The Flop I Love- Jhoom Barabar Jhoom

It began like many of my Bollywood love stories. It was just there, on my Netflix screen, suggested for me along with a handful of others for instant streaming. But this one looked a little garish. It looked a little cheap. I didn't yet recognize most of the cast (I think I knew Preity Zinta). I had no idea what the title meant. I passed it over many times. But then one day, and I don't recall why, I went ahead and pushed "play" on Jhoom Barabar Jhoom.

And, of course, I loved it! I laughed out loud. I grinned goofily. I was completely charmed by this completely improbable, silly movie.

I was sad to do a little more research and find that Jhoom Barabar Jhoom flopped in India. Flopped! And sadly, the director, Shaad Ali, has not directed a film since (as of this writing). I hope I will eventually get to see some more from him.

The movie has two beginnings. It actually begins with Amitabh Bachchan, whose role in this movie seems to be something along the lines of a Shakespearean Chorus (of all things), dancing to the very catchy title song in a train station in London with a diverse collection of extras backing him up. I didn't know much about Amitach Bachchan when I saw this film, actually, and was a bit bemused by the old guy in the ridiculous outfit.

My 12-year-old later informed me that he thought Amitabh's character looked "really cool," however, so what do I know? And the opening song and dance he heads up is very, very fun.

The story proper (so to speak), begins with Rikki (Abhishek Bachchan) and Alvira (Preity Zinta) meeting in the train station while each is waiting for a delayed train.

At first they are somewhat antagonistic, but to pass the time they begin to tell each other the romantic stories of how each of them met their significant other. As they get to know one another, it seems they begin to fall for each other. The rest of the film deals in light-hearted manner with how that all pans out.

Yes, it is a silly movie. It also knows that it is a silly movie, and does not take itself seriously. It pokes fun at the fantasies in Bollywood romances and makes shrewd commentary on their improbability, while simultaneously being one itself, in all its improbable glory.

Preity is both caustic and charming, Abhishek knows how to do comedy, and Lara Dutta and Bobby Deol, who play supporting roles, are dead-on and committed to their goofy characters. The music is fabulous and fits in perfectly. An important part of the film involves a dance competition, so we also get to enjoy an abundance of dancing, which is a major plus for me! This film is a rocking good time. Give it a chance!

Three times the laughter- Amar Akbar Anthony

A funny thing happened after I watched Amar Akbar Anthony, the Bollywood hit from 1977 starring Amitabh Bachchan, Rishi Kapoor, and Vinod Khanna (which, in case you didn't know, is an awful lot of star power).

I watched the film and enjoyed it, full as it was of good ol' Bollywood melodrama, plus a generous sprinkling of what I like to term "'huh?' moments." My husband had wandered in and out while I was watching a couple of times, but he is never drawn in by 70s Bollywood production values, so he never stayed. Afterwards, however, he asked me what it was about, and while telling him I literally laughed until tears came to my eyes!
I'm not sure I would recommend this as anyone's first introduction to Bollywood, but it is a rollicking good time!

The story begins thusly: a chauffeur, played by the inimitable Pran, agrees to take the rap for a hit-and-run crime perpetrated by his rich boss, because his boss assures him that he will take better care of his family than he himself can.

However, when the chauffeur gets out of jail he finds that his boss did not keep this promise, and that his wife is ill and his three sons hungry. He confronts his boss, and there follows a dramatic series of events culminating in the children being lost, the chauffeur thinking his wife is dead, his wife thinking her entire family is dead, and the three boys being adopted by a Hindu police officer, a Catholic priest, and a Muslim tailor, respectively. Oh, I forgot to mention that the boys' mother was struck blind in this series of unfortunate events. The chauffer had managed to steal a lot of gold from his rich boss, and, in retaliation for the loss of his family, also steals the rich man's baby daughter.

We then shift scenes to 20 years later. The three brothers unknowingly reunite at a hospital when they all donate blood to an accident victim, who is actually their mother. Many hijinks follow before the family are all reunited at last. Many hilarious, hilarious hijinks, and also some confusing offshoots of subplots as well.

But surely we can forgive a lot of a film that presents us with Amitabh Bachchan dressed like Mr. Peanut.

 


 This is, you see, apparently how a good Christian man dresses to attend an Easter party. One must be properly dressed when emerging from the huge, celebratory Easter egg to sing and dance in honor of the occasion.

Frankly, I think these images alone should make you want to see the film! And that was one surprise for me from this film, actually. Amitabh Bachchan is hilarious! I had seen a few of his 70s films before this, and he was always very serious and brooding, with his character showing any levity only very rarely. This was not surprising, since he is famous for his "Angry Young Man" persona. But in this film he gets to display a knack for clowning and a wonderful sense of comic timing. It made me wonder if there are more "funny Amitabh" movies out there.

Another thing that surprised me about the film is that there is never any contention between the three brothers stemming from their different religions. When I read the short synopsis given by Netflix, I had assumed that the fact that they had been raised in different religions would prove a significant issue for the three brothers, and perhaps that they would be antagonistic towards each other before having to face the fact of their blood relationship. But this plays no part in the story whatsoever. The brothers are perfectly friendly, despite being ignorant of their real connection, after meeting that fateful day in the hospital. (Well, there is some tension between the Hindu brother, who is a policeman like his adopted father, and Anthony, who has unwittingly aided a criminal his policeman brother is pursuing, but religion never enters into it.) Though this surprised me, I found it quite nice. It also seemed to gently suggest that all religions are kin, even if their adherents don't recognize it, which is a nice sentiment.

Now I want to do a shout out for the ladies of the film! They are wonderful. Each of the brothers has a romantic interest (but of course!), and each of the women (Parveen Babi, Shaban Azmi, and Neetu Singh) gives a delightful performance.

Bollywood films from the 1970s seem to be brimful of strong female characters, although they do not get a fair share of screen time. For example, a major part of the ending of the film (I hesitate to say climax... this film has several contenders for the "climax" title) revolves around rescuing Anthony's love interest, who has been kidnapped, with the kidnappers intent on forcing her to marry a particular goon who is obsessed with her. The three brothers go to the rescue, aided by the love interests of the other two brothers. They are disguised as the priest who is to perform the marriage, the tailor who made the wedding dress, and a "one man band" hired to provide the music.

They don't find a sobbing damsel in distress when they arrive, however. She is giving her kidnappers plenty of trouble, and Anthony actually has a hard time getting near enough to let her know it's him because she has plenty of fight in her.

Incidentally, perhaps only Vinod Khanna could pull off the dignity he showed when called upon to reveal himself as a police officer, ready to take charge of the situation, while actually still wearing cymbals attached to his knees.

I think anyone exploring Golden Oldies of Bollywood should certainly give Amar Akbar Anthony a try! It is chock-full of melodrama and delightful music, colorful characters, great performances, and, yes, the occasional plot thread that simply disappears into thin air. Masala film-making at its best, perhaps, and all part of the charm.

Bunty Aur Babli

Bunty Aur Babli is a film I watched to about halfway through and then forgot about for a good long time. I finally watched the rest of it. It is fun but not fantastic, as evidenced by the fact that, well, I forgot to finish it for awhile.

Abhishek Bachchan and Rani Mukerji star as a two big dreamers (Abhishek's big dreams involve running his own business, while Rani dreams of winning the Miss World pageant) from small towns who fall in together and turn to a life of crime when their dreams are stymied. They pull increasingly high-stakes con jobs, relishing both the money and the adventurous excitement.

This man thinks his is making a big sale to a beautiful woman. Oh the disappointment awaiting him...

This movie was, apparently, quite a big hit but I can't get too excited about it. I think part of the problem is that, with films where you are on the side of the criminals, like heist films such as Ocean's Eleven, I'm used to having a definite reason or at least an excuse for siding with the criminals. For example, the guy they steal from in Ocean's Eleven is such a sleazeball that you don't really care that they rip him off, especially when they're so charming and clever about it. But here they seem mainly to be ripping off harmless business owners. If the victims had it coming, I completely missed why. (Except for the con involving the supposed "Richest Man in the World" who thought he could buy the Taj Mahal. That one was pretty funny. Ridiculous, but funny.) Also, Bunty and Babli didn't really seem to have a strong reason to fall into a life of crime. It wasn't as if they couldn't have just gotten jobs, it was just that they found that too boring and mundane in the face of remembering their exalted dreams. For me, however, a reason such as "I'm disappointed that I missed the deadline for the Miss World pageant so now I have no alternative but to steal my way to riches" just falls kind of flat. Abhishek's character was dealt a rude blow, and the scene where he gets even with the guy who did it (which was their first con) was one that, I thought, worked better because he had such understandable motivation and the victim was, clearly, a real jerk. But it still doesn't really explain why they did the next one, although as they kept going it was clear that Abhishek's character enjoyed the notoriety. Better a thief than a nobody, right people?

I don't want to spoil the ending, but I will say that, while it doesn't stay so morally ambiguous to the very end, it does seem to cling to the idea that a normal, decent life is extremely boring and sad. Which seems like a slightly rude thing to sell to an audience that will probably mostly comprise people with normal, fairly ordinary lives. Part of watching movies is an escape from the mundane, of course, but I don't necessarily want it hammered home to me, while I'm escaping, what a bore I am!

Amitabh Bachchan plays a policeman who vows to track Bunty and Babli down. He is over-the-top, but he carries it off. Loved him! He and his son clearly enjoy acting opposite each other, and the script took every chance that showed up to make a joke out of the fact that these two are famously father and son in real life. How many times can one character tell another not to act like his father? Watch to find out!

Some of the music was very enjoyable and some of it was ho-hum (but did involve impressively ugly costumes!). I loved the song in the middle, "Kajra Re", featuring Aishwarya Rai, and she was fantastic in it, but it had absolutely nothing to do with anything else in the film. I've heard other people complain before that some songs in some films are unnecessary or make the pace drag, but I've always enjoyed the music and dancing and never before found one to be completely out of place. There always seems to be some justification for it. There have been songs I haven't cared for as much as others, of course, but I've never thought that I couldn't see the filmmaker's reason for using a particular song-and-dance number. But here it really does come out of nowhere, and moreover adds nothing, develops nothing, and changes nothing. Rani isn't even in the scene, and why is Abhishek falling all over this dancer when he's now a married man? And why is this beautiful dancer making such a point of flirting with Amitabh Bachchan's character, who is old enough to be her father (and who, two years after this film came out, became her father-in-law in real life)? What on earth is going on? Weird. I guess the idea is that Aishwarya being gorgeous is reason enough?

I don't think that anything is executed poorly in this film. It is well done. It just doesn't seem to me to have much to offer. It's fun for one watch, as long as you're not expecting much, and if you're really hankering for a Hindi caper film.

That Seventies Film- Sholay

The story of why I decided to sample 70s Bollywood films is kind of a convoluted one. The song Deewangi Deewangi from Om Shanti Om (which stars Shah Rukh Khan) was featured in the sidebar on Youtube when I was watching some other Bollywood song, and, intrigued, I watched it. It was catchy and fun, but soon became a stream of actor appearances, with people showing up to dance a few steps with Shah Rukh while people cheered. That was fun when I recognized the actor ("Hey! Wasn't she in Life in a Metro?" "Oh look! It's Preity!"), but more often I didn't recognize them. I got curious, however, and looked into the movie. Plenty of people, I came to find, thought it a highly entertaining film, but apparently a lot of the humor in the movie is based on references to 70s Bollywood. Somehow, probably bearing witness to some slight perfectionist tendencies of mine, this became an impetus for me to research the top movies of the 70s in order to track them down and watch them. In other words, a lot of preparation is going into watching Om Shanti Om someday, and I hope it appreciates it!

This is not always easy, I must point out. I love my red envelopes that come in the mail, bearing DVDs to make me happy, but most of the top 70s movies have a wait (short, long, or very long). Evidently, I am not the only one interested in watching important films from that specific decade. Many are on Youtube, but not always subtitled.

Sholay is one I was able to watch on Youtube- with subtitles! According to this article on squidoo.com, Sholay is THE top 70s Bollywood film. The title means "embers."

I have to admit this poster didn't make me all that excited to see it. Nevertheless, I ended up being pretty entertained by Sholay. In my usual newbie, naive way, I remarked to myself that it looked a lot like an old Hollywood Western... except it was in India. You may not be surprised to find that I am not the only one to have noticed that- the term for this type of Bollywood film is "Curry Western." (See what they did there?)

The film stars Amitabh Bachchan and Dharmendra as goofy outlaw types, who steal and scoff the law but are loyal, fast friends and generally decent guys (despite the whole being criminals thing).

This was the first film I watched that stars Amitabh. I was at least aware that he was a big, big star. It was also my first exposure to Dharmendra. I hadn't heard of him at all. As it turns out, though, he is one of those stars that shows up in the Deewangi song, so I look forward to trying to recognize him when I finally do watch Om Shanti Om. These two make a fun pair, and certainly play off of each other well.

A policeman who once was THIS CLOSE to apprehending this playfully criminal duo, and who ended up impressed with their bravery and decency, tracks them down and wants to hire them to rid his village of a very bad man. I am suddenly picturing "El Guapo" from The Three Amigos,

but no, it is this guy,

and he is a really nasty piece of work. They didn't shy away from making this guy very, very bad indeed. The actor is Amjad Khan and he knows how to play the bad guy. He has it down cold.

They end up taking the job, and all sorts of drama ensues. Both find love interests in this small village they have been hired to protect. I was interested to find that both of their loves interests were real-life love interests as well, and they are now married to them. Amitabh had married the actress playing his love interest, Jaya Bhaduri, just before filming started. But the story of Dharmendra and Hema Malini, who plays the quirky village girl that his character falls in love with, is just fascinating.

First of all, I was very taken by Hema. She plays a spunky, strong girl, although her character can also be quite naive and gullible. At one point she is required to try to save her love by dancing- it may sound strange, but trust me, it is a fabulous scene- and her determination and strength are as awesome as her dancing. That is actually my favorite part of the movie.

Anyway, I decided to find out who this actress was, and my research led me to find that Hema and Dharmendra fell in love while shooting Sholay. Awww.... AND, he reputedly bribed the lighting techs to mess things up so he would have more time with her doing retakes of a certain scene. How sweet! But, it turns out, he was already married at the time. Urgh. That puts a damper on what was looking like a charming real-life romance. Then things get interesting. According to Hema's biography on IMDB.com, Dharmendra wanted to get a divorce and marry Hema, but couldn't because his wife would not agree to it. But eventually Dharmendra and Hema both converted to Islam and got married anyway. Apparently, and I am still trying to find out more about this because it is so very intriguing and culturally fascinating, there are different laws regarding marriage in India, depending on your religion. Which is a reminder to me that there are certainly a lot of different ways of looking at the world. I wonder what Dharmendra's first wife did then? But I haven't been able to find any information on that. Can anyone point me in the right direction? Fascinating, fascinating stuff!

But back to the actual film. Sholay has action, adventure, humor that I actually found funny (humor can be tricky, cross-culturally), sacrifice, tragedy, and very memorable characters. It also had the most ridiculous climactic combat scene that I have ever seen in any type of cinema. I can't tell you more without being very spoilery, but it is just ludicrous. Shaking my head here.

It didn't ruin it, though. I think, as a Western, non-Hindi-speaking person, Sholay does not have the impact for me that it evidently had in India when it was released. Still a good time, though, and a piece of Bollywood history that I am glad to have seen!