My Filmy Dunia

I guess those who know me also know that I am a movie buff. I always was. However, now since my son, Nyle also has got into Hindi movies, it is more fun to watch them together because we can laugh together at ALL Hindi movies (even the serious ones have so many holes in the plot that we end up laughing throughout the movie). For example, I do not think that the makers of “Dhoom 3” were promoting it as a comedy movie but when, during Christmas holidays, Nyle went to see it with us; he was pretty amused by some humorous situations in the movie:

• The Chicago police are so incompetent that in order to solve a few theft crimes, they have to bring two cops from Mumbai. And it is not that they invite the best and the brightest from the Indian police force. One of the guys they brought appears to have an IQ of a cabbage. And then they also bring Ali (Uday Chopra)
• These two guys come to Chicago and from the second day know the streets so well that they are chasing the bad guy on their own without anyone’s help. And the chase runs through the waterways as well.
• Even when they are fired and asked to leave, they decide to stay back. What exactly did they do with their visa?
• And when they make the decision to stay back, they are shown in front of a SBB train. Last I checked, SBB trains operated only in Switzerland.
• We visited the Six Flags amusement park many times when we lived in Chicago for almost 10 years. Therefore, I am pretty sure that they do not give remote controls to general public to operate rides the way Aamir Khan has when he ties Abhishek Bachchan to the track of the roller coaster.
• So, Aamir wants to kill Abhishek by tying him to the roller coaster but Abhishek escapes. Later on, when Aamir gets Abhishek nailed down on the underground street below Michigan Avenue where he could have killed him with the pipe he was carrying, he lets him go. Really?
• They show all major landmarks of Chicago (The Millennium Park, Field Museum, Opera House, Chicago river, The Tribune building etc. etc.), however, they do not show the most famous landmark – The “H2O” store on the Magnificent Mile (those of you who do not know why it is the most famous landmark of Chicago can ask Kiddo Bahwa by sending her an e-mail at kiddobahwa@crazyforshopping.iloveH2O.com).
• How did The Great Indian Circus qualify as a circus when all they did was to sing songs and dance? Shouldn’t it have been called the Great Indian Musical?
• Finally, in the penultimate scene, both Aamir Khans escape after getting cornered by these 2 cops at Navy Pier in Chicago. Abhishek tells the Chicago Police that next morning he wants extra force to finish both bad guys for once and all. Where do they meet next morning? At Contra Dam in Switzerland. God Bless Bollywood.

Another movie we saw during the holidays was Krish 3. Nyle had already seen “Koi Mil Gaya” and “Krish” so based on how Krish 3 ended (the baby disappeared) and how Rakesh Roshan has named the  movies in this series, Nyle predicted the names of the next 2 sequels  – “Koi Kho Gaya” and “Roh 5”. Send me a note if you want to understand the logic behind these names.

Since Nyle is now into Hindi movies and songs and also attends lots of Desi parties with us, he recently had a very good observation. We were coming back from a Desi party where one of our friends sang some Hindi songs for all of us. If you are a Desi and you live in North America, I am sure you have been to many of these parties where someone is a “good” singer. Then his/her friends plead him/her to sing a song or two. For me, this used to be a pretty innocuous thing until Nyle pointed it out by saying, “You know, there is a reason why there are these playback signers for Bollywood stars…. because not everyone can sing well. If these people really wanted to listen to a song, they could have just turned on You Tube and played the song rather than asking someone to sing it for them.” 

I agree. I experienced this phenomenon when I came to Lehigh as a graduate student and met a fellow student, Vinay who is a very “good” singer. Vinay now is a close friend and has entertained us a lot in the last 20+ years. However, if I think about Nyle’s observation and extend the argument, I would say that if people can sing in these kinds of get-togethers, why can’t they reenact the movie scenes?? Isn’t it the same thing? This summer, we “Lehigh” friends are going to have a get together and I think it would be great if Vinay and Sami can reenact the following scene from the Hindi movie “Deewar” for all of us. For their convenience, I have already worked on the script. They just have to act it out. The script here is in English but obviously I am expecting them to converse in Hindi.

Location: Lehigh’s Mountaintop Campus, under the Iacocca Hall Bridge (pic below)

Vinay: Sami, we started our professional lives from this same Mountaintop campus running experiments in the Emulsion Polymers Institute. But look where you live now and where I do. Why don’t you move to the Greater New York area?

Sami: No, I am happy living in Cleveland. 

Vinay: You have no idea how bad it can be if you continue to live in Cleveland.

Sami: Living in Cleveland MAY lead to bad things. However, living in Greater NY area leads ONLY to bad things.

Vinay: What do you have against New York? Why won’t you move there?

Sami: My principles and my ideals won’t allow it.

Vinay: Uff, your principles and your ideals. What is the use of these principles and ideals? If you knead them together, you can’t even make enough raw material for one experiment. What has Cleveland given you? Crumbling infrastructure, lake effect snow, bone-numbing temperatures and Cleveland Browns??? Look at NY area. We have the Empire State building, Time Square, Yankees, NY Giants. What do you have?

Sami: Mere paas maa hai (which actually is true because Sami is one of our very few friends who are fortunate enough to have their moms living with them)

As always, my final thought – I never believed in New Year resolutions but this year for a change, I decided to make some resolutions – No exercise, more drinking, less sleep, more junk food, and more stress. I know many of you must be struggling with your NY resolutions, so I do not mean to rub it off, but 28 days later, I am proud to say that so far I am doing really well on my resolutions. Yayyyy!