Padmavati—Trailer

Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Padmavati is expected to hit the theaters on December 1, 2017. The trailer of the eagerly-awaited film was released recently and was received with a positive response. As always, the trailer showcases the trademark strength of Sanjay Leela Bhansali in creating visually stunning spectacles. Padmavati is the story of Rani Padmavati, the Rajput queen and the wife of Rawal Ratan Singh, the ruler of Mewar. In 1303, Alauddin Khilji attacked Mewar with the aim of capturing Padmavati. The Rajput forces were defeated. However, instead of surrendering to Khilji, Padmavati is said to have committed jauhar (self-immolation) to protect her honor. The film portrays her story and stars Deepika Padukone, Shahid Kapoor, and Ranveer Singh in the lead roles.

There is Deepika Padukone as Rani Padmavati, dressed in traditional costumes and jewelry. Since the film is based on Padmavati, the background music in the trailer is also about her. The lyrics say, "Rani sa Rajputi shaan hai, Rani sa mhaari aan baan hai." The queen is the pride of the Rajputs; she is our honor and dignity. She is often seen inside the temple of Lord Shiva with the shivling and the tridents, representing the legend of Parvati and Shiv. 

The trailer brings out the contrast in the personalities of Rawal Ratan Singh and Alauddin Khilji. Ratan is well-groomed, calm, and composed, while Khilji appears to be wild and has a flair for drama showing all emotions. Ratan is seen wearing white representing purity; Khilji is often dressed in darker colors, representing his evilness. In one particular scene, Ratan walks with women behind him, while Khilji is sitting on a chair and men carry him. There is also a contrast in the background score in their scenes. Ratan and Khilji both seem enamored of Padmavati. While Ratan keeps looking at Padmavati while she sews pearls on his turban, Khilji keeps a padma (lotus) with him. As they are opponents, they seem to be playing chess, and later, fighting on the battlefield. This contrast is underscored also when we see that the Rajput army's flag has the sun; the Khilji army's flag has the moon. We also see Ratan and Khiji wearing their headgear that represents their pride. Khiji wears his crown; a few scenes later, Padmavati puts the warrior helmet on Ratan. 

Contrasts

The most discernible aspect of the trailer is that it brings out the sheer wickedness of Khilji. The first time he enters the screen, the tone of the background music changes. We see that there are birds kept captive in their cages in his lair, as if showing us how he prefers to keep people in control. Khilji is narcissistic as he is often seen near the mirrors. In the scene, where he is being carried on the chair by some men, there are some wild animal statues in the front. Also, notice how the two ends of the chair on which he is seated look like the open mouth of a wild animal. The same thing is observed in his lair, where there are two pillar-like structures that seem to look like the open mouth of some animal. Khilji eats like a wild animal. He wears clothes that are made of fur-like material. He fights and wins various gladiatorial contests. All these scenes show Khilji's ruthlessness and he is being compared to a wild beast. Ranveer Singh has completely transformed himself into this evil incarnate.

Animal Instincts

In addition, we see that all the three characters in the trailer have scenes with fire. The opening and the ending credits in the trailer are also written as sparks of a fire. Since the act of jauhar is significant to the story, perhaps, that is why there is an emphasis on fire in the trailer credits as well. 

Fire

There is a bit of Bajirao Mastani in Padmavati, especially, in the war scenes that have a sepia color palette that resembles the scenes in the former film. In Bajirao Mastani, Mastani defines her love for Bajirao where she speaks three statements that end with woh ishq. She said, "Ishq—Jo toofani dariya se bagawat kar jaaye, woh ishq; bhare darbar me jo duniya se lad jaaye, woh ishq; jo mehboob ko dekhe toh khuda ko bhool jaaye, woh ishq." Sanjay Leela Bhansali always emphasises and repeats some words. Oo ke tera, tera, tera zikr hai. In Padmavati, we see something similar again where Rawal Ratan Singh narrates the characteristics of a Rajput warrior, and he ends the phrases with woh Rajput, like Mastani did using woh ishq. He says, "Chinta ko talwar ki nok pe rakhe, woh Rajput; ret ki naav lekar samundar se shart lagaye, woh Rajput; aur jiska sar kate phir bhi dhad dushman se ladta rahe, woh Rajput." He mentions ret ki naav, a boat made of sand, and later in the trailer, we see a ret ka toofan, a sandstorm with a warrior galloping towards it. There are some other similar touches from Bajirao Mastani's trailer as well, such as men dressed in red headgear, the use of fire on the arrows, among others as shown below.

Padmavati and Bajirao Mastani

In all of Sanjay Leela Bhansali's films, there is a leitmotif of weaving representing the bond of relationships. For instance, the flag-weaving scene between Kashi and her mother-in-law in Bajirao Mastani, or Sakina weaving carpets in Saawariya. Here also, there is a particular scene where Padmavati was shown to be weaving pearls on Ratan's turban. It is one of the most beautiful scenes in the trailer.

Weaving Scenes

There is always a lot to see in Sanjay Leela Bhansali's films and he seems to be one of the rare filmmakers who still understand the mesmerizing power of the big screen. As a fan and an admirer, I am eagerly waiting not only to watch Padmavati but also learn from the vision of an indefatigable auteur. 

Other Reading:

Weaving Love—A Motif in the Films of Sanjay Leela Bhansali—Link

Dialogue of the Day:

"Rajputi kangan me utni hai taakat hai, jitni Rajputi talwar mein."
—Rani Padmavati, Padmavati

Bareilly Ki Barfi—The Ingredients of Love

As the title of Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari's Bareilly Ki Barfi suggests, the film is a short and a sweet love story. It is inspired by The Ingredients of Love by Nicolas Barreau. Set in Bareilly, the film is about Bitti (Kriti Sanon). She thinks she has a lot of 'flaws' in her, which is why she is not able to find a groom. She runs away from her house, and serendipitously reads a book titled Bareilly Ki Barfi whose lead character is exactly like her. The book is ostensibly written by Pritam Vidrohi (Rajkummar Rao); however, he was forced to be the writer by the book's actual writer and publisher Chirag Dubey (Ayushmann Khurrana). Bitti wants to meet Pritam as she thinks he will understand her, and she reaches out to Chirag to find more about him. What follows is a nice and a humorous tale that has shades of Lawrence D'Souza's Saajan and Kunal Kohli's Mujhse Dosti Karoge!

One of the themes in Bareilly Ki Barfi is that people have flaws and one of the essential ingredients of love is to accept people with their flaws. Bitti keeps reiterating that she has many faults in her. In her first letter to Pritam, she writes that everyone sees faults in her, but he saw a positive aspect in those faults. When Bitti decides to get engaged to Pritam, she again explains to Chirag that Pritam likes her the way she is, and accepts her with all her flaws. Bitti will not change herself to get married to someone. In another related moment, Pritam's mother keeps on pestering him that he should take care of himself better. He rhetorically questions her that perhaps he has all the faults, which makes one conjecture that his mousy underconfident personality could be a consequence of his mother's constant complaints. The film never delves deeper into this aspect of him, but this underscores the concept of flaws that Bitti also mentioned. It is fascinating to watch how effortlessly Pritam becomes this new person Badass Babua who is the polar opposite of him. Perhaps, he always had this side to him, but he never got a chance to flourish. We see even Chirag trying to become who he is really not. He is also hiding some aspect of him. He behaves a little differently with everyone. There is a point in the film when Chirag schemes for Pritam's downfall and his friend Munna jokes with him that he is 'neech' (villain). Later, Munna takes back his words and he tells him he is not 'neech' (villain) after Chirag is not able to say the truth to Bitti as he cannot break her heart. There is a shift in the film as to who the hero is and who the villain is. In fact, at some other point, the voice-over tells us, "Ek chaalbaaz nahi, dusra rangbaaz nahi, par love ki leela dekhiye, ek chaal bana raha hai, aur dusra chaal jama raha hai." One is not a schemer; the other is not a bully. But strange are the ways of love that one is hatching schemes, and the other is taking on an attitude. It is this whole aspect of being true to yourself, not becoming someone else, and accepting people with flaws, is what the film tries to portray and reward its characters. 

The film has some really hilarious scenes, but also has some lovely little moments. When it is Chirag's birthday, Bitti takes him to her family shop whose board reads Lovela Sweets, as the ee ki matra fell off in the rain. She takes him inside and puts a candle on one of the sweets, making it a little birthday cake, like Sid did for Aisha in Wake Up Sid where he made a bread-jam cake on her birthday. The name Chirag means a lamp of light. When Chirag is reading his letter in the end, he stands in front of numerous little lamps. At some point, while he is reading, the electricity goes off, and the only light present is the one from the lamps. It is a beautiful touch where the man whose name is Chirag is standing in front of little chirags, proposing to his lover who is compared to a sweet. It is also quite befitting that a man who opposes the hero's love is named Pritam Vidrohi—Lover Rebel. 

In Vikas Bahl's Queen, Rani was the docile daughter whose father was the proprietor of a sweet shop. She was naïve and ingenuous. She was studying home science. At one stage, her fiancé Vijay says that she is as sweet as sugar syrup. He refuses to marry Rani days before the wedding, and she is heartbroken. Bitti from Bareilly Ki Barfi is also the daughter of a sweet-shop owner. Bitti is also a barfi. However, Bitti, even though belonging to a small town, is nothing like Rani, from the supposedly modern Delhi. She smokes cigarettes, drinks alcohol, eats non-vegetarian food, does break dance, and watches English movies. She does not listen to her parents. She is independent and works in the customer care department of the electricity board. She will go on to meet someone who is like Surinder Sahni from Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi, who also used to work in the electricity department. Punjab Power, lighting up your life. Surinder Sahni this side ji. But the most interesting aspect of Bitti was her relationship with her father. Narrotam Mishra raised Bitti with the freedom to do whatever she wants. Bitti is called as the son of her father. There is a lovely moment in the film when he comes and offers her a cigarette. She declines, but there is an image in which both of them are actually smoking. When was the last time we saw a scene where a normal (and not some villainous) father and a daughter shared a smoke together? Then, Bitti tells him that being a girl is a disaster. He then tells her that he does not believe in these norms but eventually, they have to live in the same society. As Bitti told he is a Libran, perhaps, that is why he is able to maintain this balance. At some other point, there is a Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge reference in the film, where Bitti compares herself to Simran and tells her friend Rama that Raj should know how her Simran looks like when she is sending her picture to Pritam. Taking it a little further, one can visualize the strict relationship that Simran had with her Bauji is in complete contrast with the less formal, almost friendly relationship that Bitti had with her father. Simran had to literally beg her father to let her go so that she can marry Raj. In Bareilly Ki Barfi, Bitti has already decided she will marry Chirag; however, just before she puts the ring on him, she still asks for her father's permission. Of course, he will not object to it.

There are some other really laugh-out-loud moments in the film, such as the one where Pritam says, "Rangbaaz log dekhte hi nahi hai," when he is asked to behave like a bully. The setting, the location, and the dialogue seem authentic. Debit and credit card expected (sic). Aasteen ka anaconda. Rama tells Bitti that she has a boutique and not a shop. Performances are splendid by everyone, especially by Pankaj Tripathi, Seema Pahwa, and Rajkummar Rao. It is as if they have belonged to this small-town milieu since forever. However, at places, Kriti Sanon felt too sophisticated for the part of Bitti. And, as much as I love Ayushmann Khurrana (#BublaForever), he feels a tad too urbane as Chirag. I guess these are minor quibbles and it requires more thought on the importance of actors 'looking' the part. But I was happy that unlike Meri Pyaari Bindu, he gets his Bindu Bitti here because writers should also have a happy ending, sometimes. 

Trivia—

Songs used in the background

Titanic poster

Books in Movies

P.S.—At some point in the film, when they are in a boat, the boatman talks about Jawani Diwani and says it starred Hema Malini, Dharmendra and Vinod Khanna. After that, he starts singing the song Dreamgirl. Was it some kind of a joke as Jawani Diwani has no connection with the aforementioned three stars or the song?

P.P.S.—I have a personal connection with the city of Bareilly. My mother was born and raised in Bareilly. I have been there a few times when my grandmother and my mother's brother were alive. The last time I went there was in 2004 and I still remember I watched Koi...Mil Gaya on cable TV there. Bareilly is largely known for its surma (kohl). Mera Saaya's Jhoomka Gira Re made Bareilly famous in films. Let's see how much impact Bareilly Ki Barfi has on the popularity of the city.

Other Reading:

1. Of Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi, and Tamasha—Link

Dialogue of the Day:

"Pyaar kiya hai Munna, kurbaani toh deni padegi."

—Chirag, Bareilly Ki Barfi

Mukti Bhawan—Of Free Will

 

Shubhashish Bhutiani's Mukti Bhawan is the story of a seventy-seven-year-old man, Daya (Lalit Behl), who thinks that his time of death has come. He wants to spend his last days in the holy place of Benaras. Daya's stubbornness forces his obedient son Rajiv (Adil Hussain) to take him there. They check into a place called Mukti Bhawan, a hotel for people who are waiting for their death. The hotel allows people to stay there for a maximum of fifteen days. During their stay, Daya and Rajiv let go of past resentments, form new bonds, and ultimately find salvation in different ways.

In Hinduism, the term mukti, or moksha, refers to freedom from the cycle of death and rebirth. The soul is believed to pass through a cycle of successive lives, and its every rebirth depends on how the previous life was lived. People must take responsibility for their actions (karma) in their different lives. Mukti means permanent liberation from this cycle and is, thus, called the ultimate goal. Mukti Bhawan is also essentially about freedom, and the freedom that is portrayed here is not just about moksha, but also the freedom and the desire to live life on your own terms. At some stage in the film, Daya asks Rajiv why he stopped writing the poems that he used to when he was a kid. Rajiv replies that Daya's stick in school made him stop writing. Whenever something happened, Rajiv, being the teacher's son, was the one who was punished. As a father, Daya was probably too harsh with his son, forcing his own choices on Rajiv rather than letting him do what he wanted. In another lifecycle of parenthood, Rajiv, the father, has become like his own father, forcing his own choices on his daughter, Sunita. Rajiv's daughter does not like her fiancé, but she is marrying him because she wants her to do so. Rajiv is initially aghast to know Sunita can drive a scooter and is not in favor of her having a job. Rajiv carries some resentment in his heart against his father and is inadvertently meting out the same treatment to his daughter that he got as a kid. He has become a version of his father. In fact, both of them are called ziddi—stubborn. While Daya talks about freedom from this world, the film is as much about Rajiv, where he learns to let go. The time he spends at Mukti Bhawan is also about his own salvation.

The sense of liberation is reiterated at other stages throughout the film. When Sunita and her mother are going back to their home, Daya advises Sunita to do whatever her heart wants. Vahi karna jo tere man ko accha lagta ho. At some other point in the film, Vimla and Daya take one of their walks together, and she tells him that death comes at its own will. Vimla tried to do that when she went hungry for many days, but it did not work. She has been waiting for almost eighteen years, but death comes at its own volition. It is as if making the point that if death follows its free will, then what is stopping the mortal humans from doing the things that they want to do. Vahi karna jo tere man ko accha lagta ho. After Vimla dies, Daya writes an obituary for her in which he tells us that Vimla is flying, and has become a free spirit. After Daya's own death, Sunita reads a few lines that he had written in his diary, where he writes a poem titled Mann Ki Karo Hamesha—Do what your heart says—again underscoring the theme of free will and liberation in the film. He wrote, "Karo vahi jo man ko bhaaye, varna jeevan bhar pachtaaye." At an earlier stage, when Daya gets sick, everyone thinks his time has come. During one of the nights he was not well, he and Rajiv had a tearful conversation where he admitted he was not a good father to Rajiv. Just after this conversation, Daya gets better on his own the next morning as if this guilt that he had felt was something that was making him sick from the inside, and he is now free from it. Even the TV show that the residents of Mukti Bhawan watch regularly is named Udan Khatola—A Flying Vehicle.

Mukti Bhawan also tells us that one has to be ready for death. And, by being ready, it does not mean singing devotional songs and eating the food as that of the hermits, but rather learning to let go. In an earlier scene, Vimla tells Daya and Rajiv that she has no problems staying alone as she has learned to let go and is now waiting for death. When Daya fell sick, everyone thought he would die, but he did not because he was not ready. Later, Daya learns to let go and asks Rajiv to return as he feels he is getting closer to his son again. He will have to learn to live without the people and without the worldly desires that he demanded, or else he will never be ready. He has to become an elephant, who, when its time of death is near, leaves everyone and goes to the jungle. Daya eventually becomes the elephant.

Use of height

There are many other beautiful touches in Mukti Bhawan. Since death plays an important role in the film, it is quite interesting that Rajiv works in a life insurance company, where he sells policies that benefit people after someone's death, in a way helping people prepare for their death. When a cockroach is found dead, Mishraji picks it up, and says it achieved salvation. Earlier this year, Vikramaditya Motwane's Trapped also had a cockroach that was eaten by Shaurya (Rajkummar Rao). Incidentally, that film also dealt with themes of freedom and entrapment in the modern day urban life.

Safe Life Insurance

There is also a little bit of Masaan and Piku in the film. As parents age, they almost become like a child, requiring attention and care. They become cantankerous, but it is so difficult to abandon them. In one of his dreams, Rajiv kills his father. But, of course, it is only his sub-conscience. As Alain de Botton's The School of Life has taught us, these feelings are natural. Rajiv does not act on them; rather, he takes the best possible care of his father, with great personal hardship.

I remember the scene from Delhi-6 when Roshan's grandmother starts preparing for her death. Vriksh bole paat se sun patte meri baat, iss jag ki yeh reet hai, ek aavat, se jaat. The tree told the leaf, "This is the cycle of life; a leaf dies, another is born." Roshan initially finds the idea of preparing for death a bit morbid, but then he thinks that humans cannot control how they are born, but at least they can plan how they are going to go away from Earth. Mukti Bhawan also shows this preparation for death, but it is also one of the few films celebrating death. When Daya dies, he is sent off with a big celebration as he had wanted. Death is certain for every human on this planet, so why not celebrate a life lived well. After all, what greater freedom there is other than a soul achieving its permanent mukti.

Trivia:

Navnindra Behl, who plays Vimla and plays a small part in Queen, is the wife of Lalit Behl and the mother of Kanu Behl, who directed Titli.

Dialogue of the Day:
"Sapna toh antarman ki aankh hai."

—Mishraji, Mukti Bhawan

Shuddh Desi Romance—Of Toilets and Cold Drinks

Recently, I came across a video essay by ScreenPrism that elaborated on the symbolism of toilets in Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction. It explains that scenes with bathrooms and toilets precede major deaths in the film. These bathrooms represent the ultimate isolation—these are one of the only places where characters (and ourselves) are really alone, and death represents the ultimate loneliness. Thus, toilets symbolize death in the film. In Tarantino's other films as well, there is a repeating motif of a bathroom scene. 

While watching the video, I was reminded of Maneesh Sharma's Shuddh Desi Romance, a gem of a film based on the modern-day romantic relationships in India. Toilets play an important part in that film as well, and represent something related to relationships. Throughout the film, the characters keep going to the toilet at crucial points. In fact, there are many scenes that are shot where the characters are sitting on the toilet seat itself. Early in the film, as soon as Goyal Saab (Rishi Kapoor) gets down from a bus, he asks the location of the toilet. Moments before Raghu (Sushant Singh Rajput) is about to get married to Tara (Vaani Kapoor), he wants to go to the toilet and, then, runs away from his own wedding. Toilet appears again when Raghu and Gayatri (Parineeti Chopra) are getting married. Goyal Saab tells one of the boys to not let Raghu go near the toilet as he might again escape. During this time, it is Gayatri who goes to the toilet. She smokes a cigarette while sitting on the toilet seat, and the words Pyaar Do, Pyaar Lo are written on the walls. Raghu also feels the need to go the toilet but his friend prevents him going there. Raghu beats up his friend, and they find out that this time Gayatri has run away. Then, the film's interval appears and instead of the usual 'Interval' being written, the words 'Bathroom Break' appear underscoring the importance of toilets in the film.

The use of toilets continues in the second half of the film as well. When Raghu is waiting for Tara at the airport, he is standing next to a pillar that has toilet written on it. At some later stage in the film, Tara's friend is getting married. Gayatri bumps into Raghu at this wedding. A lady asks Gayatri to accompany Raghu to pick-up Panditji from the railway station. However, given their history, Gayatri makes an excuse that she needs to go to the bathroom first. Sitting on the toilet seat, Gayatri explains her reasons for running away from her wedding with Raghu. While coming back from the railway station, Gayatri again wants to go to the bathroom and asks Raghu to come with her. Later, when they reach back at the wedding spot, Raghu and Gayatri meet near a mobile toilet that has the words 'Chalte Phirte Shauchalya' written on it. During the final moments of the film, when Raghu and Gayatri decide to get married for the second time and start having doubts for the second time, they both walk to the toilet again and run away. The repeating instances of the characters going to the toilet are pointing to the film's theme of the inability of the characters to commit to the relationship of the marriage. They are unable to hold on to the commitment of marriage, hence, they keep going to the toilet. When Goyal Saab asks a young boy if he plans to get married in the future, even he is non-committal and makes an excuse to go to the toilet. Toilet provides a space where the characters are alone and do the act by themselves, perhaps, pointing that they are happy being single, unbound to any ties. 

We never see Tara talking about or going to the toilet; it is mainly Gayatri and Raghu who cannot hold on. Tara, however, keeps asking for a thanda (a cold drink). When Raghu runs away from the wedding, leaving her stranded at the mandap, her first reaction is to ask for a cold drink. When Tara's uncle almost beats up Raghu when he sees him at another wedding, Tara comes to Raghu's rescue, and orders to bring a cold drink for her uncle. At some other instance, Tara and Raghu meet at a restaurant, and Raghu asks the waiter to bring a cold drink for Tara. He says to her if there is any specific drink that she would prefer. She replies that all thandas are the same. It is, later, that Tara reveals the reason of her drinking cold drink all the time when she and Gayatri get to talk inside the bus. She tells her that whenever she is confused, and does not know how to react, she orders a cold drink. It brings a certain comfort to her. And, we also see that if Tara keeps having a cold drink, Gayatri keeps smoking a cigarette. Each character in the film has been given some quirks. 

The most remarkable thing about Shuddh Desi Romance is its views on marriage. The film questions the concept of marriage itself. Marriage has been portrayed as the ultimate goal of a romantic relationship in films. Early in the film, Raghu questions this by asking if marriage is like a glucose drip that can cure all problems of life. The society does not easily recognize a relationship in which two people are happy living together and do not feel the need to get married. Raghu and Gayatri are not just suited for marriage. The film has many weddings, and unsurprisingly, we don't see any of the wedding ceremonies, actually, getting completed. Initially, Raghu runs away from his wedding. Then, Gayatri runs from her wedding. And then, they both run away from their wedding. Even a side character, such as Tara's friend, in whose wedding Gayatri and Raghu meet again, also runs away with her electrician boyfriend before the wedding is completed. In a hilarious scene, Panditji, who is picked-up by Raghu and Gayatri, sits behind in the car and does not say a word. He is of no use to the film's characters. Traditional marriage takes a backseat. While sitting in the car, Raghu asks for blessings from Gayatri (not from Panditji). At some other point in the film, Goyal Saab wonders if marriages will stop happening in the future and if his business of wedding planning will go bust. 

Raghu and Gayatri work as fake wedding guests, again, pointing to the film's belief that marriage is fake and is nothing more than a monetary transaction. Raghu, actually, says that it is the fake wedding guests who can easily spot the pretense of marriage and its rituals, hence, he is not suited for this façade. In addition, it is a human psychology that if one is tied to something, he wants to break free. As long as one has no restrictions, a person is free to do anything, but as soon as he is told that he cannot do something, it becomes enticing to break away and do the same thing he is told to avoid. Marriage is like that kind of a restriction. An open door makes one go in and out as per his choice, but a closed door can only be opened. Raghu and Gayatri are happy to have an open-door policy, and their story ends with them living together with an open door, not bound by the restrictions of marriage. Earlier, when Raghu moves in with her, he shares the work responsibilities of the house with Gayatri. He cooks, puts clothes to dry, and does household work as well. They both are considered a sort of equal in their live-in relationship, quite a contrast with the traditional portrayal of a husband-wife in a marital relationship. Shuddh Desi Romance is, thus, a significant film that tries to subvert the conventional concept of marriage; it is almost revolutionary in its portrayal. 

The film portrays all the three characters in the film as people who are free to do whatever they feel like. None of the three central characters have any visible filial relationships. Parents are absent or are dead. Gayatri's father does not turn up for her daughter's wedding. Gayatri stays all alone and not with her widowed father in Guwahati. She has had many boyfriends, and also had an abortion in the past. She frequently smokes in a society where women who smoke are judged (most recent example being Mahira Khan). All these acts are showed not as a sign of any rebellion, but as something that a normal girl will like to do. She is not shy to have sex. In fact, the opening stretch of the film, Raghu acknowledges that women also have armaan (desires). Tara, too, has a certain freedom. She is an orphan raised by her relatives. After Raghu leaves her, she does not start crying or become depressed. She comes to Jaipur and pretends that she is an air hostess as she always wanted to live her childhood dream of flying. She is more upfront than Raghu when she tells him that he does not need to flirt with her using his eloquent falsehoods. If he wants to kiss her, he can say directly. She also has sex with Raghu. In the end, she achieves her dream of flying and experiences true freedom when she lets go of Raghu. She is also free. At some points, we see that Raghu is in a dilemma of doing what the heart says, and doing what is (ethically) right. But this dilemma never was a serious problem for him. He always went on to do whatever his heart said, without thinking the impact that his actions will have on others. At some stage, Gayatri tells Tara that she did not intend to hurt her; she adds that she did not even think of Tara, again highlighting that they only think about their own self. In some ways, the film celebrates this individualism and encourages one to follow his/her heart in relationships.

My favorite bits were the monologues in which the three of them talked to the audience, being completely honest about their thoughts and feelings. They reminded me of Kal Ho Naa Ho. There is another beautiful scene where Tara says that it might be difficult to remember the moment one fell in love with but the exact moment when someone falls out of love is always remembered. And, I absolutely love Gulabi. It is splendidly shot. Everything in the song is pink, the song is also shot in the pink city of Jaipur. Red is the usual color of love. It is another interesting subversion where pink, a lighter version of red, becomes the color of love, much like the love between the film's characters. There are many other nuances that scriptwriter Jaideep Sahni brings in the film with his understanding of contemporary India. There is a blink-and-miss scene in the film where a billboard of the film Naya Kadam (A New Step) is being carried by a few people in the streets of Jaipur. I guess that film does not contribute anything to the context of this film, but Shuddh Desi Romance is truly a new step for Hindi cinema in more ways than one.

 References:

Naya Kadam

Self-reference Chak De! India

 Books In Movies:

Sacchi Adayein 

Hindi Pulp Books

1. Pehle Pyaar Ki Pehli E-mail

2. Risky Ishq

3. Ati Random Love Stories

4. Sex Ki Shayari

5. Dhuandhar SMS

6. Kashmakash

Dialogue of the Day:

"Doubt ghadi dekh kar thori aata hai."

—Raghu, Shuddh Desi Romance