2015 gave us a lot to cheer for, but several facepalm worthy moments too. Check out our selection of this year’s favourite filmi scenes that deserve a Manoj Kumar style hand-on-face.
1. Mapping the Gap: NH10
Navdeep Singh’s NH10 processes many logical slits in its narrative, starting with making an entire village lonesome because of an ongoing tamasha. It also has all men as evil incarnate, watering down the larger context of gender parity and patriarchy. But the moment that totally made our eyes go wide, was when the couple uses a physical map on their way out of Delhi. Both Meera (Anushka Sharma) and Arjun (Neil Bhoopalam) are working professionals, and carry smartphones with Google aided navigation, but still prefer to use a physical map, inevitably to get lost. For the sake of convenience, use a better trick please.
2. A King’s Dance: Bajirao Mastani
When Dilip Kumar was signed on for playing prince Salim in Mughal-E-Azam (1960), and Naushad came on board as the music composer, everyone wanted Kumar to lip sync a song, a romantic ballad perhaps if not dance. But director K. Asif was very clear. “Woh Hindustan ka honewala baadshah hai -- woh gana nahin gayega (He’s the future emperor of India, he’s not going to sing.),” he declared. The influence of Asif’s magnum opus is very evident in Sanjay Leela Bhansali’s Bajirao Mastani, in which there’s a major hat tip to the famous song, Pyaar kiya toh darna kya. It was still passable when Kashibai (Priyanka Chopra) and Mastani (Deepika Padukone) danced, but when Peshwa Baji Rao I (Ranveer Singh) started to shake a leg and went into Tattad Tattad mode, all we wanted to do was observe a moment of silence for K. Asif’s shaken and stirred soul.
3. Second Marriage Without First Divorce: Tanu Weds Manu Returns
The sequel of Tanu Weds Manu was entertaining despite its many bizarre twists and turns. We discovered for the first time that marriage counselling happens in a mental asylum, where the therapists act like executioners. Manu actually gets locked up in the asylum! Many scenes later, Manu (R. Madhavan) falls for Datto (Kangana Ranaut), Tanu’s look-alike, a love story which gives the most insane twist in the tale later. Manu decides to marry Datto, without getting a divorce from Tanu. To top it all, Tanu who fiercely wants her husband back is okay with the marriage, without any emphasis on the divorce. This is a new take on the theatre of the absurd.
4. Symbolic Violation: Baahubali: The Beginning
S. S. Rajamouli’s Baahubali: The Beginning introduced us to the grander vision of a world with imaginative storytelling and magnanimous visuals. However, truth to be told, this wonderful universe has also been sacrificed to certain conventions. From black-faced enemies to the incorporation of the Wuxia genre and Peter Jackson’s monumental The Lord Of The Rings trilogy in the grain of it, they are a few spots of bother. But the one scene that was most worrisome was the romanticised version of a woman’s violation. When Tamannaah’s Avanthika finally comes face to face with Prabhas’s Baahubali, the former is pushed into a dance of trance, without any consent. From a warrior, she turns into a make-up laden woman, her warrior self giving into the feminine garb, and to top it all, she falls for him. The scene is done with spectacular choreography, and the visual artistry is undeniable. But we know there isn’t any go-ahead on her part. This is how a woman is tamed. Applause.
5. Chai Pe Charcha: Phantom
What Kabir Khan delivered in Bajrangi Bhaijaan, he almost undid in Phantom. There are several moments in which we are asked to use suspension of disbelief, and cheer for Saif Ali Khan’s Daniyal khan finishing his mission impossible. But the biggest unintentional hilarity ensues when a tender scene tries to connect the protagonists’ mission with the Taj Mahal Hotel, you know, to drive home the case of revenge for the attack at the Taj. In this scene Katrina Kaif’s Nawaz Mistry recounts her childhood memory of being taken to the Taj Mahal Hotel by her father for food and beverages, and the timing of the scene left us giggling for hours. Lol.
(The writer is a journalist and a screenwriter who believes in the insanity of words, in print or otherwise. Follow him on Twitter: @RanjibMazumder)
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