This morning has been some kind of strange trip. I don’t know where it started, I don’t know where it ended. I’m not sure what happened. Everyone ate a lot of rajma chawal, except for me.
Our great leaders at the great state of Haryana have decided to address Gurgaon’s pressing concerns in civic amenities, health and well-being, law and order, and general lack of humanity, by changing the name of the city to Gurugram (Haryanvi slang for “Deal with it, mothafucka!”).
Mouthpiece (n): One who uses one’s mouth to service an ideology, a person, or a group of people all at once.
The month of March 2016 saw India’s great leaders compete in viral speech-making. Smriti Irani took a spirited early lead by promising to chop off her own head.
Although this seemed impossible to best, dark horse Kanhaiya Kumar stole media attention by not being involved in a protest, getting arrested for being involved in the protest he wasn’t involved in, then getting beaten up by lawyers inside a court-room, then getting released without proof of any crime, thus setting up a perfect platform to make his soul-stirring, patriotic speech. Typical opportunistic behaviour.
Anupam Kher, who speaks Hindi so well it sounds like English, took pages out of Kiran Bedi’s ‘MODI’ and ‘GOVERNANCE’ files for material, and delivered a performance that split critics and popular audience right down the middle. On the same stage, Barkha Dutt picked up the ‘voice of reason’ mantle, amazed that no one would snatch it.
Tired of sitting on the kids’ table, Congress president Rahul Gandhi took out some poems in Lok Sabha. His oration skills took a beating, and he could win no hashtags and no glory.
Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal felt neglected after not being invited to JNU’s big protest, and blamed his engineering background for it. He promised his friends an even bigger protest, with all kinds of drinks and women.
And for the first time in his career, Arnab Goswamy found nobody listening to him.
Baazigar is a story of a man desperate to take revenge but with the least amount of effort.
For most of the movie, the revenge-taking is so secretive that until neither the victim nor the revenge-ee realize why the things that are happening to them... are happening.
The movie opens with a car race, in India. So we already know it’s fantasy fiction. SRK loses intentionally to Kajol’s dad, but that’s because he has a bigger prize in mind.
His hair dripping with sweat, SRK looks into Kajol’s eyes, and she melts like an ice-cube in the Sahara desert.
BUT.. the metaphor is inside another metaphor, which is gift-wrapped with murder and destruction. The hero loses his heroism in gaining his revenge, because his plan is to kill this man and take over his business empire.
SRK seduces, woos and promises to marry his elder daughter, before sending her plummeting to her death. He does this to bring pain to Daleep Tahil, the target of his actions. Unexpected, crushing, irreversible pain.
But revenge is an uncontrollable beast, once let loose. Our hero realizes this as his thirst for blood, and laziness regarding proper disguises, lead him to murder again to cover the first one. And then again to cover that.
After ruthlessly killing her sister and her friends, SRK makes himself literally the only living person Kajol can hang out with. He woos and he charms, and suddenly realizes that this time the love is real, because true louw can blossom anywere, like a lotus in the mud.
He flatters her with blatant lies about her eye and skin color, while secretly plotting the destruction of everything around her, as his pogrom continues.
At the climax, SRK reveals his true purpose - to avenge the death of his father, caused by Kajol’s father. By lying, cheating and finally killing the man he lost the race to, our hero has finally taken his revenge.
“Did I not do well?” he asks her.
"Well, you could have NOT died. That would have been a good plan too.”
“...Yeah.”
But such emotional plot twists aside, it is bravery that makes me love Baazigar. I miss the SRK that could make this kind of film. Father died, homeless, and poor Learns to drive race cars. Goes to college, on presumed racing scholarship. Woos girl. Kills girl. Kills girl’s friends. Uses the emotional window to move in with younger sister. Marries her. Keeps killing people. Insults her cop-friend. Takes over company. Dies while killing father.
The Astronaut was sent to look for advanced civilizations, and trick them into giving him their secrets. He had bottles of incense, fruit-baskets, wines and a copy of TIME magazine to give them.
He found their absence puzzling. Were they hiding? Did they never exist? Or had they wiped themselves out accidentally?
“I’ve been thinking about my life, doc! Can I call you doc?”
“I’m not a doctor.”
“It still helps. It was very sudden, doc. Thoughts! And original thoughts! I started questioning myself. Why?? Why is this happening to - Oooh, 20 Reasons Why I’m The Next Jennifer Lawrence!”
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