Bulandi (2000)

The blundering Bulandi suffers from a narrow-minded worldview, an idiotic storyline and inevitable comparisons with the far, far superior Virasat. Like Virasat, Bulandi is an epic tale of rural India, told from the perspective of a divided village's noble thakur, played - yet again - by Anil Kapoor. Yet despite excellent cinematography and a gorgeous setting - similar to Virasat's - this film's attempts to tackle the same East/West cultural dilemmas are irritatingly simple-minded. Whereas Virasat acknowledged the East/West tensions and ultimately demonstrated how both Western individualism or Eastern communalism can be morally problematic, Bulandi falls back on the tired, regressive cliché where all that is Indian is morally pure and all that is Western is morally corrupt. Even more annoyingly, women are once again presented as the vehicles of Western temptation and weakness. Oh, come on! Furthermore, an unnecessary comedy sideplot starring Paresh Rawal slows and cheapens the narrative (most of the jokes are incest-based), and the comic book villain (Shakti Kapoor) felt similarly tacked on in a feeble attempt to pump up the narrative. We can only imagine that this film was made in an attempt to redo the formula which worked for Virasat - rural setting, Anil Kapoor as thakur, remake of a South Indian film, discuss culture and other lofty things. Understandable, since Virasat was such a good film. Too bad Bulandi isn't. Like waaaaay isn't.


Pretty shot, no? Well, enjoy it 'cause that's all you're gonna get here!

The story begins with some narrated scene-setting: the Elysial rural Indian village, where life is simple and the thakur's word reigns. In one particular village, we are introduced to the thakur's family of three brothers: eldest is the affectionately named Dada Thakur ("Grandpa Thakur", Anil Kapoor in gray), middle is the spunky Arjun (Anil Kapoor in brown), and last is the young Nakul (Harish). The way the brothers are introduced, it felt like the story wanted to sketch out some rough character traits - too bad they apparently didn't have any!

The story begins with Dada Thakur fixing middle brother Arjun's marriage to the "educated, modern girl", Meena (Raveena Tandon). Uh oh. Meanwhile, another even more Westernized "modern girl" arrives in the village as the next schoolteacher - this woman's only setting seems to be "Horny" and so, after one quick glance of Arjun's manly, hairy chest, she proceeds to spend the rest of the film biting her lip and writhing around while embarrassing eroticized howling plays in the background. And it gets worse! But once rapists starting marrying their victims and this was being presented as "justice", the PPCC adopted a policy of Ignore the Story, knowing that, otherwise, our head would just explode. So we distanced ourselves from the terribleness, leaned on the fast forward button, and ended up laughing very, very hard during the "tragic" ending.

The Awful

First, let's get the awfulness out of the way. First and most awful thing: the gender relations.

The film's two "bad" women - Meena the wife and No Name the school teacher - couldn't be more superficially presented. "Modern wife" Meena is a caricature of Westernized ignorance and disrespect: she scoffs at the village's superstitions, proclaims that she's not interested in children and - in one of the film's (unintentionally) funniest moments - warns Dada Thakur himself to "MIND IT!" when he innocently asks for some cold water. "Isn't this woman stupid and evil?!" the film seems to scream. Well, we found her hilarious too. Too bad she had to be "tamed" by the Good Indian Wife Lakshmi (Rekha), Dada Thakur's wife.

We found less funny the ridiculous schoolteacher woman (who wasn't even credited on IMDb!). Watching her scenes of breathlessly detailed and demonized sexualization was just painful. How regressive and idiotic were her attempts to seduce Anil Kapoor, especially compared to, for example, Madhuri Dixit's seduction of Anil Kapoor in Beta. We were very annoyed to see woman's sexuality caricatured and demonized (and associated, again with Westernized moral bankruptcy!), where anything less than being "shy and demure" loses a woman's "respect" and brands her as a shameless whore. ARGH. Does anyone have a spork?! Because we'd like to POKE OUR EYES OUT WITH IT.


The saucy school teacher.


She saucily strews strategically opened magazines in Arjun's path.


And then just tackles him onto a pile of melons, provoking much jocularity at the PPCC.

Of course, all these regressive inhibitions and limitations on women are dressed up in the usual "But it's your dharma!" discourse - that is, as Good Indian Wife Lakshmi explains, it is a wife's spiritual obligation to "serve like a slave, look like a goddess... and have the capacity to endure like the earth"! Once again, a comparison with Virasat is inevitable: while it didn't beat us over the head with "dharma" this and "dharma" that in the dialogues, Virasat's entire narrative was basically an examination of what it means to follow your dharma all the way to the (occasionally grisly) end. Without giving too much away, Virasat's protagonist loses almost everything dear to him in his pursuit of his dharma as the thakur's son (to serve the village) - yet he chooses the dharmic path anyway since that's the only morally acceptable choice. That is, after a reasoned evaluation of a difficult moral situation, Virasat's Shakti chooses the self-sacrificial anti-individualist dharmic path - this is in contrast to having dharma repeatedly thrust upon the hero via guilt trips about cultural loyalty and Hindustani pride - and the film furthermore shows that the dharmic path is painful, mired in ambiguity and an ultimate submission of the individual into the community. Bulandi's circular argument is, "You must follow your dharma because dharma is good."

The Curious

That said, there are some acceptable aspects to Bulandi (the cinematography, Rajinikanth's cameo, Kulbushan Kharbhanda shows up at one point too), as well as some purely "whoa, freaky" factors for the curious: Anil Kapoor bizarrely (and unnecessarily?) plays a double role and is paired opposite Rekha (?!) in the "older" incarnation. Whoa! Freaky!

Heroines get a hard time in commercial Hindi cinema, and there's the usual double standard where twenty year age gaps between heroes and heroines are okay... if and only if the man is older. We admit that, since it's so unusual to see an older heroine, we watched the Anil/Rekha romantic cavorting in a state of slightly bewildered discomfort. And yet Rekha's only five years older than Anil (!) - despite this Planet Bollywood review's wild claims ("70"?!).


Wha...?


Yanna Rascala! MIND IT!!!

South Indian superstar Rajinikanth's extended cameo injects a much-needed punch of energy into the film. He also seems to be the only one with a sense of humor, and he plays it straight pulpy. We've never seen Rajinikanth in action, but have only seen him parodied. South Indian cinema remains shrouded in exoticized mystery for us Hindi cinema-loving PPCC, so we were very curious and just soaked it all up. Our first impression? We can see why Rajinikanth is so popular - he was a tidal wave of charisma, with hilarious trademark moves like flipping his cigar into his mouth and flapping his shawl around to dishoom dishoom sound effects. This guy was like an alien from the Planet Fantastic! And we even recognized that exaggerated superhero anthem-style acting in Rajinikanth as the thing we loved best about Anil Kapoor's performance in Nayak where, wait for it, he plays a character... based on Rajinikanth! (That is, Anil's character's name, Shivaji Rao, is Rajinikanth's real name. And the film is a remake of a South Indian film.) Except that, next to the real deal, even our reliably zany and larger-than-life Anil Kapoor looked awfully repressed - his naturalism looked out of place amidst Rajinikanth's antics, and we kept going, "Come on, cut loose!" Have these two been in any other films together?

But speaking of jodis, why did Anil Kapoor get a double role in this? He was sort of okay as old Dada Thakur, forgettable as Arjun and only slightly resembling his usual persona as young Dada Thakur. We think this film would have improved heaps if Anil Kapoor had confined himself to playing one role and then let someone else play the other brother. That would have also opened up the jodi potentials. Since, come on, how are you gonna have jodi with yourself!?


That's just weird. (Though, side note: look! The doubling was so good that the two Anil Kapoors could even TOUCH EACH OTHER. AMAZING, NA!?)

The Passable

As stupid as this film was, we did derive some satisfaction in seeing occasional flashes of directorial and cinematographical brilliance. The compositions during the song sequences were often inspired, despite the often mediocre dancing and forgettable music. Little details were amplified for good emotional effect. For example, the PPCC is a big fan of zooming in on nervous, expressive hands. We still remember the moment in the 2005 Pride and Prejudice where the camera followed Darcy's hand in close-up as Darcy walked away from his secretly beloved Elizabeth Bennett. Heck, it was that moment itself that made us reconsider the whole film and dub it "very, very nice" instead of just, "Well, it's not Colin Firth, is it?" Bulandi has a similar moment when the camera briefly focused on Dada Thakur's hand as he gripped the carriage in an effort to discreetly contain his vast emotional suffering, and, a moment later, another close-up of the hand relaxing as the tension breaks and relief floods in. (Don't ask us what Dada Thakur was upset about, though, as it was really stupid.)


This film would have been so much better on silent. Pretty visuals without interference.

Another source of decency in the film were two of the songs. First, there is an oddly (and unintentionally!) poignant song when Arjun and Meena, having freshly made up and resolved to be the ideal Good Indian Couple, accidentally drink a load of hemp-laced bhaang, get stoned and imagine themselves in a sort of lovably dorky early 90s rap video. There was something endearingly sweet and also tragic about these two hapless, sheltered people fantasizing about enjoying life in the evil West - within the highly restricted confines of this film's "morality", a drug-induced fantasy romp was the only way poor old Arjun and Meena could have any fun, cross cultural borders and harmlessly shake it up a bit! And they were so dorky about it too! And the song itself was decent too! Oh, tragic.


The family that gets inadvertently stoned together...


...and fantasizes together...


...about mimicking LL Cool J circa 1990 together... STAYS TOGETHER.

The second song we want to mention was worth it for novelty value. In the extended flashback sequence, we see the young Dada Thakur (Anil Kapoor, remember!) fall in love with Lakshmi (Rekha, remember!). The cinematography in this song was gorgeous, the dancing was fine, but we just watched it with eyes wide because... well, goodness, it's Anil Kapoor and Rekha (!?!).

Our dominant feelings during this film - disgust, boredom, unintentional laughter, occasional rage and the mild freak-out - meant that (1) we will never watch this again and don't recommend you do at all and (2) we desperately need to go purify ourselves with something GOOD now. Recommendations, please!

Lajja (2001)

Some movies end with "Thank You!" instead of "The End", and the epic, dismal, nominally "feminist" misfire that is Lajja (Shame) should give us some gratitude too, wethinks. Gratitude for sitting through three hours and twenty minutes of a relentless, ham-fisted grotesquerie about the Plight of Women, where the scenes swing from fantasy-style empowerment to incredibly distressing violence. We'll just say up front that we found the recent Chak De! India and the zany, emancipated Beta much more succesful feminist Hindi films. Lajja, for however hard it tries, ultimately left us with a bad taste in our mouth - it wasn't challenging, subversive or uplifting. It was just angry and angering. In short, Lajja was to misogyny what Dhan Dhana Dhan Goal was to racism: both films tackle an unsavory, real life topic in a clumsy and ultimately ineffectual way.

The first red flag, for us, was director Rajkumar Santoshi's well-meaning but subtly offensive disclaimer:


Last line, in particular: "After all, the greatness of a civilization can only be measured by the status of its women."

Ahem. Okay. Right. This annoys us because why can't society also be measured by the status of its men? Why are women relegated to this "special" role, serving as representative tokens? In particular, the film itself criticizes Indian culture's "hypocrisy" in putting women on a pedestal - for example, Sita of the Ramayana, or the eternal "Maa" of filmidom - worshipping them while simultaneously imprisoning them in highly restrictive ideals of purity, chastity, morality, and so forth. Yet the film seems to suffer from this very thing, if we're measuring freaking civilizations by the size of that pedestal! Also, very importantly, notice that the harrassed heroine, Vaidehi (Manisha Koirala), is a stereotypical filmi Good Indian Wife: that is, she is distressed not only by her husband's physical abuse and philandering - as anyone would be - but she is also alarmed by seeing her emancipated friend, Janki (Madhuri Dixit), drinking, smoking and whistling. And the Good Indian Wife gets the happy ending, whereas Janki is the victim of mob violence! We got the distinct feeling that, as much as director Santoshi wanted to emancipate and empower women, he still suffered from that particularly male-centric desire to define the terms in which women can be emancipated. Apparently it's okay to want to be free from domestic abuse, but it's not really okay to try things, have vices, make mistakes or, gosh, not want children (shudder at the thought!) as every woman in this film is associated with being a (potential) mom.

The odyssean tale begins with Vaidehi (a gloomy Manisha Koirala), imprisoned in the first ring of misogynistic inferno: her husband, the schmoozy, boozy Raghu (Jackie Shroff), gives her a lot of material wealth and a lot of problems. He openly flirts with other women and hits Vaidehi behind closed doors. When Vaidehi finds the strength to escape, she flees to her parents' home in India - and her parents, in what will become a running leitmotif of the film, offer practically no sympathy and urge her to return to Raghu. Meanwhile, Raghu has been in a car accident and found that he's sterile and Vaidehi is pregnant. His desire to track Vaidehi down therefore becomes much more intense, as she becomes - clang! another blunt note! - importantly and merely a "baby-producing machine" that he can dispose of once the baby is born. He sends his two goons (a highly restrained Johnny Lever and Razak Khan, thank goodness) to track her down.

Vaidehi now runs around the subcontinent fleeing from her evil husband's evil goons' evil clutches. And along the way, she runs into every Representative Problem of Indian Women that director Santoshi could think of. First: dowry. Vaidehi gate crashes a wedding in order to hide from the cops. There, she runs into the first (of two) good guys, the thief with a heart of gold, Raju (a very cute Anil Kapoor), as well as a gaggle of unexpected 1970s masala comedians (Asrani! Jagdeep! a Johnny Walker lookalike!). Vaidehi and Raju and the comedians witness the evil conniving of the groom's family as it tries to extort as much dowry money as possible from the harried father of the bride (Anjan Shrivastav).


A special note about Asrani: he looks AMAZING for his age! A special note about Jagdeep: we secretly hard-core love Jagdeep and think he was an untapped potential of humanistic, tragicomic genius. We have also decided that he will be playing Anil Kapoor's father in the film we're writing.

Next up: the working woman. Hindi films have a long tradition of showing the theatre woman's doomed attempts at love and marriage due to society likening her to little more than a prostitute. Vaidehi indeed runs into the feisty, fun Janki (Madhuri Dixit), who is pregnant, unmarried, a drinker, a smoker, a whistler and the star of a local theatre company. When the jealous and evil theatre owner (Tinnu Anand) plants the seeds of doubt in Janki's lover's mind, lead actor Manish (Sameer Sodi), Janki is quickly dumped and asked to have an abortion. In retaliation, Janki becomes a little wasted and - in the film's most blunt but also most satisfying mini-climax - rewrites the Ramayana play they're performing to demand why Sita must be tested by fire, why not Ram too?! Good one. As Carla noted, this nugget is representative of the entire film: that is, it is a criticism of Sita's famous trial by fire, on which so much of Indian culture's gender relations are based. (Nota bene that all the heroine's names are variations of Sita's.)


You made Sita cry! BESHARAM!

Anyway, third problem: infanticide (and a little wollop of casteism). Vaidehi's next stop is in a tiny village ruled by an evil thakur type, Gajendra (Danny Denzongpa). The village's midwife, Ramdulaari (Rekha), is progressive and empowered - uh oh, this doesn't bode well in a film where all except two of the male characters are violent, stupid and evil. As Ramdulaari welcomes her computer geek son back from university, she is horrified to learn that he has fallen in love with Gajendra's daughter. This gives Gajendra the perfect pretext to get rid of Ramdulaari once and for all. Yet with the arrival of the second (of two) good guys, the dacoit with a heart of gold, Bulwa (a very studly Ajay Devgan), a full-scale dishoom dishoom is unleashed. The remaining half hour of the film sounds like this: dishoom! whack! aarghhh! wahh-pshhhh! splash! gurgle! thump!

And the PPCC of course: siiiigh.

Just when we were thinking, "Hey, it's been over an hour and no sign of Anil or Madhuri. Did Santoshi just forget about them!?" Santoshi proves that, no, he didn't - as he ties everything up, a little haphazardly, in a hasty "happy" ending.


Man, we wish we could just chill out with Rekha sometimes.

We've already described the film's main problem above. Basically, it's a dangerously oversimplified, one-sided view of a complex and deep-rooted problem. In this film, all women are pure, virginal and true, and all - except two - of the men are either stupid, evil or both. While Santoshi's disclaimer notes that things have been "amplified for deaf people to take note", we think he undermines his own message by being so "loud". Awful things happen to women in this film, and it seems like anything less than perfection - both in terms of personal strength and purity - is severely punished. Often, even perfection itself isn't enough, and then it's up to Anil Kapoor and Ajay Devgan to sweep in and save the damsels in distress.


Manisha and Madhuri. One of the few moments when they're not CRYING ABOUT BEING A WOMAN in this evil man's world.

Which segues nicely into a note about the two sole "good guys". We thought it was interesting that both good guys are "anti-socials", a thief and a dacoit, operating outside of the system. Way to the stick it to the Man! Anil's Raju openly criticizes the establishment as a hateful society, noting that going to jail would be a respite from its wretchedness (ha! we liked that line, btw), while Ajay's Bulwa seems to embody a fiercely independent (notable in itself) and proto-feminist Jai Santoshi Maa! mentality. One of the most notable scenes (slight spoiler), we think, is when Bulwa has the chance to behead Raghu the evil husband. As he raises his machete, Vaidehi screams in horror. Bulwa stops himself and, angry, bellows at Vaidehi that "you women are your own worst enemies!" and only an "Indian woman" would still be apalled by the decapitation of her clearly evil husband. We think this scene is interestingly saying that Indian women's culturally-approved devotion to the sanctity of marriage (sometimes embodied in their inability to remove their mangalsutra or, you know, watch their husband get decapitated without flinching) is against their own interest. A fascinating, weird scene.


Shameless Ajay Devgan pic, but, goodness, he looked divine in this film. STUD! And Good Guy #1.


That said, our heart belongs to Anil Kapoor these days. Awwww! Good Guy #2. Dilsquish!!

We wanted to like this film, because anything pro-woman gets big brownie points at the PPCC. Unfortunately, we found this like a much more bloated Mirch Masala - a facile, unhelpful look at "how women suffer". We highly recommend, however, that you watch it yourself as it can certainly stimulate useful debate.

Do Musafir (1978)

Rich dad, poor dad.

Do Musafir, a satisfying masala melodrama, does nothing wrong. That's not to say that it's particularly special either - resembling, as it does, several other movies, and maintaining an altogether difficult emotional tone, even when in the guise of zany masala tropes. It's altogether solid and enjoyable, but we wouldn't call this genre-defining or particularly uplifting.


Delirious romance among the coconuts, whoopee!


Juicy melodrama at home, yeehaw!

In many ways, this film is to fathers and sons what Duniya Meri Jeb Mein was to brothers. Both films use the masala mold to teach us moral lessons about the ties that bind, and both films are generally downers. Do Musafir is, thankfully, less of a downer than Duniya Meri Jeb Mein, mostly because instead of revenge, we have obstacle-free (yes!) romance!

But from the initial set-up of Do Musafir, you know that it's not going to end well: Kailash Babu (Ashok Kumar) is a wealthy industrial and single father. His only son, Vicky (the dreadful Master Bittoo, bane of child actors and the PPCC), is his joy and life. One day, Kailash and Vicky go on a father-son fishing trip, and it's all fun and games until Vicky falls off the boat and is lost at sea. Kailash, assuming Vicky drowned, begins to drown himself in whiskey. (You'll start noticing this film is chock full of parallels. Which is nice.)

Vicky washes up on the Keralan shore (woohoo! new region!) and is promptly picked up by Shambhu (PRAN!!! OMG!!!) and the missus. These simple fisher folk have been praying for a son, and cannot resist keeping Vicky and raising him as their own. Sound Shakespearean enough for you? Vicky quickly grows up into Raju (our beloved Shashi Kapoor), who is, as usual, impossibly adorable and charismatic. With his coy playfulness and incredible studliness, not only his family - but everyone in the village - has got a serious, heart-melting crush on Shashi. So scrumptious!


The Shashi-Rekha duo is da best: Vijeta! Baseraa! Immaan Dharam!

And it's all squishy hearts, coconut milk and fishing in the first half, especially when Bijli (which means "electricity", doesn't it? played by Rekha) shows up and the suitably gorgeous Shashi-Rekha jodi fires up. After a couple songs romping down the Keralan canals and up the palm trees, Rekha moves to the city and Raju, dragging his father along, follows her.

Once there, it is time for the Hindi Movie Irony. Kailash, who now spends his evenings getting drunk in bars, picking up young men and inviting them to bed (yes, really), one evening picks up Shashi and drags him to his bedroom, beckoning him to tuck him in, as a son would a (totally smashed?) father. While most young men take advantage of Kailash, who usually drunkenly insists that they take "what is yours, son" (i.e. his wallet and watch), squeaky clean Raju is, instead, touched and gently pitying. He returns the next morning with Kailash's things and Kailash, marvelling at his honesty, hires him on the spot. And who else works in Kailash's factory? Yes, love interest Bijli! So convenient!


Shashi's rays of goodness, brightening Ashok Kumar's world of pain. Can Shashi do wrong in this film? The answer is no.

So now we have two very sympathetic father figures, played with emotional honesty by Ashok Kumar and Pran. How can this possibly be reconciled? Maybe Shashi can have two Dads? Alas, things can't end well for everyone, and the introduction of our stock Masala Villain (Prem Chopra, in a leering, hilarious role) makes sure of that. Woe.

So what's good about Do Musafir?

• The region! The film makes ample use of the Keralan countryside. Apart from the small meeping sounds the PPCC made whenever we saw our beloved Shashi wearing a lunghi man-skirt and ambling along rows of palm trees (did our heart just pop an artery? the artery of LOVE!), the filmmakers had some fun showing us a fabulous Keralan boat race. For a genre so defined by Emergency-era Bombay, it was such a refreshing change to see such a different (and gorgeous!) state.
  
• The actors! If you've read any other post in this blog, you'll probably have come across our deep and everlasting loyalty to Shashi (our number one), Pran (our other number one), Rekha, Ashok Kumar and even, recently, Prem Chopra (hilarious!). Sometimes Shashi sleep-walked through roles in films that he clearly didn't believe in, and part of the fun of watching his entire catalog (our life goal) is seeing the obvious delight he exhibited in some other roles. In Do Musafir, Shashi is definitely giving it 100%, tossing his curls through the melodrama and exhibiting great comic timing. Everyone else is likewise committed and - with actors such as these - this means it's all great fun! Even the Usual Proletarian Subplot Guy (Jagdeep) was one of our more likable 70s comedians.
  
• Which reminds us of... the comedy! This surprised us, since masala comedy tends to be very broad. Instead, there were several moments in Do Musafir which were subtle, winking jokes - things that surprised us with their easy wit. For example, the fast cut between Shashi handing Rekha's mother a heaping plate of laddoos and, a take later, that plate being nearly empty and Shashi's nervous, bewildered expression as he sits with the mom. Or a moment when one of Prem Chopra's minions catches him drumming his shoes excitedly while alone in his office (though, Prem Chopra has already convinced us he's a comedy super-genius ever since Mard).
  
• The one song Rekha sings in the factory. Well, you know we're suckers for these sorts of things. Proletarian, happy, minor-keyed, elated sublime. This was also very similar to another PPCC fave, Kanyadaan's transcendental Mil Gaye.

The bad-ass boat race!


Shashi bumming it on the ferry from the village.

This was a film that, unexpectedly, didn't rely on the romance or the villain to propel it forward (somewhat to the detriment of Rekha, who didn't have as much to do in the second act), but instead focused solely on the tension between the desire to have a son and a father. The film made no attempts to modernize or quirkify this classical story, but instead maintained such timeworn staples as the contrast between the rich, city father and the poor, peasant father, or Shashi's offer to tear himself in half so they can share him.

All in all, a gushy, goopy film. At times, it threatened to become almost too saccharine, and we wished Shashi would stop being so sympathetic and kick some dishoomy butt. But hey, "too fluffily pure" is hardly a big indictment, and our only real criticism was that it was terrible to watch our beloved trio, the poor Pran-Ashok-Shashi jodi, stuck in such a zero-sum game.

Fake trailer: Vijeta (1982)

Ah, there's nothing quite like seeing all your blood, sweat and tears produce something fabulously mediocre. We give ourselves a C for output, but A for frickin' effort. Anyone else want to take up the mantle and make a better one? Pleease.

Specifications:
Software: Windows Movie Maker
Music: A-Punk by Vampire Weekend (no postcolonial pun intended), For the Widows in Paradise, For the Fatherless in Ypsilanti by Sufjan Stevens.
Crappy subtitles: the PPCC's tenuous grasp of Hindi + a lot of guessing
Target audience: trendy hipsters, thoughtful international/art cinema market, the PPCC's mom
Film: Read the PPCC review! Read the Planet Bollywood review! Buy it for yourself!

Well, this was a bitch to make.

We wish we could say it was a bitch because of technical issues - the constrictive Windows Movie Maker, our sluggish RAM - but, in all honesty, it was just hard because our creativity apparently doesn't extend as far as movie trailers, as we previously thought. Those things are trickier than they look, man! Especially the whole musical changes - how the frick do you change the music in these things without making it incredibly jarring? How?!

Anyway, we assume the PPCC is the only entity on the internet right now making hipster-style movie trailers for old Hindi films, so at least we have novelty value. Our noble mission is to make some of our recently PPCCed, older movies more enticing for the average young person with the cunning use of fake trailers. Our secret, Crazy Person mission is that, one day, a Prithvi Theatre employee finds this, quickly goes to their boss and exclaims, "Boss ji! Boss ji! Arre, Shashi ji! We think we've found someone with fresh, raw talent, heaps of enthusiasm and a passion for learning Hindi! And it's not Gonzo! Maybe we should invite the PPCC to Mumbai in some sort of well-paid, creative (or even just peripheral) capacity?" That's looking unlikely, given how crappy the trailer actually is, but maybe we'll get charity points for trying?

Come on, we're advertising your movies for free, Shashi ji! FOR FREE.

Vijeta (1982)

We had high hopes for Vijeta (The Victor). It sounded right up our alley - early 80s Shashi! Govind Nihalani! parallel cinema! minority religion! - and we're happy to report that we were not disappointed.


If we were more informed, we would draw parallels with Top Gun... except we've never actually seen all of Top Gun.

Vijeta tells the story of young Angad Singh (Kunal Kapoor, real-life son). As his mother, Neelima (Rekha), describes him, Angad is an Angry Young Man. He has just failed out of another boarding school, much to the consternation of his stern father, Nihal (Shashi Kapoor, real-life father), and he is angst-ridden, aimless and toying with the idea of suicide. Home is a toxic place, where Angad's parents engage in nasty arguments - the residues of Nihal's past infidelity - and the battle lines are drawn - Angad sides with his mother, resents his father.


OMG and anyone would resent this guy. Shashi is excellent as the horrible pater familias.


Oh, Holden! Hang in there!

It takes a visit from his maternal uncle, Arvind (Om Puri), to kick-start Angad's adulthood. Arvind, with his ruler-straight posture and meticulous precision, is a military man. After being shown around the warboat Arvind works on, Angad is inspired: he wants to join the air force too! While his mother and grandmother (Dina Pathak) agree to the idea, Angad's father is adamantly opposed. After more oppressive tension, Angad is finally allowed to go.

The rest of the film follow his slow awakening and maturation as he transforms himself from an emo punk into a responsible, sympathetic and brave young man. In the final quarter of the film, India goes to war with Pakistan (it's 1971, apparently?) and, after several tragedies, Angad's rite of passage ends on a bittersweet yet hopeful note.


A gorgeous, slow, Zen tracking shot. Just perfect.


Angad's three buddies, each a religious rep - Hindu, Muslim, Christian. The guy on the right, K.K. Raina, was fab!

Now that plot summary doesn't really do justice to what is a considerably more complex and interesting film. We'll try to mention the major themes we noticed, but obviously - being non-Indian and with a tenuous grasp of recent Indian history - we can't cover everything, as we probably didn't get everything. And unfortunately our usual guru on all things Hindi cinema, Prof. Philip Lutgendorf, hasn't reviewed this yet.

Fathers and their children. If Angad's Growing Up is the foreground theme, then Fathers is the background. While the plot centers on Angad, it is bookended and constantly informed by the story of his father, Nihal. In the very first scene, a sleeping Nihal suffers a flashback to Partition-era Punjab and we see that most of his family was murdered in the rioting. The last scene, likewise, features the resolution to Nihal's plotline. In this way, the movie's a lot like the great Mississippi Masala, where the child's coming of age is cast against the broader historical angst that the father brings with him.


On-screen, off-screen father...


...and son. We at the PPCC love visual parallels like this. Sigh!

The relationship between Nihal and Angad is one of the film's big emotional hooks. Initially, Angad is full of resentment for Nihal's past infidelity and Nihal's treatment of his wife. Indeed, Nihal is a very flawed man: he is the self-pitying patriarch, throwing his weight around, quick to remind everyone of how hard his life has been, and, when that doesn't work, using the slow poison of guilt. Argh! The arguments between Nihal and Neelimi were painfully evocative, mostly because they were so real. Expect no masala melodrama with which to emotionally distance yourself! Instead, the film works to show you how alienated father and son initially are (see also the themes of religion), so that, in their moments of closeness, it's all the more poignant. Alas, expect no masala-style weepy reconciliation either. Sigh.

The second most important father is the air force instructor, Verghese (Amrish Puri). Our young Angad falls in love with Verghese's daughter, Anna (Supriya Pathak), and there is much hero-worshipping of Verghese by everyone - Anna, Angad, the other fighter pilots. He's like a father to his air force students, and he is generally a great guy: stern yet sympathetic, strong, blah blah. Basically he juxtaposes starkly against the relatively selfish and somewhat spineless (wait 'til you hear his excuse for the infidelity! it's very WTF) Nihal. However, the film's ultimate message seems to be an acceptance of flawed human beings. Nice.

Religions. Most mainstream Hindi movies that we've PPCCed are primarily from a Hindu perspective, with Islam, Christianity and Sikhism playing supporting, stereotyped roles. It was very refreshing to see a movie told from a Sikh perspective. While the usual Blunt Hindi Movie Pluralism is present - Angad's fighter pilot buddies are a Hindu, a Muslim, and a Christian - these guys aren't caricatures. Furthermore (and interestingly!), the second most prominent religion in the film is Christianity.

Another way in which religion is used is to create more distance between father Nihal and the rest of the family. While Nihal's nightmares show that he used to live as a devout Sikh, when he wakes we see that he's shed the dastar and wears only the karra bracelet. His secularism is emphasized further: he's a bit boozy and he works on (self-described) "low-grade" films featuring cheesy Western song and dances. Meanwhile, Angad has been raised devout, and Neelimi sings devotional songs at dawn and listens only to classical Hindustani.

Flight. It was cute to see a movie about growing up using flight as the main symbol. Angad's departure from the nest becomes literally all about learning to fly, and one of the pivotal scenes is when he takes his first solo flight. It's one of the sweetest and most inspiring moments in the film, and we can only thank Govind Nihalani for letting the plot slow down so we can admire the gorgeous cloud kingdoms with Angad. This sequence also ties in with the theme of fathers, and it's very affecting overall.


Angad's first solo flight, which is a great sequence. Another director who loves the motif of flight: Hayao Miyazaki.

Modern India. If we have any criticism of this film, it's that the canvas is very broad - with discussions on war, rioting, Partition, patriotism, death and so forth - and some scenes (such as the very protracted battle sequence in the end) could have been cut to leave space for more domestic, small-size bliss. Director Nihalani spends a lot of time in the beginning establishing the domestic reality of Angad and his parents, and the camraderie of the air force academy. Yet the latter half of the movie begins to get more and more large-scale, until all its themes are just bursting at the little plot's seams!

Similarly, the dialogue becomes progressively more and more large-minded, with pilots, fathers and wives-to-be all discussing heavy-handed issues like death and bravery over their tea. We think the film was far more effective when, instead of talking about these things, the characters did what real people do - petty arguments, easy-going chat - while perhaps thinking about the larger issues.


Also, another criticism: Rekha's arc begins importantly but becomes progressively overshadowed by the father-son bonding, which seemed a bit unfair.

But we can't really complain. Nihalani is an excellent director. He is humorless - both Vijeta and the previously PPCCed Droh Kaal are serious films tackling weighty subjects - but he is also humanistic. At least, we like it when directors take the time to build up their environments via small, human details: the morning devotional song is a perfect example, showing us Nihal and Neelimi during their morning routine. Nihalani's use of dreaming and foreshadowing is also excellent.

All the performances were very good, though the PPCC wouldn't say they were something to name your first-born after. Kunal Kapoor was very charismatic as the earnest, soft-spoken Angad, and everyone else - Shashi, Rekha, Om Puri, Amrish Puri - was solid, though sadly not mind-blowing (which we always hope and expect them to be). Overall, Shashi was very effective as the tyrranical and fragile Nihal - it's always a treat to see him play these darker roles! - but there were some moments that left a bit to be desired (the opening nightmare of the Punjab rioting). Or maybe we're just WAY too used to Shashi's Shocked Face, which we associate immediately with Masala Shashi. Surprisingly, we think a stand-out performance was K.K. Raina as Angad's fighter pilot buddy, Wilson. Raina takes this peripheral role and really fleshes him out - just watch his body language during the cricket match, it's great!

Just like it's impossible not to wonder about the off-screen relationship of Raj Kapoor and Nargis in Chori Chori, it was hard not to wonder how much of the father-son relationship in Vijeta was informed by reality. In particular, at one point Nihal exclaims, "You want to show me your principles. I've sold them cheaply, I've compromised. I make low grade films. But I slog all day to give you a better life!" Well, gosh, that could be Shashi talking himself! And Shashi ji, there ain't nothing wrong with "low grade", populist cinema - heck, some of it's transcendental!

Rahu Ketu (1978)

Look! There goes the plot! Wheee!

Ah, there's nothing quite like a film that you don't understand at all.

Rahu Ketu seems to be capitalizing on the mythological tale of Rahu and Ketu (of Hindu astrological fame). We at the PPCC didn't know anything about Rahu Ketu before watching the film, hence it made no sense to us. Now we've read the relevant Wiki entry and... it still makes no sense.

Plot summary: Uh...

Right. So. Hmm.


Hi, I'm Shashi and I read things like a dork.

Well, there's Shashi. He plays Ravi Kapoor, a ruler-straight, super-serious police officer who wants to figure out who killed the gardener and why. Shashi sleeps through most of his scenes, occasionally waking up to yell something or shake his fists at the injustice of it all. Even sleepwalking, he's awfully cute. We love you, Shashi ji!

Shashi-as-Ravi occasionally engages in violent showdowns with the Madman Who Owns the White Horse (yes, that's his name).


Hi, I'm insane. And strong. For these reasons, I will kick your ass.

Then there are Prem Nath and Pran. Prem Nath and Pran are presumably the eponymous Rahu and Ketu, and they seem to be two corrupt big wigs who run the village where our story is set. How they are related, why they are criminals, what exactly they do, how they do it, etc., is never explained or even alluded to. Astrologically speaking, one's supposed to be the head of the demon and one the tail. In practical terms, this seems to mean that Prem Nath is the face of corruption and Pran is corruption in disguise. What they exactly do in this town, apart from Be Corrupt in a vague way, remains a mystery.

Insert half-hearted love interest, played by Rekha. Rekha is Tulsi, daughter of the deceased gardener. Shashi and Rekha's romance was the only thing that made any sort of sense in this movie, mostly because it followed the comfortingly familiar pattern of the usual hardbitten cop-meets-victimized village waif story.


Ravi's double-take and Tulsi's coyly lowered eyes. Awww. Note the mini-Shocked Shashi moment. Always a great look for our sabse bara hiro!


Then there's the whole "nurse you back to health after you save me from thugs" scene. So sweet.


OMG but the brother's there too?! Now it's awkward.

These brief moments of familiarity quickly disappear as the film launches back into this whole Rahu-Ketu-Ravi-gardener maze. Fresh from being tended, Ravi appears with an inexplicable haircut to confront Rahu (or is he Ketu?). Nothing is revealed. And then Ravi grows his hair back.

Further stuff happens. The Madman with the White Horse tries to kill Rekha by putting a time bomb in her house and then waiting outside the door until it explodes (yes, he's clearly insane). Shashi disguises himself as an old man and tries to shame Pran and Prem into giving up their life of crime. Pran and Prem sing a love duet to each other that becomes bizarrely Brechtian. "I'm your Prem (love)," Prem Nath sings. "You're my Pran (life)!" Pran sings the same refrain back to him, rinse, repeat ten times. But alas! Things take a sour turn and they decide to kill themselves. Prem cops out at the last minute, but then goes home and murders his wife instead. WTF? The end.


Love you, man! No, no, no, love YOU, man!


Shashi's inexplicable haircut, which lasts for a few scenes.


Ahh, Pran's such a saucy minx when he gets his disguise on.

Everyone seemed to be asleep in this film - Shashi, Rekha, Prem Nath, Pran, Kalyanji-Anandji, the PPCC. You'd think, with all our powers combined, we could make something flashy and amazing, or at least Captain Planet. Instead, the songs were lacklustre, the scenes dragged with narry a funky background score to be heard, Rekha stifled yawns and Shashi would occasionally shout something for punctuation. Even Pran - who is usually fun and awesome and hilarious and lovable and super-great - was sort of, well, meh.

Plotlessness is one thing, but we couldn't even figure out this film's supposed genre. Was it a hard-nosed crime thriller? Shashi's stern and unhappy police officer made us think so, especially when he gets his ass kicked by that random dacoit (and, by the way, who the hell was that dacoit?!) - it's rare for a masala movie to acknowledge that violence isn't all slapstick somersaults. Also, the treatment of Prem and his wife was quite cynical - he, a lecherous and unhappy husband looking for any opportunity for escape; she, a shrill and morally bankrupt leech. But if the vibe was supposed to be semi-serious, why this weird subplot about the Madman and the White Horse?

This whole serious-and-seriously-lacking-a-plot vibe gave us horrible flashbacks of Atithee. However, thankfully, we enjoyed Rahu Ketu much more than Atithee. In fact, even though it lacked plot, action, interest, color, good songs, characterization, genre and a point, Rahu Ketu was still sort of... well, relaxing. We think the reasons behind our agreeable acceptance of it was:

• Shashi looks fine. While his hair seems to grow and shorten of its own accord throughout the film, at least he's not in a wig and a Burt Reynolds moustache.
  
• It's actually been a long time since we've seen any Shashi, since we've become the local masala lending library and we had nothing - NOTHING - to watch for almost three weeks. So anything was good.
  
• We got the impression that, despite this film's apparent lack of EVERYTHING, there might have been something going on that we just missed due to cultural ignorance. The whole Rahu-Ketu thing, which we still haven't understood, was no doubt often alluded to. Then there were issues of scheduled tribes and village politics and Licence Raj - all meaty, thought-provoking issues. It must be nice to have movies that address these issues. Sigh.
  
• For a brief moment - like, a single scene - Shashi and Rekha seemed to wake up from being zombies to sing and laugh and be cute and joyful. And, sigh, we were reminded why we love Shashi and Rekha. It really is a great scene - with bizarre aesthetics straight out of Satyam Shivam Sundaram, a bubbly Rekha, a teasing Shashi, and adorable cross cuts between the acid trip song and Shashi and Rekha's 5-minute hug. Ah, an oasis in the desert.

So then I was like, "Hoo da doo da - "


OMG SHASHEE!!!

Baseraa (1981)

First, a funny meta story: For many weeks, a Friend of the PPCC had been badgering the PPCC to go get a pedicure, since the local pedicurist kept telling the friend that the pedicurist had a Shashi movie for the PPCC. Long ago, the PPCC had gone for a pedicure, and, oh, the fun we had, discussing Shashi this and Shammi that. Anyway, the PPCC was skeptical - a Shashi movie we had not yet seen? Ha. But today the pedicurist delivered (and how!): a double-whammy of Shashi/Rekha films, including Gulzar's notable Baseraa and the Shashi-Rekha-Pran Do Musafir. Yes. YES! One, a movie with a thoughtful, early 80s Vijeta-era Shashi, all greying temples and wormy moustache (YEAH! we love that look!). The other, 1978 and including PRAN. Could it get any better?!


No, it clearly cannot get any better. Shashi and Rekha are fab! And remember Koncam Koncam?! (Ooh-ooh-ooh!)

By the way, India Weekly: it's been a month now, and we are still waiting on Vijeta. Any day now. Any day now.

The real review: First of all, large kudos to Gulzar for tackling a thorny, oft-mishandled subject - mental illness - with sensitivity and sympathy. Baseraa is a quiet, unassuming movie that instantly appeals by combining (1) the painful emotional ironies of your standard, squishy masala dil with (2) interesting variation, intelligence and maturity. It reminded us a lot of Masoom, in that it was a naturalist portrayal of domestic life gone horribly awry. Also, like Masoom, the narrative structure was like an onion: as things progressed, important points were revealed, layer by layer. This was in startling contrast to the usual 1970s masala convention of beginning immediately on a prologue/info dump. Baseraa, instead, often teases you with allusions to unknown past events which are only later explained. Despite our love of straightforward, populist masala, we at the PPCC are actually BIG BIG fans of zero exposition. We like to work for our narrative. Hence, we were lovin' Baseraa.


Have Rekha and Rakhee been in anything else together? They were fab!


More wonderful Shashi-Rekha. With some angst, plz.

The story follows the your usual happy family clearly on the way to destruction. There is, as per usual, the jolly father, Balraj (Shashi Kapoor), the good-humored mother, Nima (Rekha), and their two sons, Sagar (Raj Kiran, who played Shashi's romantic rival in Bezubaan released the same year) and Babbu (Master Vikas). Sagar is now of marriageable age, and he has fallen in love with the pretty, smart med student Sarita (Phoonam Dillon). Sarita is clearly your Perfect Daughter-in-Law, and in one sweet scene, she stuns the family by singing early morning pooja. The parents heartily approve, and all seems well.


There's even a children's song, like the one in Masoom.

However, already there are cracks in the perfect façade. It is revealed that the mother of Sagar is actually Sharda (Rakhee, real-life wife of Gulzar) - Balraj's first wife, Nima's older sister. Fourteen years ago, it seems Sharda had been having psychotic episodes. Eventually, she had to be taken to the local asylum. The family still grieves for Sharda, and they are in close contact with her doctor, Dr. Gokhale (Iftikhar, who is always in everything!). Sharda has recently had a minor accident in the asylum. When she recovers, however, her mental illness seems to have dramatically improved, and Dr. Gokhale decides to try to continue the improvements by sending her home to heal. He informs the family, however, that Sharda's mental health is fragile, and so no big emotional shocks, please. Ergo, Balraj and Nima must revert to their roles from 14 years earlier: Balraj as Sharda's husband, and Nima as a widow. The rest of the film watches this impossible drama unfold.


There is much angst, as you'd expect.


Which is juxtaposed nicely against flashbacks where everyone was a lot happier. Rekha, in particular, is so much fun when she's allowed to be a bit crazy! (e.g. her Punjabi disguise with Amitabh in Suhaag!)

The weakest point of the film, for us, is the somewhat tenuous tension. Sharda's mental illness is never specified, and Dr. Gokhale's advice that everyone must pretend it's fourteen years ago is a little hard to believe. Sure, it must suck to be Sharda, when your sister has wed your husband, but we couldn't really imagine her going demented over it - at least, the movie seemed far too realistic to resort to such a filmi convention. Another weak point was the misguided use of whatever drum that was. It was your standard comedy slapstick drum sound, but they kept using it whenever they needed to emphasize a tragic point.

Nonetheless, the film was so well done in other ways that we overlooked the kind-of-silly plot idea and the drum. Rekha, Rakhee and Shashi all gave good, honest performances - in other words, they were in their 'Parallel Cinema' modes, which we love! But the best aspect, for us, was the portrayal of Sharda's mental illness. Rather than exploiting it for laughs or demonizing it, Sharda's illness is portrayed as just that - an illness. In one poignant scene, Balraj loses patience with Sharda, and she reminds him that she never wanted to be ill, and she hates it as much as he does. Another effective scene is in a brief flashback, when Balraj and Nima remember the day Sharda was taken away. In a very long tracking shot from the bedroom, down the stairs, to the living room, the camera follows the tumult as hospital workers restrain Sharda, while her husband and her doctor try to calm her. It's very painful to watch, and thankfully it is presented honestly and straightforwardly, with little melodramatic embellishment.


The most painful scene, done with a great tracking shot.


Poor Rekha, too! Poor son! Poor all of you!

The songs were mostly OK, with our favorite being the one where Balraj remembers his life with Sharda. It had a lovely haunting quality, relying mostly on Lata's voice and the piano. But we don't feel confident to judge the songs or the dialogue, since Gulzar is always lauded as being such a poet, and yet we can't understand Hindi all that well (and our subtitles kind of sucked too).

Overall, we've been really enjoying these early 80s Shashi films. After all the excitement of the 60s and 70s, they are a welcome respite. One of these days, we'll make a list of our favorite Shashi movies, and a lot of these 80s movies are definitely going to show up. And ARRGH India Weekly! Now we're dying to see Vijeta - especially after this wonderful clip and after learning that it was directed by Govind Nihalani, who directed the powerful Droh Kaal! Aaarghhh.