Wednesday 13 May 2009

Dev D - duniya yeh duniya badi gol hai

I finally saw Dev D. The movie had got some rave reviews and is on its way to become a cult classic. The hype however left me a little hesitant as all over-hyped things do. The other reason for not catching this movie when it first came out was that it never hit the theatres here and this was one movie I wanted to watch on the big screen

Anyways I finally saw the very, very R rated movie. Apart from the fact that I rejoice every time there a movie made especially for adults complete with grey areas, wearable/ affordable clothes, and realism that does not immediately transport us into a world of slums, poverty, and exploitation. After a point such depiction becomes a form of exploitation on its own (pointing fingers esp. at Madhur Bhandarkar).  

But I digress, what I loved about Dev D was the fact that despite characters in the movie that included - one sexually liberated girl and one prostitute all the women kept their clothes on. Abhay Deol on the other hand seemed to forever live in his underwear. 

And before you get ahead of yourself and accuse me of being a lech, let me explain myself. Yes, I am a lech but that was not the reason (OK OK not the sole reason) for my overwhelming approval. We are finally exploiting the male physique, after decades of unkempt men romancing beautiful women around trees. Finally the male bodies will be exposed to the cross hairs of all and sundry, something the female form has had to suffer forever. 

When John Abraham scratched his behind in Dostana, the first thoughts in my head were - “he takes off more clothes than the girl :)". Male body under female scrutiny gives me a sense of power however fake, short lived...

An era in which women wear what they want is already here but now we have an era where women are the target audience (the wielder of power) and men wear what women want :). We have come a full circle - ye duniya badi gol hai... (Though that’s not what the song was about).

Edited to add

My reaction may be a result of the little things in my everyday life. Like last Sunday, a particularly warm and balmy day. Husband and I were spending time with husband's - for lack of a better word say Friends whose birth preceded our own by high single digits/ low double digits ( oh all right they are old!!!). There was husband enjoying the sunshine in his shorts and there was me too self conscious to wear my pair of shorts - dressed in jeans and kurta and eyeing my husbands bare legs with growing irritation.

Recipe -

Methi Chole - this is a simple dish. The idea was to get some greens into my chole. The link also has a batura recipe but I have never tried that at home.

6 comments:

Phoenixritu said...

I so agree, commented on a similar thing in my blog post
http://www.phoenixritu.com/2009/05/04/of-babes-bitches-and-singledom/

I love eyeballing all that eye-candy

stringOfPearls said...

True and about time too :). Thank you for visiting my blog and commenting on it.

balai said...

Moving away from men in their chaddis , I loved the movie for its abstraction of the beaten-to-death Devdas story and stylized rendering; the visuals and the music to go with it were very cool. You could see influences of Danny Boyle and aptly he is thanked in the credits. Any idea how this movie received in India by the not-so-multiplex crowd?

stringOfPearls said...

From what I can tell the movie was a big success.I agree that the movie was a fresh take.
"apart from the men in chaddis" what I also liked that there were no "victims" in the movie. All the protagonists took the cards that they were dealt and at some part moved forward in stead of the self destructive characters of the original devdas. But the men in chaddis still scored bronie points with me :)

Indian Homemaker said...

Clothes, how much or how little, do symbolise a lot!! So I agree when you say, ...what I loved about Dev D was the fact that despite characters in the movie that included - one sexually liberated girl and one prostitute all the women kept their clothes on. Abhay Deol on the other hand seemed to forever live in his underwear."
I loved this movie and blogged about it too :) I am always happy to meet others who also liked it :)
http://indianhomemaker.wordpress.com/2009/03/03/practical-paro-artless-chandramukhi/

stringOfPearls said...

Thank you for visiting and commenting.
I like your take about Dev D and "Don't get caught". Very true...

A Woman Second

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