran and Yashwant’s wife, Meneka (Neena Gupta) in the Kohli family. Pratap prepares for the final assault and once he kills Swami he leaves the city with his wife, Kiran and his family never to return.

Till ‘Sarkar’ all Hindi ‘Godfather’ interpretations focussed on the character of Michael Corleone and in ‘Zulm Ki Hukumat’ the narrative for the first time featured a heavyweight to play Vito Corleone. Unlike ‘Dharmatma’ where Premnath was from too stylised, Dharmendra’s presence gives a wonderful balance to ‘Zulm Ki Hukumat’ with the perfect mix of vulnerability and power that even Amitabh Bachchan’s Subhash Nagare in ‘Sarkar’ falls short of.

The narrative took many liberties with the Mario Puzo novel and the Coppola-Puzo screenplay by combining two or more characters into one, leaving out ancillary characters like Tom Hagen and Fredo Corleone, hardly giving any screen time to Peter Clemenza and Salvatore Tessio, two of Vito’s earliest associates and omitting parallel plot-lines like Connie Corleone and her abusive husband Carlo Rizzi. While it did away with the iconic succession scene between Vito and his youngest son Michael, it used the Baptism of Michael’s Godson and the killing of Corleone family’s enemies in two parts with most of it playing out when Pratap is marrying Kiran.

Today, Govinda’s casting as Michael Corleone might be considered a mistake but watching him is a treat. He perfectly complements Dharmendra, an actor on whom he has modelled most of his career, and gets Michael’s coldness better than any other version. His introduction in a song is pathetic as is the duet with Kimi Katkar but the scenes, where he has to appear distant, scheming and menacing without being overt, Govinda is better than Aamir Khan in ‘Aatank Hi Aatank’ and Abhishek Bachchan in ‘Sarkar’.

At a few places, Govinda’s interpretation of the sociopath that Michael really is so good that even with dramatic dialogues and imposing close-ups, where his eyes invite you to peek into his soul the audience can only see a dark hollow pit. It’s intriguing how the one-time associate director of Hrishikesh Mukherjee on films such as ‘Chukpe Chupke’ and ‘Golmaal’ among others, Bharat Rungachary was better at films like ‘Zulm Ki Hukumat’,

‘Khatarnak’ (1990) a wonderful study of a cold-blooded killer Sunny (Sanjay Dutt) and ‘Takkar’ (1995), his last film before his untimely death that had a convict (Sunil Shetty) studying law to avenge the corrupt cop (Naseeruddin Shah), who framed him, than the likes of ‘Baat Ban Jaye’ (1986), a comedy closer to Hrishi da’s universe.

It’s funny how ‘Sarkar’ remained more faithful to the source material than all other remakes and yet took the Swami’s character from ‘Zulm Ki Hukumat’, the most liberal of remakes of ‘The Godfather’, to be the main villain.

By: Gautam Chintamani is the author of the best-seller ‘Dark Star: The Loneliness Of Being Rajesh Khanna’ (HarperCollins, 2014) / tweet him -@gchintamaniv