Fire in Babylon - An Education

Somewhere in the middle of Fire in Babylon, Viv Richards, batting without a head gear tries to hook a vicious bouncer but the ball comes too fast on him and hits him on his face. The Amarnaths and the Vengsarkars of this world would have been down after a pounding like that but the King is standing tall, undeterred and unmoved. Without showing a hint of pain or even a shrug of his head, he stares back at the bowler as if asking him, ‘Is that all you got?’. Bowler turns back to his run up as if to convey, 'Hold on, there's more coming'. He comes in steaming and again pitches in short. Richards repeats the same shot, this time sending it sailing over fine leg for a six, which should ideally have been an eight.
The crowd cheers in awe. You feel the same way. In the words of Viv Richards, "It is the history that you never forget."

Back in 1998, during one of my school summer vocations, I remember how eagerly I was awaiting the West Indies tour of South Africa to commence. The 5-Test match series was billed as the most keenly anticipated cricket series in a long-long time, especially with the whole socio-cultural African backdrop coming into play. But the series turned out to be a damp squib as the Windies were literally whitewashed 5-0 by the Proteas and barely managed to avoid the double ignominy in the subsequent ODIs where they were thrashed 1-6. I distinctly remember reading a Viv Richards interview in the aftermath of the disastrous African safari, where he was asked how he thought his own West Indies team from the mid-80s would have fared against the all-conquering South African team of Hansie Cronje. Richards replied with a child-like nostalgic excitement, "It would have been a great series...Oh man...I would have loved it. With our fast bowlers having a go at their batting, our batsmen taking on their bowlers...it would have been some contest." Having read about the long lasting West Indian dominance for years, I could understand back then what he meant when he compared the two sides but didn't quite realize the essence of it. After seeing Steven Riley's Documentary feature Fire in Babylon, I totally get it. And with my little found insight into the West Indian heydays, I am not sure if Cronje's side of 1998, for all its clinical brilliance and methodical efficiency, would've been able to avoid a similar 'Blackwash' against the West Indian side, that is shown in full glory, sweat and blood in the motion picture.

Fire in Babylon shows the causes and effects of the unbelievable rise of West Indian cricket and how it played a role in overcoming years of subjugation and racial abuse at the hands of their colonial masters. It revisits that era of cricket history and underlines its political implications in the way you have never seen or felt before. The rise of West Indies was seen as the rise of Black Power that unleashed a battery of demigods who'd strike down upon the forces of white prejudice with "great vengeance and furious anger".

Foremost among them is the towering figure of Vivian Richards – who looks as rocking in his interview excerpts as he does in the adrenaline pumping vintage footage. One always knew that the man is a legend, murderer of fast bowling and stuff like that. What FIB does is to give color, perspective and story to his larger than life persona. When you see the role he played in fostering racial, national and regional pride in West Indians each time he walked in to bat, each time he saw eye-to-eye with the intimidating white bowlers before he smacked them into oblivion, each time he took a political stand (against the WI Board for equal wages as white players or refusing a blank cheque offer to play for the rebel WI squad in S.Africa during Apartheid). He was the protagonist of the Black Power that was crusading towards unprecedented cricketing heights. He made his people believe that something as first-rate, undisputed and unchallenged as their brand of cricket could emerge from a group of supposedly 3rd world countries. In a subliminal way, you will also realise why Neena Gupta or any other actress who acknowledged his courage and manliness would give her right arm or left breast or both for having a child out of wedlock with the man like him and cherish that forever. If somebody told you that for an average West Indian he was no less a figure than the great Muhammed Ali or Pele, you would gladly believe so.

Don't Funk With My Heart

That’s not all. With Holding, Roberts, Marshall, Garner, Greenidge, Haynes, each reliving his glory years, FIB is a treasure trove of cricket memorabilia. Though you do wish to have someone like an Imran Khan or a Gavaskar to turn up on screen and speak of those times from a neutral perspective, but then it might have diluted the message from where it was coming.

You do, however, stumble upon some archive material which is as riveting and engaging as anything you have possibly come across. Like, you have no idea how fast Jeff Thompson really was until you see him throw one thunderbolt after another on the hapless West Indian batsmen on that wretched '76 tour. You wonder if Shoaib Akhtar would even come close to him in sheer pace. You also wonder how mentally strong Clive Lloyd's side really was to be able to come back from that position of mental and physical torture and then rule the game for the next 20 years. You feel the adrenaline rush when Michael Holding sends Tony Greig's stumps cartwheeling and the sinking realisation from the English side about the ill fated 'grovel' comment. You wonder how the West Indies today have traveled full circle and come back to where it started from in the 60s - Calypso Cricketers - those who can entertain but can't win. And finally, you wonder whether Indian hockey too needs a Fire in Babylon to stir up the dying spirits.