“Not salsa, not flamenco, brother. Do you know… naatu?”
With this friendly challenge begins the number “Naatu Naatu” in the hit Indian film “RRR”. The tune is nominated for an Academy Award for Best Original Song —the first time that has happened for an Indian production. “RRR” is a hit straight out of South India and the Telugu language film hub known as Tollywood.
Set in colonial India in the 1920s, “RRR,” directed by SS Rajamouli, pits a tribal warrior, Bheem (NT Rama Rao Jr., known as NTR Jr.), against a British Indian police officer, Ram (Ram Charan), whose task is to find him. But the two become friends, and in the “Naatu Naatu” sequence, they confront a British bully who wants to throw them out of a garden party.
The dance competition that follows has delighted hundreds of millions of viewers on YouTube and millions of moviegoers.
Rajamouli envisioned “Naatu Naatu” as something of a fight sequence: a showdown between the dynamic Indian duo and the pompous colonialists, with ferocious steps instead of punches. Bheem and Ram dance their hearts out, all smiles in front of admiring British ladies, which angers the bully, Jake (Eduard Buhac), and he dances furiously and ridiculously.
Jr. NTR and Charan dance in sync next to each other, while scores of British ladies and lads battle to keep up.
“Rajamouli told me that their styles had to match,” said Prem Rakshith, the film’s choreographer. “It had to be hard, but all the people had to do it.”
Rakshith chose a routine with lots of zigzag movements for the arms and legs. It’s fun to watch and imitate (judging by the TikToks).
The musical number has a wild, irrepressible feel, much like the action scenes in the film. (Despite the frenetic pacing and timing, none of the dances were artificially sped up or digitally altered, says Sreekar Prasad, the film’s editor.)
Rakshith added colorful touches—a synchronized rotation of the head and feet, and movements with elastic straps.
The throbbing rhythms of the drums and chorus are infectiously propulsive and feel more organic than many synth beats. MM Keeravani, the song’s composer, compared the upbeat 6/8 tempo to the traditional rhythms of popular village songs.
The rustic sound also comes to life in the instrumentation. Keeravani used duffs, an Indian skin drum that is held in the hands. “The duff will give you a very bright, resonant, piercing sound,” she said.
Eight or more duffs were used for the rhythms, mainly supported by timpani and other synth percussion and mandolins for the melody, along with other processed elements. As the dance marathon reaches a feverish pitch, the rhythms and vocals become trance-like with the help of a pulsing echo effect.
Keeravani shares the Oscar nomination (and a Golden Globe win) with lyricist Chandrabose, whose lyrics, he said, give the song “an inherent groove.”
Chandrabose’s Telugu-language verses are brimming with sunny rural images of banyan trees, leaping bulls and green chillies. “Jump until the dust rises in the air!” she says one line—which is exactly what happens in the movie, as the dancers kick up clouds of dust.
But one question remains: What is “naatu”?
“Naatu means raw and rustic,” Chandrabose said. He grew up in a small town in Telangana, a Telugu-speaking state whose capital, Hyderabad, is the base of operations for Tollywood.
“Everything I wrote in the song comes from my childhood memories of my life and my parents,” he said. “That’s why I created it very quickly.”
Both Keeravani and Chandrabose stressed the very local meaning of naatu. “It’s a word that says ‘something of our own, of our own culture,’” Keeravani said. That is reflected in how the sequences of “Naatu Naatu” unfold.
Bheem and Ram defeat colonial oppressors through their own dance tradition.
The Academy Award-nominated song will reportedly be performed in some capacity during the March 12 ceremony. Keeravani and Chandrabose were pleased that the world now really knows ‘naatu’.
“That is the creativity of an artist: you have to bring the local to the global platform,” Keeravani said. “That is the model of art.”
By: NICOLAS RAPOLD
BBC-NEWS-SRC: http://www.nytsyn.com/subscribed/stories/6591059, IMPORTING DATE: 2023-02-28 21:30:08
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