The Cinderella Man

No, this is not about James Braddock. But this is about what he stood for. To the americans of 1930 James Braddock stood for hope in a rubble of depression, unemployment and hopelessness. This is about that same spirit - of hope. And the torchbearer of that hope is none other than Karan Johar !

Apprently, Indian cinema is now being recognized by the rest of this world. We have successfully beaten the demons of ignorance of the rest of the world and they have woken up from their deep slumber only to find that their worst nightmare has come true ! There is a school of thought which argues, and quite forcefully too, that our movies are 'different' - and besides there is absolutely no need for us to 'ape' the Hollywood style of movie-making and that our song-dance routine is the most marvellous piece of discovery in the history of cinema. Indeed, Charles Chaplin and Sergei Eigenstein would have been proud! And this giant stride of the Indian cinema is being accentuated by none other than Aditya Chopra and Karan Johar. Obviously not Madhur Bhandarkar, Nagesh Kukunoor, Ram Gopal Varma, Shimit Amin, Vidhu Vinod Chopra (Who are they !)

Today I watched Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna (KANK) - Karan's latest offering.

It is a wonderful movie. It is the best movie ever to grace the Indian screen. I am incredibly happy that such a 'bold' subject has been taken up by Karan Johar and even more happy that the Indian cinegoers are fortunate to have amongst them in this generation a director of his ability. Let us get back to KANK.

KANK is a rivetting, short, crisp drama of only three hours and thirty-five minutes ! It is about a love that broke all relationships unlike Johar's previous offering where it was only about loving your parents. Basically, after you have had enough of your parents, you can now think of loving your lovers !

Such is the power of love in the movie that the people who are in 'love' are actually apologetic about it throughout the movie and have to do penance for their unholy act of falling in love. The first half of the movie is about realizing that the lovers are in love. The second half of the movie is about again realizing that they are in love ! (Yeah, it was not a typo, it is actually true!) And Karan in all his interviews tries to emphasize the point that "this time he has not taken a safe subject" reinforced by the critics, some of whom are the stooges of Yashraj and the Johars that this is a movie that has over-the-top performances by all the cast and is one of the best to be offered to the Indian public in a long time.

All of the cast sucks - big time. Except Amitabh and Abhishek. Specially Amitabh. He actually makes the most sensible and pragmatic statement in the entire movie on his deathbed. The subject of the movie is amazingly novel. Never before in the history of cinema has the subject of marital 'infidelity' been addressed. In fact, Karan Johar and Taran Adarsh ought to be lauded for finding a completely new dimension to humanity for exploring extra-marital love for the first time ! Awesome Karan ! Just mind-blowing !

A story which could have been told in an hour and a half, which could have charted a new territory in Indian cinema, which could have been short and sweet and actually bold, upfront and revolutionary to the pseudo-liberal, self-sacrificial Indian mindset was not told even in three and a half damned hours. Instead, unfortunately, the James Braddock of Indian cinema chose to churn out a half-baked, commercial, unimpressive story made with 60 crores which neither had love nor relationships.