The idea of a biopic being made on him might not have sat well with Saadat Hasan Manto. The writer never came across as someone aching for attention. His stories, not his person, were his primary focus.

In a short article entitled How I Write Stories, Manto suggested: “I write because I’m addicted to writing, just as I’m addicted to wine. For if I don’t write a story, I feel as if I’m not wearing any clothes, I haven’t bathed, or I haven’t had my wine.” And in the same text, he wrote: “I’m forced to think of myself as not so much a writer of stories but more as a pickpocket, who picks his own pocket and then hands over its contents to you. You can travel the whole world but you won’t find a greater idiot than me.”

Even when Manto was trying to be self-effacing, his language was nothing but lyrical. And it’s exactly these two qualities, his down-to-earthness and his penchant for poetic dialogue, that filmmaker Nandita Das has tapped into for her outstanding biopic Manto. Luckily, Das never creates a cult of personality around the great man. What’s remarkable is the fact that, towards the end of the film, Manto (Nawazuddin Siddiqui), a writer so shaped by history, becomes almost secondary to the narrative. In fact, the film becomes a comment on Partition, on religion and above all, loss. It’s a bold storytelling choice that pays off beautifully.

But first, there’s Manto, famous screenwriter of the Indian film industry. He enjoyed the kind of respect and admiration in ’40s Bollywood that contemporary film producers in India or Pakistan might find bewildering: he was allowed on to film sets unannounced and was quick to call out sexist re-imaginings of his screenplays. It’s a carefree time for him — his contemporaries are Ashok Kumar (Bhanu Uday), Shyam (Tahir Raj Bhasin) or Ismat Chughtai (Rajshri Deshpande). Deshpande does such a fantastic job of portraying Chughtai that there’s a slight feeling of sadness that this isn’t a film about her. Manto and Chughtai’s scenes are terrific.

Nandita Das’ Manto is more than a portrayal of the legendary writer. It is a comment on Partition, on religion and above all, loss. It’s a bold storytelling choice that pays off beautifully

Manto’s genius is unmistakable. When a newspaper editor asks him to write an article lighter in nature, he wittily remarks: “Today’s column will be on cigarette smoke; what can be lighter than that?” And when communal riots break out, he humorously criticises religious clothing, such as a topi (prayer cap), that separates a devout man from a non-believer.

When 1947 does arrive, and people start chanting “Hindi, Hindu, Hindustan” in the streets, Manto starts fearing for his family. Even though his friend Ashok Kumar says “Ye sab pagalpan hai, khatm hojayega [This is madness, it will soon be over], history dictates another course for Manto. And in 2018, the irony of that sentence doesn’t escape the viewer. The madness is here to stay. Manto migrates to Pakistan with wife Safia (Rasika Duggal) and their little children. And once he’s there, it’s as if the independence has sucked the life and joy out of him. He becomes depressed and yearns for his old life and friends in then Bombay.

Amidst fighting his inner demons in newly formed Pakistan, Manto has to repeatedly stand trial for obscenity charges. The obscenity trials (much like Chughtai’s for The Quilt) have become a thing of legend, and by and large, Manto came away unshorn. Even so, Das has some fun in recreating courtroom scenes; there’s an exceptionally funny moment when a deadpan Faiz Ahmed Faiz argues that Thanda Gosht (Cold Meat) is in no way obscene, but it isn’t of high literary quality either. It’s a devastating blow to Manto, stinging far worse than the trial itself.

Another thing Das recreates with great attention to detail is Manto’s actual short stories, expertly and organically woven into the narrative by editor A. Sreekar Prasad. In fact, the film starts off with a visualisation of Ten Rupees while Manto is reading it to Safia, and later on, there are retellings of Ten Rupees, Khol Do (Open It), Thanda Gosht or even Toba Tek Singh, starring a diverse range of Indian character actors such as Purab Kohli, Paresh Rawal, Tillotama Shome, Divya Dutta and Ranvir Shorey.

These deeply human stories have lost none of their edge. They are just as relevant today as they were back in the day. Therefore, a biopic on Saadat Hasan Manto is very topical. And thankfully, it’s devoid of any chest-beating nationalism. Das hasn’t set out to make a “Manto was Indian, no, Manto was Pakistani” movie. The film steers clear of any melodrama too, even in the writer’s darker moments, when he’s downing one drink after the other and neglecting his family.

Das might have taken some dramatic liberties for her script (after all, it’s not a documentary); however the fact remains that this is as much a period picture concerned with what made its subject and what made him write his stories, as much as it tries to give a sense of the man himself. For now, Manto might stand as a definite portrait of Saadat Hasan Manto, but it’s so much more than that. It’s one of the more definitive films on Partition in recent memory. It’s a film Manto himself might possibly have been agreeable to.

Published in Dawn, ICON, November 25th, 2018