Of Soaps and Supervamps

My mom is visiting for a couple of months – and there are two main side effects of this. The first is that I find myself on the wrong side of the ‘nagging’ process – I get so relentlessly nagged by her that I forget to nag my own kids. The other, more worrisome side effect is that along with her, I start watching all kinds of Bong soaps on TV.

This time too, it is the same story and I have been watching back-to-back soaps on Z-Bangla. And I made one discovery. Whether it be Hindi or regional language soaps, they have one thing in common – behind every successful soap there is a woman (or women). And no, it is not the goody-two-shoes super heroines of these soaps who guarantee their run week after week. It is the outlandishly dressed vamps with their constant plotting and machinations.

This is not a recent phenomenon, though, since the time of fairy tales, this has been true. Except for a rare Big Bad Wolf or Ogre, the chief villain of all renowned fairy tales is one (or more) of the female characters. Think Hansel and Gretel, Rapunzel, Snow-white or Cinderella – every story is set in motion  through the intrigues spun by some evil female – witches and step-mothers being the perennial favourites.

And the trend continues till today, at least on Indian TV, if not on our films. Albeit, the witches and step-mothers have been replaced by sundry mothers-in-law, daughters-in-law, aunts, and sisters-in-law, but the stories still revolve around the machinations of these conniving women!

Another interesting pattern I noticed, is that the physical appearance of these women scream ‘VAMP’ the moment they appear on screen. They have the 'Vamp-stamp' on them, so to speak! The more garish the make-up, the skimpier the blouse, the shorter the hair, the more outlandish and intricate the bindi and jewellery - the nastier is the vamp! I observe that my 11-year old daughter has made quite a pastime out of identifying vamps in Bong and Hindi serials. She will walk into the room in the middle of a serial, and announce “Yeh wali aunty gandi hai!”, seemingly taking a lot of pride in being able to identify the nasty lady at one glance…

Sigh! if only we could tell the intent of a person this easily from their appearance in real life... how easy life would be!

Identifying nasty women in Indian soaps - child's play!

If daily soaps are to be believed, about 50% of all women spend most of their time scheming and plotting the downfall of the other 50% - the ‘good' women! And what is worse, most of the time they don’t even do their dirty work themselves, they work through unsuspecting men whose minds they poison incessantly!

But I have a confession to make. Despite knowing all this, I find myself putting all rational thought on the backburner and getting (almost) addicted to these soaps. My mom is off TV for some days now due to an eye surgery, and I find myself being sorely tempted to watch the soaps she follows, to find out the latest shenanigans of these supervamps!

I hope Ekta Kapoor will next turn to making serials full of male villains who take over the mantle of plotting and scheming from their female counterparts. So here’s looking forward to the making of ‘Kyunki Sasur bhi kabhi Kunwara tha’…

Birthday Banter

Perception of birthdays over the years...

Delhi Diary

I made a very short trip to Delhi last week to bring my mother to Mumbai. As usual, Delhi left me confused as to whether I like it or detest it. I started off on a not-so-good note by landing up at Nizamuddin station. Nizammudin station, for those uninitiated, can easily be termed as the ‘travellers’ nightmare’. It’s utter chaos personified. Amidst the chaos, I debated the relative merits and demerits of the options I had: engaging in oral boxing matches with various touts, or sweating it through a long serpentine queue for a prepaid rickshaw. I decided on the latter, only to discover that the counter just took the responsibility of doling out the pre paid tickets. Actually getting hold of an auto-wallah to go to my destination was my own lookout!

After a long search for a rickshaw-walla willing to go to Janakpuri, I finally found one. Needless to say, he relented only because he wanted to go towards that direction anyway. The relief was short lived, though - the rickshaw-wallah seemed to be in an inordinate hurry to get somewhere. The way he drove the auto through traffic snares, I was scared he would trim the toes of people standing by the roadside. And he drove over speed breakers at about 80kmph, with as much care as if he was driving an SUV over a tiny bug.

I sat quietly, nursing my jostled insides, and contemplated asking him to slow down – but decided against it. Incurring his wrath at that point did not seem a good idea.

Returning to Mumbai the next day, I got stuck in terrible traffic jams at various points on my way home (it was Muharram day and processions were out on every street). And I noticed a pattern – of how Delhi traffic jams vary from their Mumbai counterparts. Here is a representation illustrating the difference:

A comparative representation of traffic jams in Mumbai vs Delhi. Each arrow represents a vehicle, and the arrowhead the direction in which it is trying to move...

While both cities have terrible traffic jams, in Mumbai you keep moving while in a jam (albeit at a speed at which an old snail taking a leisurely stroll could overtake you). In Delhi, on the other hand, a jam is ABSOLUTELY chaotic – and there is no way you can move ahead unless you are ready to do one of the following things:

a) Be ready to knock over the people standing by and drive over them

b) Be ready to drive over the tops of other vehicles

c) Get down from your vehicle and start an argument with another driver – and go on arguing till the traffic clears or one of you kills the other...

But there were some heartening bits of news about Delhi – I learnt that my mother’s presswalla’s (dhobi’s) son was doing MCA… nice! And I read in the papers that for the new lot of auto rickshaw permits in Delhi, women drivers would be given preference – a leap forward again, after the women conductors in DTC buses! Hope the move works out...

Funny Favourites

Some days back, I was wondering if I had enough money to buy full collections of books and films, what I would choose to buy. Mentally, I started preparing my wish lists in different categories. As a person fond of humour, my first mental list was that of genuinely funny Hindi films (rather rare specimens, amongst the multitude of trash like 'Ready' and 'Thank you') that I would like to possess. Here is the list I came up with, of the top ten Hindi comedies that I would love to watch over and over and over again…

1. Jaane Bhi Do Yaaron – The very best dark satire ever made in India, if you ask me! Scene after scene, even as you roll in the aisles with laughter (as I actually did, when I saw the movie for the first time in the theatre in the 80’s), you can’t shake off the feeling of despair from the back of your mind. Even at the end - after that mad climax scene, you are in splits, but your heart is feeling despondent at the fate awaiting the crusader duo. Apart from the climax too there are scenes that are totally hilarious. I still remember the scene where Ravi Vaswani and Naseeruddin Shah (in quick succession, without being aware of the other one's attempts), try to flirt with Bhakti Barve in the studio thinking she is a wannabe model, and both end up with resounding slaps! And the look on the ‘dead’ Satish Shah’s face is so comical, you completely forget he is supposed to be a corpse and go hysterical with laughter. A film that is on the top of my ‘Not to be Missed’ list.

2. Golmaal(1979) – Much Ado about a Moustache! Even now, when I remember Utpal Dutt’s reaction when Amol Palekar’s glued-on moustache starts coming undone, while he sits oblivious of the fact, munching the goodies served to him - I break into fits of laughter. Apart from the main actors Utpal Dutt and Amol Palekar, Dina Pathak’s comic brilliance was a revelation. Playing the socialite actor forced to play the role of Palekar’s widowed mother, she essayed the role to perfection. Remember the scene where she tries to squeeze her ample behind through a small window to get inside Palekar’s house in order to prevent Dutt from discovering that she is an impostor…and you can’t help but chuckle…

3. Khosla ka Ghosla – This is one which will be appreciated more by people who have lived in Delhi  (or should I say people who have survived Delhi J). In particular, it strikes a chord with those who have withstood the sundry property dealers and brokers strewn about the city. The film was so ‘people like us’ that it still amazes me. I see Anupam Kher grumbling when forced to eat a pizza, and I remember my uncle who never eats noodles, claiming they remind him of wiggling worms. Think of the hero of the film being a full grown adult male called ‘Cherry’, and you will find 10 like him in your immediate neighbourhood (if you happen to live in Delhi, that is). Many scenes in the film are absolutely hilarious, but my favourite is the one where Navin Nishchol, impersonating a rich NRI, goes to a five-star hotel to meet Boman, the land shark. Everything from Nishchol’s self conscious walk to his dialogue ‘Aap chup rehne ka kya lenge?’ to the middleman are absolutely top class.

4. Munnabhai MBBS – What can I say about this film- I find some scenes insanely hilarious. My most favourite one is the garden scene where Sanjay Dutt informs Boman Irani he can’t marry Boman’s daughter Chinky because he is in love with Dr. Suman (wthout knowing she is actually the very same Chinky he is supposed to be thwarting). Boman is totally stupendous in this scene – no matter how many times you watch this, I guarantee, you will laugh!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iOhxW2TBsKE

5. Padosan (1968)– Not the most politically correct of films – with a large part of the comedy being provided by the ‘madrasi’ classical music teacher played by Mehmood, who seems to be perpetually fighting a battle with his veshti. But still, I love the film, and the sight of the paan chewing Kishore Kumar, shaking off a lock of hair from his forehead and saying “Arrey Bangdu!” to Sunil Dutt is pasted in my memory.

6. Lage Raho Munnabhai-  I’m not quite sure whether this film qualifies technically as a comedy, since it has a deep social message and also a full quota of heavy duty emotional scenes. But for me, it produces more laughs than most stuff that is passed off as comedy nowadays...

7. Chashme Buddoor – This film, about a couple of jealous guys  (Ravi Baswani and Rakesh Bedi) trying to scuttle their friend's romance with a girl they themselves fancy, is relatively unknown - but I consider it a must watch. I promise, you won’t regret it!

8. Chalti ka Naam Gaadi – Kishore Kumar at his barmiest best, with his real life brothers Ashok Kumar and Anoop Kumar for company. Many of the songs themselves are comic masterpieces. Who can help but laugh at the irony of the lyrics,


roop ka tum ho khazana
tum ho meri jaan ye maana
lekin pehle de do mera
paanch rupaiya baara aana

accompanied by Kishore’s antics!! Take a look at the story behind the 'paanch rupaiya baara aana' at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sL17TR0uX4.

9. Chupke Chupke – One of the best situational comedies in Hindi films. Raises deep philosophical questions about the English language such as ‘If T-O is pronounced too and D-O as doo, then why is G-O not goo?' Profound!J

10.  Hera Pheri (2000)– Another hilarious sitcom I simply love to watch – rerun after rerun on TV. Every actor manages to do justice to his or her role, including Suneil Shetty – which is quite a feat…

So, this is my selection. If you think there are some which I have missed out, you are welcome to add to the list. Let me see how many of these I can acquire in the next 6 months!