Bollywood
Feminism takes a beating in r balki’s latest Flick Ki & Ka, a Far cry From its yesteryear counterparts that portrayed women in a more true- to- life light
Just when the film industry is opening up to feminism, come films that prove otherwise. Read all about it
She added ‘ Khan’ to her name. Quite clearly, that indicates that heroines need not worry about their marital status — which, trade bosses chauvinistically contend, subtracts their fan following, besides also whittling down their market equity.
The credit titles of her recently- released Ki & Ka mentioned the 35- year- old actress as Kareena Kapoor Khan. Well done, I say! The R Balki- directed romcom, however, is another story altogether — a muddled attempt at underscoring the point that it’s alright for a man to stay at home, mind the kitchen and dust the furniture, while his wife spends long hours climbing up the corporate ladder. Today, even a cursory look at reality would prove that it’s fine if a man and his wife both go to the workplace, whether separately or together. Double income couples are hardly a rarity — but who’s to tell Mr Balki that?
Moreover, the addled script goes to the extent of suggesting that the workings of a couple with a child on its way is in serious trouble. Cue a frustratingly lengthy sequence that shows the working woman to be furious upon learning she may be pregnant. By contrast, the househusband couldn’t care less. If she doesn’t want to become a mom, it’s cool. If she does, ditto.
Neither displays a shred of recognisable emotion, compelling you to wonder if the Mr & Mrs out here are human, or puppets being manipulated by a director who can’t distinguish between what’s progressive and what isn’t.
To be fair, despite her implausible characterisation, Kareena Kapoor Khan does knock out a performance that has its fire- and- ice moments. As Kia, the career- obsessed cor- porate executive, she’s way more competent than Arjun Kapoor, who appears to sleep- babble through his dialogue-heavy role. Truly, any flicker of chemistry between them is conspicuous by its absence.
To craft a film on the so- called war of the sexes requires maturity and sensitive handling. Not surprisingly, it has been an area that filmmakers, in the majority, have feared to tread. Over the decades, the accent has been on the classic situation of boy- meets- girl. They handle miscellaneous obstacles, then eventually hop, skip and jump towards an all’s- wellthat-ends- well ending. Arguably, this formula has been best apotheosised by Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, the best go- to date flick of all time.
Shift gears towards post- marital blues, though, and the highway is littered with barbed wire, especially when the plot hinges on the lead pair being depicted as working professionals. Inevitably, the ugly head of jealousy and misunderstanding springs up in the tradition established by Bollywood’s clones of A Star is Born. Think of that Judy Garland- James Mason classic ( or its remake with Barbra Streisand- Kris Kristofferson), and you’re more than likely to detect overt similarities in Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s Abhimaan and Mohit Suri’s Aashiqui 2.
While Amitabh Bachchan and Jaya Bhaduri reached a balanced compromise in Abhimaan, Siddharth Roy Kapoor’s character in Aashiqui 2 elected to commit suicide. Reason: to leave the field open magnanimously to his more talented songstress partner, enacted by Shraddha Kapoor. Both films were handled with a certain amount of tact, besides being
To craft a film on the so- called war of the sexes requires maturity and sensitive handling. Not surprisingly, it has been an area that filmmakers, in the majority, have feared to tread
enhanced by outstanding music scores. Yet, you can’t help feeling that it’s eventually the male who calls the shots. The call on whether to preserve or destroy the relationship is left to the ‘ hero’, so to speak. I, for one, would cheer an ending that clearly states that the woman i s the superior of the two, and leave it at that. Wishful thinking, perhaps.
Of course, domestic drudgery, fatal attractions, parental pressures and incompatibility have been the other pegs for movie plots about marital strife. In this realm, filmmakers have been more articulate in stressing gender equality, be it Hrishikesh Mukherjee’s Anuradha, Basu Bhattacharya’s Anubhav, Aavishkar and Griha Pravesh, Gulzar’s Aandhi and Ijaazat — not to forget Arth, Mahesh Bhatt’s most cherished film to date. In these instances, the woman retained her independent identity, on her own terms. Narrated with a semblance of complexity, these films were exceptionally forthright.
Alas, BR Chopra’s Pati Patni aur Woh tended to be flippant, while Yash Chopra’s Silsila was a gross case of embarrassing casting, exacerbating the fanzine rumours related to Amitabh Bachchan, Jaya Bachchan and Rekha. Surprisingly, the audience, at the time of its release, chose to thumb down the
uncomfortable roundelay.
Coming to Anil Ganguly’s Kora Kagaz from 1974 — a remake of the Suchitra Sen- Soumitra Chatterjee face- off in the 1963 Bengali film Saat Paake Bandha — it is recallable for getting its fundamentals right. A conflict between a university professor and his more well- heeled wife, portrayed in its Hindi version by Vijay Anand and Jaya Bhaduri, was as believable as it was poignant. The viewer felt concerned, and hoped against hope that their ir-
reconcilable differences would be sorted. Were they? To an ambivalent degree, they were.
That quality of ambiguity, which encourages viewers to take a film home to draw their own conclusions, is a lost art. In the event, Ki & Ka, which bludgeons you with exaggerations and pseudofeminism, is eminently forgettable.
Needless to emphasise, yesteryear’s cinema on gender issues was far more true- to- life than today’s flights of fantasy. More’s the pity.