The Murderous Mangalsutra in Ramaiya Vastavaiya

(Minor spoilers ahead)

I enjoyed Ramaiyya Vastavaiyya like you can only enjoy a Telugu potboiler or a Salman Khan movie: with a dollop of indulgence and surrender to the movie's loony premise. The movie is no doubt skillfully crafted. I watched it with my in-laws and my parents, and we are an assortment of five very unique individuals. It is to the credit of the film and the people in front as well as behind the camera that each one of us enjoyed the movie and never once got bored. More on the movie later; here I am only addressing a common trope used during the climactic fight scene.

My knowledge of South Indian films is very limited - I cannot tell Tamil from Telugu. Anyone who can enlighten me on the subject here is most welcome to do so politely.

A very knowledgeable friend, a rationalist who has spent the best years of his life fighting superstition in rural Maharashtra, once told me about the origin of the Mangalsutra, a string of black and golden beads that married women in Southern states of India wear to signify their marital status (besides the mandatory bindi, toe rings, bangles, sindoor and whatever else local customs require married women to wear to make it crystal clear that they're taken).

According to him, in olden days when an attacking army ravished a neighboring kingdom, women in the besieged land were considered spoils of war for the victorious soldiers. To avoid fighting among themselves over the best goods, the custom was for the horseback soldier to throw a noose around the neck of any woman he fancied. That noose came to symbolize a man's right over a woman. Over the centuries, this noose evolved into a more elegant ornament called mangalsutra, but it's function, for those who believe, remains the same - it signifies a man's possession of a woman, and the woman's status as one with a living husband.

I don't know if this origin story is completely true, but the brandishing of Mangalsutra in some Indian movies, particularly in Southern potboilers and their Hindi remakes, makes this theory plausible. The errant young bahu in one movie gets her way with her husband and in-laws by threatening to tear the yellow string; the good wife in another movie runs as if for her life when the villain tries to snatch the sacred thread from her, like it would have mortally hurt her hale and hearty husband; the baddies in yet another movie try to get their revenge on the guy from a poor family who secretly MS-ed their precious young sister (using it as a verb seems to convey the action more effectively), by threatening to get the village madman to MS the poor guy's widowed mother. The scene where the old widow is humiliated in front of the whole village by first splashing color on her chaste white sari, then adorning her hair with jasmine - soon followed by a shot of her terrified face framed by the approaching Mangalsutra in the madman's hands - has disturbing undertones of a rape being committed in full public view.

The latest frothy romance from Prabhu Deva turns to the same trope during it's climactic fight scene. Truth be told, the scene where the mild-mannered Shruti Hassan is kidnapped and surrounded by some repulsive-looking goons in an isolated area is creepy enough to make the skin crawl. When baddie-in-chief declares that his son will now make her a proper bride, I began to worry that this so far family-friendly movie was about to turn ugly, when son-of-baddie revealed his evil plan and his evil weapon - yes, a Mangalsutra. Of course the girl's brother and boyfriend promptly appear to her rescue, but even amid the chaos of men fighting and arms and legs breaking all around, son-of-baddie manages to corner the girl and MS her right then and there. Of course his throat is slit by one of the good guys before he can execute this nefarious scheme.

Maybe I'm too much of a softie, but rather than kill a human being, no matter how creepy and despicable, wouldn't it be more amicable for all parties to just let him tie the freaking thread, then go ahead and break a few of his bones, dispose the thread, and get on with your life? I get that tying the thread is a visual metaphor for evil deeds you'd rather not show on screen. Much like Marshall 'reading a magazine'*, noisy neighbors 'playing bagpipes'** and college kids 'eating sandwiches'*** in HIMYM.

Still, it is somewhat offensive to see an educated woman feel so threatened by an object that is only symbolic of a sacred bond. Sacred objects are sacred because of the meaning we bestow on them. Even if the story of the black beads having evolved from a noose is true, in a civilized society the MS would serve only as a symbol, not a contract - certainly not without informed consent from both parties. By brandishing the sacred thread like a weapon - even if it is only a metaphor in a family-friendly movie - these films seem to take us back to a time when women had no more agency than cattle or a notebook labelled with a kid's name.

* taking a dump
** having noisy sex
*** smoking marijuana

I heart luv stories... though not quite

I recently realized that I'm late to the party as far as a slew of retro love stories in apna Bollywood are concerned. Maybe it's a sign I'm getting old, but I never felt motivated enough to go out and watch I Hate Luv Stories, Mere Brother Ki Dulhan, Rockstar, Ishaqzade, Student Of The Year, Ashiqui Thoo, Ranjhana, and while I was curious about Yeh Jawani Hai Deewani, I let that pass too (and no, I won't include Jab Tak Hai Jaan in this list, dead director zombie hero or whatever). So pardon me for admitting that Lootera took me by surprised. I mean, the era of anti-romantic love stories heralded by Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jayenge and Hum Aaapke Hain Kaun is over, and nobody bothered to share the good news with me!

Now before you start pelting stones at this blog, let me explain. First, stop throwing stuff at your computer screen. Second, well I loved DDLJ and HAHK as much as anybody else in 1994. In 1994.

Those films were good. They stood apart in a time when love stories meant a creepy hero stalking a pink-frocked heroine till she gave in to his rakish charms, then beating up a few baddies before riding off into the sunset. Or creepy hero stalking pink-frocked heroine till she gave in to his rakish charms, then getting into trouble with local don who dutifully plunges at hero's sister who in turn proceeds to die either before or after getting raped in order to be avenged by brooding Bhaiyya who then rides off into the sunset or goes to jail, depending on whether brooding Bhaiyya was played by Akshaye, Sunil or Sunny.

All this changed when Yash uncle and King Face Khan stepped in with a film that, for the first time on Indian screen, put stalking in perspective and reminded us all that in the real world, carving someone's name on your chest is a sign of mental imbalance, at par with talking to your dead mother on phone and killing people. Then came HAHK which reminded us that while finding The One you can frolic around the pool with is really nice, you need to think of your family and their interests too - and chances are, Divine Pomeranian Intervention will step in at just the right time before your sacrifice goes too far.

Then DDLJ put a final seal on the new rules of romance, rules that were to be followed for nearly two decades of Bollywood romances:

• You may hanky-panky against pretty European locales as long as you are appropriately chaste, wear your Hindustani values on your sleeves and can rattle off some lines on the moral superiority of desi boys and girls
• The girl is dad's property, to be taken with permission only
• That means dad's permission, not the girl's. You may hand over the girl to Daddy to be married off as he may please, never mind what she wants
• Love is... leaving some poor guy at the altar to be with your puppy faced lover because... awww....

Over the next couple years, the last rule got slightly reset to:

• Love is... the poor guy at the altar happily relinquishing marital bliss for the sake of puppy faced lover because... awww....

And so it went. Whether it was a big banner NRI wedding video or its cheap knockoff, the hero no longer bothered to propose marriage till the girl was properly attired for the ceremony. Even wedding guests got so used to the routine, their faces rarely registered surprise in the event of grooms getting swapped: notice the reactions on all of Kajol's sahelis in the climactic scene of Kuch Kuch Hota Hai. They are so damn relieved that Kajol was ditching Salman for the blast from her past, it's like... I mean, if I was invited to a wedding where the card says Bunty weds Babli, and then Bunty stops mid-ceremony and hands Babli over to his good friend Bunny, I'd be very, very confused. Unless I had an unreciprocated crush on Bunty.... anyway, I digress.

A nice twist to the last-minute groom swapping tradition came in Jab We Met. 

(Spoiler Alert for losers who don't want to know the denouement of a six-year-old movie) 

Here we have a girl, the guy she's supposed to want to marry, and the guy her family thinks she's going to marry, and all she has to do is to tell everyone that while the wedding preparations and decoration are spot on, they might want to change one of the names on the card in time to spare some unsuspecting guests a lot of confusion. The only problem is, she no longer wants to marry the guy she's supposed to want to marry, and wants to marry the guy her family thinks she's going to marry instead! Now that was a deliciously confusing conclusion to a simple love story if there ever was one. 

(End Spoiler Alert for losers who don't want to know the denouement of a six-year-old movie)

From all evidence, love stories are becoming more real, more relate-able now, where actions have consequences, locations are more earthy and matters of who marries whom are settled outside the Mandap.

***
Coming back to Lootera...

I liked the somewhat bratty, strong headed heroine in Lootera as much as I liked its flawed hero. What I liked most, though, were the little things - like Barun Chanda's colonial accent, Vikrant Massey's no-head-bobbing Dev Anand impression, the haveli with its colonial knick-knacks and its lime-washed walls, and all those little details so lovingly compiled by Motwane.

Now some of my favorite critics have already given some beautiful reviews to this film, so I won't go into all that. Just sharing a few thoughts here.

The setting:
The first time Sujay suggested watching Lootera, I flippantly dismissed the idea - "Not another period film." The heavy costuming, the posturing, the affected speech from most characters, all the artificiality of your average period flick usually wears me out. It was a bit refreshing then, to see a lot of outdoors, bright & fresh colours and a Sonakshi with very little jewelry and brocade. I'm also glad that the two leads do not try too hard to fit into the period setting, and focus instead, on the story of these two people they're portraying, and their emotional journey.

I've mentioned before that I'm not a sucker for authenticity in my movies. My views were reinforced recently by the first half of Matru Ki... I am no more motivated to finish the movie than to finish typing its name here. All the hilarious sounding capers - and this film puts you through two crazy drunk scenes with the spectacularly talented Pankaj Kapur (one of them in a twin seater plane), a pink buffalo, a pink Navneet Nishan, a corrupt Shabana, a gorgeous Anushka, a buffoonish fiance, kidnapped zulu dancers, a flying Mao... all in the first half - just didn't do it for me. Perhaps because Imran, who is given an enviably complex role here, puts all his energy into the Haryanvi accent instead, which by the way sucked.

What I found in Lootera instead was just as much detail of the era as was necessitated by the story. The many little treasures in the old haveli of the landlord are also an important component of the story, and they walk out of the picture once they have played their part in catalyzing some key events. The lavishness here never tapers towards the obscene, and the buildings, the people, feel like people and stuff in a real world rather than the ghosts haunting one of SLB's blue-green studios, rehearsing the roles they were meant to play in the local Ram Lila before tragedy struck. It is interesting that Motwane has been mentored by the man Bhansali himself. If the ambiance of this film owes anything to said mentoring, then Motwane is the best kind of student out there, one who can really cherry-pick the best qualities of the mentor and thrash the rest.

O' Henry:
When I first read The Last Leaf, and during my many subsequent re-readings (I can never have enough of O' Henry, sue me) I often fantasized about turning that story into a film. I had even sketched out a possible adaptation, in which the girls would be struggling actresses living in a cheap apartment in Andheri, and the old man would be an out of work painter of film hoardings. So pardon me for being a little biased, but great choice of story there!

The chase scene:
Am I the only one who thought the chase scene in the second half was somewhat inspired by the one in Anurag Kashyap's Black Friday? The way Ranveer gradually wears out, how that messes up his orientation, how the inspector calls out to him by name, the initial assurance that gets drained out as he finds himself cornered... do read Baradwaj Rangan's piece where he has beautifully captured this part.

***
So yeah, maybe watching a love story every once in a while may not be such a colossal waste of time. Now that Bollywood has some actual young people to act as young people, we might perhaps get more of these, and maybe, just maybe they won't turn into the assembly line products of the noughties too soon. Hopefully they won't be too much in the Hollywood template either (more on that later). Needless to say, Dr Horrible's Sing-Along Blog remains the greatest love story ever told.