2 January 2010

An Idiot, An African --And the story of story ideas treated like "Kaminey"



Have you heard of Cajetan Boy?

Today was only the second time I came across the name, and that too, after an Internet search.
Strangely, symbolically and significantly, he shares the same initials as Chetan Bhagat.
And thereby hangs a tale on intellectual property.

Now, Cajetan Boy is the man whose idea gave rise to the story of "Kaminey" for which no less than four other writers took credit. But it goes to the credit of director Vishal Bhardwaj that the movie's starting credits clearly identify Mr. Boy.
Boys must be separated from Men. Vidhu Vinod Chopra, who asked reporters to "Shut Up" on New Year day when asked about writer Bhagat's wail that his story was not given proper credit in the making of "3 Idiots" could do well to learn a lesson from Vishal B, whose earlier two films Maqbool and Omkara were based on Shakespeare's Macbeth and Othello. Given Vishal's treatment, he could have easily called the stories his own, but he did not.
That is the business of respecting intellectual property, even if it involves only an idea.
Check out the Internet Movie Data Base where Cajetan Boy gets due credit for his idea that gave rise to Kaminey
Or then, read here about the fascinating story of how an African stands at the heart of a story that talked about Guddu and Charlie lost in Mumbai's bylanes.
I agree with my friend Shubho. Smirking at Chetan Bhagat is one thing, but giving IP the recognition that is due is quite another.
3 Idiots may be a big hit, and Chopra the Man with the Midas Touch, but perhaps he should not assume that giving ideas away is a matter of Gandhigiri.
We shall await director Rajkumar Hirani's take on this.
P.S. --There is a conspiracy theory that Bhagat and Chopra are in league because the novel (Five Point Someone) and the movie (3 Idiots) can be cross-promoted by the controversy over intellectual property. In which case, we would be the idiots to play into their hands.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hard to beleive that VVC is the same man who said on a television inteview that he would never want to be rich ever.And by not wanting to be rich he is protecting himself from that extra corrupting influence like psyching one's psyche that a certain wave of monetary overflow might bring upon his head and heart along with it.Under what pressure would he have been to not even credit a writer whose work has been so out in the open that the fact that his movie bears resemblance to the writer's story cannot be overlooked.
Who is to be looked at with what kind of eyes is forming the crux of this ambiguos behaviour that is fast filling the motion picture world .Reel imitates real.

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Unknown said...

checkout Kaminey DVD. Vishal talks about Cajetan Boy. Even he himself. The core story came from a writers camp conducted by Mira Nair and Vishal Bharadwaj in some African country(Kenya or Nigeria i guess).And this story mainly was about diamonds. Vishal Liked it and bought the right from him. "& giving money"(note it). Then this story gone through so much transition and transformation that, it resembled only a lil of wat cajetan's original story dealt with.

Now wat shud they give credit to? For getting them inspired???? For helping to take their butt on working? then they should give credit to writers wife, family, kids and dogs too... maaan then we should give credit to lots of cinema masters and classic stories like mahabaharatham and ramayanam for getting us inspired, for giving us a base to work. its the final product that is given credit to.

no comments on 3Idiots. dat idiot chetan desrves it. (well he deserved a lil more credit)