your everyday trip to the grocery store

This weekend, still mid-cold, I finally braved the Indian grocery store to rent movies. I wonder if they'd let me alphabetize the titles in exchange for half-price rentals? Anyway, what their shelves lack in organization they more than make up for in numbers. All sorts of things, and not Hindi-centric like my video store. But no Bobby. I grabbed a few things I thought I could recall the video store doesn't have, and the nice man working at the cash register suggested a few others. I politely refused Dhoom. When he asked me what kinds I liked and I said "comedies and romances," he handed me Bunty aur Babli. I laughed and said, "Oh, I already own that one" and he smiled. It's always a pleasant surprise to be sufficiently amusing to strangers.

My fistful of treasures does not lend itself to a group review, and unfortunately I'm running on fumes and can't get each its full response. So here's what I watched, in order, with a few thoughts.

Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa
  • I was in a Shahrukh mood last week and was happy to see this on the shelf. I've encountered several writers who list it among their favorites. But the early 90s and I are still not the best of friends, and this didn't particularly hold my interest.
  • The Don song was really, really choice and put my powers of disbelief to their biggest test yet. Well worth the effort.
  • This movie takes the award for "Bollywood line I would most like a fella to say about me to express his earnest and undying love while referencing a statistical oddity in my romantic past:" "How shall I convince her not even a thousand Chrises together can give her the love that I can?" The only thing that would have made that more funny for me would be if Akshaye had said it.
  • I also like the line "When you are sad, I am double sad."

Baghban
  • I reckon there have never been more heinous children in all of Bollywood. What horrible, horrible people. I finally made peace with this movie when it became clear that those distractingly awful people were necessary to make the story's point, but it was an uneasy truce and I never want to see this again.
  • Sad, defeated Amitabh was unsettling to see. I've seen him sad, and I've seen him defeated, but not both combined. But then he bounced back, restoring my faith.

Mujhse Shaadi Karoge
  • The only thing I need to share about this is that it inspired a connection in my mind between Salman and David Hasselhoff. Think about it. Both are muscley, shiny, and often seen on the beach with no shirt on.
  • Oh yes, and a choice quote from one of the sports announcers at the end: "Love is a condition of the mind when the mind is out of condition."

Comments

Obi Wan said…
Now you know why I don't want to watch Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa again?

Baghban: Though I've never been able to force myself to watch it, I know what you mean. My main problem with the story is that it is archaic, and aimed at parents who then give the example of this movie to their children (like me) saying - "See, how bad/ heartless children are nowadays)!

Mujhse Shaadi Karoge: Wicked Sunny took the cake!
Anonymous said…
Baghban: Made me cry. Not a bad thing. Not a bad movie.

MSK: Forgot the title, but I loved this imaginary wedding-song with Salman and Priyanka.
Obi Wan: re: Baghban: I agree the story seems archaic. From an American's perspective, it's pretty hard to swallow, but I also assume - maybe incorrectly! - that the emotions behind the story are somehow resonant with enough of the population in India to maek the story worth telling in movie form? And those children are so obviously broadly drawn. As is the way of movies, but still. They were really hard to bear for a number of reasons.
re: MSK: I got sick of Sunny by the end, but it had its moments.

Oliver: re: Baghban Crying can be very good indeed!
re: MSK: I loved that too. So beautiful!
Anonymous said…
I cried watching Baghban too. ='( Sad stuff.

"It's always a pleasant surprise to be sufficiently amusing to strangers." - I love that, too. ;)
Unknown said…
Baghban is a running joke in my in-laws' family, among the younger-generation cousins. Here's how it happens: one of my sisters met a guy (blind date) and he said some completely anachronistic thing like "I would expect my wife to wake up early and cook rotli for breakfast," and the story has been told and retold later with her (internal) reaction: "Who cooks rotli for breakfast? What is this, Baghban?"

Now, "what is this, Baghban?" is shorthand for an old-fashioned women-in-the-kitchen type of dude.
KC - Love it! Can I borrow it? :)

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