Check out this excellent article filled with nostalgia on the 90s by Varun Grower.
Aamir Khan and Urmila in a still from ‘Rangeela’.
Nostalgia is like cinnamon powder of the emotional realm. It’s present in everything sweet and saleable today—from resto-bar decors to photo filters to memes (“Aao kabhi haveli pe” is the latest in the same series in which Alok Nath’s Sanskaari Babuji was once a rage) to every second Hindi film remixing yet another song from the 1990s. In all this sepia-tinted violence of marketing buzzwords, is there any space or need even to talk about that seemingly unremarkable chunk of time in the history of our cinema and television?
Still—this is a question I am tired of asking myself—what is it about the 1990s that refuses to leave us, the children of that era? (By children of that era, I broadly mean those born post-Emergency but pre-liberalization; boys and girls who gained the visceral sense of body, mind, and the world in the 1990s.) Of course, it was the time of coloured TV, DD Metro, cable channels, a new sensibility in cinema, and it was the time when Baba Sehgal entered our lives. But is that enough? And isn’t that what every generation believes—that they have lived through the most turbulent or sexy or peaceful or meaningful childhoods? So why do I still dream of Alisha Chinai, Anaida, Jackie Shroff (he was singing a qawwali in a dream I had last month, something he has not done in a Hindi film yet, I think), Varsha Usgaonkar (Toh Saathi Koi Bhoola Yaad Aaya fame), and Kya Banoge Munna (serious DD fans will remember this morning-show gem)? It’s a probe, this piece, which may take me into places bittersweet.
As Fan movie is being watched by lovers and haters alike, I need to write this honest write up on my connection with Shah Rukh Khan. Seems pointless that my nemesis Ritz is gone, no one has fan wars on the comments page, Naachgaana is defunct and so my favorite SRK fans no longer found.
When I was about 8 years old, I would get so involved in film scenes that I would cry, or laugh out aloud while watching movies. Particularly for the awkward scenes, when main character gets caught or teased or does something goofy. Thats what happened to lieutenant Abhimanyu Rai, he monkeys around during training session, gets caught and punished – is asked to stand under the sun until trainer chooses to let him go . His trainer forgets the punishment till late in the evening. About the time, trainer rushes to relieve him Abhimanyu Rai is about to faint, the girl he has been wooing catches him. Then he winks and says something cute. Thats the earliest memory of watching SRK.
Over the years I developed a strong connection with this actor, got to know more and more about his personal life, watched his interviews, Read his interviews (knew some write ups by heart), scanned for his name mentioned in film magazines, kept secret stash of photos, cutouts, stickers etc.. I pretty much learnt hIndi because of him. I started watching cricket so that I catch his Pepsi ads. Later I became cricket crazy. Recently I read an article in which someone had claimed that SRK used to his first e-mail password. Even I had Raj as my password. I even wrote Ram and Simran as the sender and receiver for mock money order in my English exams. Through him I learnt many things. My taste, my beliefs, my individuality all had some connection with SRK. In some sense, he was an integral part of my childhood. Hard to ignore doing f-l-a-m-e-s with his movie characters.
Here are my 2016 Oscar Predictions – who I want to win and who I think will win.
Best Picture
Have not seen Mad Max: Fury Road. Brooklyn should not have even been nominated for Best Picture. There is nothing great about this movie and it does not deserve the Oscar nomination for Best Picture. The Martian should not have been nominated either. Its the usual cliched Hollywood science fiction movie. Bridge of Spies is a good movie but its not the Best movie of the year. The Big Short is an excellent entertaining movie but I don’t think it will win the Best Picture. Room is very good movie with an excellent first half but the second half is not that great. Spotlight is an excellent movie based on the Boston Globe investigation of the US Church abuse scandal. The Revenant is an excellent movie on survival and revenge. Its a tough one between Spotlight and The Revenant and the Oscar for Best Picture could go to either one. I personally want Spotlight to win Best Picture but I think The Revenant is going to win Best Picture.
The early 90s started a new trend of Hindi Pop Songs or IndiPop. These pop songs became very popular on the music countdown shows. 90s was a great time for Indian pop music and for a while it appeared that pop music would take over Hindi film music but unfortunately it did not. Anyway here are some of the Best Pop Songs from the 90s. I have tried to avoid any remixes of Bollywood songs.
Starting with Baba Sehgal’s Dil Dhadke from his album Thanda Thanda Paani. The song starring Pooja Bedi used to come a lot on MTV.
Most Bollywood movies avoid any of the lead actors dying because they want to have a happy ending. Many believe that movies with the lead actors dying won’t work at the box office. But death scenes have made many movies memorable and many of them have worked great at the box office too contrary to popular perception. Death scenes also give the actors a chance to show off their acting skills. Sure some of these scenes are over dramatized and involve a bit of hamming but hey its Bollywood. So here are some of the Best Death Scenes of Bollywood in mostly chronological order to the best of my knowledge. Please post your favorites in comments.
Starting with the iconic Rajesh Khanna death scene from Anand which has Amitabh desperately trying to save his friend’s life till the very last moment. Amitabh returning to see Rajesh Khanna dead and demanding his over talkative friend to speak and Rajesh Khanna’s voice playing from the tape telling him how ephemeral life is.
Sholay was the movie which made me a movie buff. Amitabh sacrificing his life for Dharmendra is a great scene from Sholay and I think it was a major reason for my becoming a Amitabh fan back then.
Check out this DNA Article by Roshni Nair mentioning Tanqeed and me.
Once upon a time there were gossip columns that were daring, juicy and joyous even, free of PR pressures and vested interests. With corporate compulsions robbing columns of much of their spice, Roshni Nair walks down gossip lane to analyse changing trends and remember ‘stars’ like Devyani Chaubal, Baburao Patel and the unsung columnists who shaped our growing years
Photo Credit – Pinkvilla, Memsaabstory
It’s the stuff of gossip legend. The irreverent Devyani Chaubal, the queen of natter who spawned many an imitation, incurred the white-hot wrath of Dharmendra for writing about his alleged sexcapades. “He was known to be a bit of a stud; Devyani’s account made him out to be a superstud. She wrote about how he serviced two to three starlets every day in the studios before he returned home to do his ‘home work’ on his wife’s bed…” the equally-irreverent Khushwant Singh wrote in his book, Women and Men in my Life. That Devi claimed to have been chased by the actor at a rally is well-known. Only, opinions differ on whether it was because she went to town about his sex life, or called Hema Malini a ‘stale idli’.
Celebrity-driven and venomous vintage gossip was both juicy and joyous. It reflected the uninhibited personality of the woman who died in 1995, her lonely sunset years a sharp contrast from her incident-filled prime. She is largely remembered for her relationship with Rajesh ‘Kaka’ Khanna. Some say she was a friend, some say she was in love with him. Devi herself claimed in an interview that she’d slept with him.
Her column Frankly Speaking in Star & Style and Eve’s Weekly magazines struck fear in the hearts of film stars. With a stroke of her pen, she demolished carefully-moulded casts of celluloid gods, exposed their frailties, then rubbed it in with some merciless mocking. More often than not, Frankly Speaking allowed its witty maker to get away with murder.
Regardless of what one makes of Devi’s venom (she once said Anil Kapoor looks like “an ordinary pickpocket”) and Kaka obsession, there’s no denying her influence on the Indian gossip column. It was she who popularised Hinglish — a style taken forward by Stardust‘s first editor, Shobhaa De (then Shobha Rajadhyaksha).
“Devi had an outstandingly sharp tongue and mind and a good ear for chatter, much like you need a good eye to be a curator,” says author Namita Gokhale, who published the film magazine Super with her husband, the late Rajiv Gokhale. “Hers was a distinct voice. The writing reminded you of the confidential sharing between two people, making you feel like you were the only one privy to the information. This intimacy is at the heart of the gossip column. And you don’t see it anymore.”
The gossip column should have ideally gone from strength to strength as the years passed, but no. Today’s columns, pale shadows of their glorious antecedents, have diluted, planted or stale contents passing off as ‘gossip’. Their dull personas fill us with nostalgia for the gossip columns of yore and the man who started it all — 35 years before Devi.
Patel rap
It wouldn’t be right to call Baburao Patel, editor-publisher of filmindia, a gossip columnist. He was more a reviewer. But his fabled snark dwarfed even Devi’s and set the tone for the kind of writing one saw in columns over time. filmindia‘s three columns, Bombay Calling, You’ll Hardly Believe That… and Pictures in Making had Patel sign off as ‘Hyacinth’ or ‘Judas’. “The entire mode of gossip is marked by innuendo, and filmindia was a master of innuendo. Most of it was in answers to letters because people wanted to verify rumours they’d heard about stars and studios. Sometimes, it would appear in the Studio Notes section,” informs Neepa Majumdar, author of Wanted Cultured Ladies Only, a book on Indian cinema and actresses of the 1930s-1950s.
Patel’s deadpan, offensive humour, which found an audience in no time, has fans even today. One of them is Greta Kaemmer, a vintage Hindi film buff and blogger at Memsaabstory who scans whatever filmindia copies she gets her hands on. “Stardust magazines from the ’70s were gleefully gossipy, but filmindia is my all-time favourite because of Baburao’s wit. Today’s film columns are poorly written and researched, and mostly unimaginative,” she feels.
(An April 1957 celeb descriptor from filmindia‘s Pictures in Making column. Nirupa Roy was one of the many Baburao Patel loved to pick on. Source – Memsaabstory)
It’s an opinion shared by film historian SMM Ausaja, who says Patel’s vitriol was not only extreme, but also taken sportingly by most: “When V. Shantaram’s Jhanak Jhanak Payal Baaje was released, the (review) headline Patel used was ‘Mental Masturbation of a Senile Soul’. He said Prithviraj Kapoor was an ‘uncouth Pathan who shouldn’t be in the industry’, that Dilip Kumar looked like ‘an escaped prisoner’ and Kishore Kumar reminded him of a monkey. But they took it in their stride.” Of course, there were exceptions. “Patel once said something that angered (actress) Shanta Apte so much that she went to his office and slapped him,” Ausaja says.
Baburao Patel went on to become founder-editor of the political magazine Mother India, establish a homeopathic company called Mother India Pharmaceuticals and member of the Bharatiya Jana Sangh (now BJP). But it’s filmindia that he remains synonymous with.
(Baburao Patel being snarky like only he could. The ‘victim’ here was Padmini. Source- Memsaabstory)
Bachchan’s boycott
Writing about gossip without mention of Nari Hira’s Stardust is like Thanksgiving without cranberry sauce. It was not only the cult Neeta’s Natter column, but the magazine as a whole that catapulted gossip to astral levels. The nicknames it gave people – from ‘La Tagore’ for Sharmila Tagore and ‘Mumu’ for Mumtaz to ‘Garam Dharam’ for Dharmendra and ‘Chi Chi’ for Govinda – became Stardust‘s calling card. “Stardust projected familiarity with the stars and caught on like no other film magazine ever had,” says film journalist Dinesh Raheja. Not least for the way in which it bared the stars of the day.
(Neeta’s Natter- ‘Gifts for Stars’. Source- Jai Arjun Singh)
Neeta’s Natter, honed by the raillery of Mohan Bawa but presented by a bejewelled black feline, was mostly about catfights and who was sleeping with who – sometimes in the form of a ‘blind item’ or a piece of gossip where people weren’t directly named, but alluded to. It took little time for Stardust to emerge a winner in the magazine wars of the 1970s. Veteran journalist Rauf Ahmed, who edited Super before moving to Filmfare, Movie, Screen and Premiere, harks back to the decade: “Stardust would tell you who did what at midnight and who was fighting with whom. Filmfare almost collapsed as it became viewed as boring or ‘vegetarian’. I think much of the gossip was overblown – maybe not by Stardust, but by its sources, who may have added masala to seem more relevant.”
Super, which surfaced in 1976, had three gossip columns: Grapevine, Deep Throat and Bitchin’, fine-tuned by Dubby Bhagat (an alumni of the cult magazine, Junior Statesman). That’s how columns worked: industry insiders gave the dope, and writers or editors put the punch across. Super‘s sources would get Rs 50 for each piece of gossip, shares Namita Gokhale.
(Zeenat Aman on the cover of Super, October 1977. Source – Pinkvilla)
“Our gossip was sardonic and bitchy, not scandalous,” laughs Ahmed. “The staff at Super was carefree and enthusiastic. We didn’t seek favours – in fact, we’d be the ones taking actors out for coffee, not the other way round. I remember for our first cover story, Namita said ‘Take Dimple (Kapadia) to Rendezvous (at Taj Mahal Palace) and interview her there.’ That standard of interacting with people isn’t there now.”
The rampaging Stardust, meanwhile, was boycotted by Amitabh Bachchan, allegedly over a story on him and Zeenat Aman. Saumit Sinh, founder-editor of the Mumbaiwalla blog, provides the backdrop. “Bachchan met with Dilip Kumar and five-six others who were ‘harassed’ by the magazine. But Stardust got to know about it and published the story about the boycott. Later, during the Emergency, many publications such as Stardust were clamped down on. Thinking Bachchan’s friendship with the Gandhis was to blame, Nari Hira created an association of film magazines, which collectively decided to not write about him,” he says.
Regardless, Stardust continued with the gossip without directly naming Bachchan, instead referring to him as “‘Jaya Bhaduri’s husband’ or ‘Lambu’. The stalemate eventually ended after the release of Bachchan’s 1991 film Ajooba.
It is naive to believe that gossip wasn’t a bitter pill for some even in the bohemian 1970s. But compare the columnist’s autonomy then versus now, and one realises that it’s a sorry state of affairs, what with defamation or libel lawsuits flying in all directions. Legal charges against writers did exist, but they weren’t as plentiful as today. “I remember a gossip item about Raaj Kumar telling a director ‘Jaani, tumhare sar se Bijnor ke tel ki boo aati hai‘ when asked why he didn’t want to act in his film. Nobody could file a court case against something like this. It was such fun to read about,” says Gokhale.
Beyond (linguistic) boundaries
Gossip’s appeal took it beyond the confines of English magazines into regional publications, where it caught on like wildfire. Rangbhoomi, a Hindi magazine dating to the 1930s, may have been the genesis for others of its kind: Cinema Sansar, and the much younger Filmi Duniya and Filmi Kaliya. But the gold star is Mayapuri, the oldest Hindi film weekly that was – and still is – a staple in barber shops across the country. Its popularity has much to do with the late poet-dramatist KP Saxena, who with his Lakhnavi tehzeeb and biting satire infused new life into the Hindi gossip column.
“Saxenasaabwas so gifted,” says Mayapuri editor PK Bajaj. “He was a perceptive social commentator, a fixture at Kavi Sammelans and the dialogue writer of Lagaan, Swades and Jodhaa Akbar. His writing, although never scandalous, had a pan-Indian reach. In fact, he had legions of fans even in Pakistan.”
(The December 29, 1974 edition of Mayapuri magazine, featuring Hema Malini on the cover. Source- Mayapuri)
KP Saxena, however, was of a rare breed. The English film gossip boom in the 1970s led to similar (and numerous) offshoots in vernacular media, and most tried to mimic Devyani Chaubal’s writing style. Author-journalist Dilip Thakur, who writes on Hindi and Marathi cinema, remembers the ‘Devi wave’. “Editors would ask us to write like her. Regional magazines ko itna readership mila ki poocho mat,” he says. “But this wasn’t so in Marathi publications. Gossip was muted until the 1980s – when Varsha Usgaonkar and Ashwini Bhave came into the picture.”
Marathi periodicals may have warmed up to gossip later than their linguistic cousins, but Thakur is quick to add that this doesn’t mean they were blind to it. An example is the hullabaloo raised almost 80 years ago, when Meenakshi Shirodkar – grandmother of Shilpa and Namrata Shirodkar – became the first Indian woman to wear a swimsuit on screen, in the 1938 Marathi film Brahmachari. “Marathi papers went berserk. It was a controversy so big that it sprouted andolans,” he laughs.
Is gossip dead?
Gossip of the scandalous kind became non-existent in the 2000s, giving way to tamer versions, including in Neeta’s Natter. Many hold the corporatisation of both, the Hindi film industry and publications, responsible. And although celebrity managers like Bunny Reuben (Raj Kapoor’s publicist) were around, they’d recede once a rapport with their clients was established. “We had personal access. This allowed you to observe stars closely, notice idiosyncrasies, be privy to interesting conversations, and bring that in your writing. You could also count the number of publications on your hand, so the celebrity-journalist equation was valued. Now they rarely remember names,” says Dinesh Raheja.
Rauf Ahmed also points to the influx of award shows. Publications need stars to attend their shows in order to get eyeballs, meaning they can’t be as catty as they once were. “Now there’s a fear of writing anything that would make a celebrity avoid your show. Earlier, stars were obliged to magazines. It’s the other way round today. We’ve now got a Gabbar Singh culture.”
Compulsions like these are downers for people who grew up in the golden age of gossip. Those were the days periodic subscriptions or visits to the library were occasions entire families looked forward to, just to get their hands on the latest gupshup tinsel town had to offer.
Rafi Mohammed was one of those people. He started his blog Tanqeed seven years ago to post film reviews, but veered towards posting old magazine scans, interviews and articles after spotting an old Gulzar interview on a fan page. That took Rafi back to his teenage years, when he’d buy magazines every Sunday from hawkers or hop over to a relative’s house to read Filmfare. “Actors back then weren’t accessible to the general public, so any news, gossip or interview was eagerly awaited. Today, most gossip is just PR for some upcoming movie. And celebrities no longer have mystery or enigma,” he says, listing Rekha’s Filmfare interview about Amitabh Bachchan and the Sanjay Khan-Zeenat Aman article in CineBlitz as his top picks.
Indeed, planted stories are a norm – which is why much of the gossip now finds its way online (an exception being Rajeev Masand’s column in Open). One such site is Pinkvilla, whose US-based publisher Nandini Shenoy says she started the blog to cater to the gossip-hungry crowd. “People like to read about scandals, affairs and controversies. This only reiterates that there’s interest in gossip. Yet, pressure to pull down stories through PR managers and other influencers is equally high,” she shares in an email interview, adding that the gossip column as it existed is dead.
Naysayers feel gossip columns allow for false claims, propaganda by vested interests and little to no fact-checking or research, but others beg to differ. Their sources, they say, are trustworthy, and claims or news are verified before being published. Archita Kashyap, senior editor at Pinkvilla, elaborates: “Even for blind items, we have solid information. For pieces in which people are named, we make sure there are at least two-three sources. Corroborating is important. If I don’t get a second corroboration, I keep things open-ended. At the end of the day, we’re all voyeurs. And what’s the point of being a journalist if you have to go through ‘right channels’ to get news? Then you’re not a journalist.”
The twilight zone
Gossip about actors, actresses and filmmakers is still easy to access compared to chatter about corporates and politicians. Just ask Delhi-based ‘Jack’, who manages the no holds barred Fashionscandal. A former journalist, Jack established his own site for gossip after the pressures of print journalism got his goat. His uninhibited way of covering the shadowy lives of the rich and famous culminated into 47 legal cases, of which four are ongoing. “I’m very proud of my reputation as a besharam, because I have reliable sources and people hate me for it. But gossiping about corporates and politicians is dangerous. I’ve been beaten, blackmailed and summoned by cops for writing about them,” says the man who’s written about Mallika Sherawat’s purported sugar daddy gifting her the Los Angeles villa she stays in for a good part of the year.
But it’s not just netas and businesspeople who seem safeguarded against gossip of the investigative kind. Saumit Sinh, who says he was arm-twisted by the National Stock Exchange (NSE) for writing about a supposed illegal lapse by the bourse, thinks social reportage is dead too. The belief isn’t far-fetched, for we’re no longer privy to ‘Page 3’ coverage and tell-alls about the affluent, the wannabes and everyone in between. High society isn’t covered like it once was. “All so-called entertainment pages would once cover society, but now, it’s like the only celebrities are Shahrukh and Salman,” says Sinh, who also laments the dearth of genuine, credible insiders.
Columnists today write several times a week, and much of it is boring, feels Outlook contributor and former UN diplomat Bhaichand Patel. Political columnists were always few and far between, with Khushwant Singh, Vinod Mehta and Behram ‘Busybee’ Contractor holding fort. But their writing was far superior to what you see today. And papers like Current — in which Devyani Chaubal broke the story about Dilip Kumar’s nikaah with Asma while he was married to Saira Banu – and Russi Karanjia’s political weekly Blitz aren’t around anymore. “People don’t write about politicians’ or corporates’ private lives. That’s an unwritten rule, unless they get into trouble. Then it’s a free-for-all,” says Patel, adding that advertising obligations double as muzzles. “Baburao Patel wrote scandalous things about actors and filmmakers of that era, to the extent that some stopped advertising in filmindia. But he didn’t care.”
A senior journalist, on condition of anonymity, bemoans that even vaunted columnists avoid writing about something as plain as tycoons or ministers having romantic liaisons. “A former PM had a journalist-girlfriend. He was unmarried, so it’s not like he was doing anything wrong. Yet, no one dared mention it. Another former PM has a biological daughter few outside political and journalistic circles know about. It’s not reporters, but newspaper proprietors who don’t want these things going public,” he says.
There is an invisible Lakshman rekha political journalists don’t cross. Which is why some anonymously share what they know on other platforms. “The Daily Telegraph or London Times‘ reporters often contribute incognito to Private Eye magazine if certain compulsions prevent them from writing about something in their own papers. We don’t have anything like that in India,” says Bhaichand Patel.
Gossip – or fact – may be circulating about the not-so-savoury private lives of politicians, but it rarely finds its way into the public domain. That’s the stuff confined to press clubs, drawing rooms and the various Lutyens handles on Twitter.
Jilted Lover songs once used to be a regular feature in Bollywood movies. These songs used to be usually set on some stage or at some party where the jilted lover is singing a song blaming or questioning his lover. Surprisingly these used to be popular during weddings 🙂 Here are some of the most popular Jilted Lover Songs from Hindi movies in no particular order.
Here is probably the most popular of all jilted lover songs – Tu Auron Ki Kyon Ho Gayee with Deb Mukerji totally trying to act like Shammi Kapoor.
As far as Asian/Hindustani classical goes – we always have individual performers who improvise in every performance. No performance of a musician is same. It is because they carry the music in their heart. When they enter a house or an auditorium – music enters with them. Not the notes and the grammar of it.
Its quite a contrast in western world music – where music goes mostly by the rules. If one note is wrong, the audience knows. In Hindustani classical/folk songs/ Asian culture – we have more mature audience which reacts to the impromptu performances in a positive way.
Its a contrast in another way – In an orchestra there are many players – and there is a conductor who manages all the notes not to clash with one another. Its a group effort. A more organized effort to put the things in place. But we are still far more individualistic and while in fact we have a denser population than the West.
Music is like a painting. No artist can make the same painting again.
Music is very subjective. It cant be taught like a physical training.
I am ok if someone says IMDB reflects the POV of intellects/pseudo intellects/educated/ access to Internet Indians but if you tell me that because some Bollywood films are there in IMDb Top 250, they are “universally acclaimed” or “crossover” then you are fooling yourself. No one cares about bw movies beyond the desis and NRIs.
By now most people may have already heard or read that Aamir Khan has criticized AIB’s roast involving Arjun Kapoor, Karan Johar and Ranveer Singh. Here is the full video.
He starts off by saying that he has not seen the roast. But then says he has heard about it and seen 2-3 clips and goes on to criticize pretty much everything about the show 🙂 Now this is the same Aamir Khan who produced Delhi Belly which had a lot of Gaalis or abuses. Back then he was promoting the movie all over the place saying its an adult film intended for adults and that’s why it’s ok to have Gaalis. Now even the AIB Knockout Roast was a show for adults and it was on youtube where one can either to choose to watch it or not. Karan Johar made it clear at the start of the show itself that “Some foul and horrific language will be used. If you are easily offended or even really difficultly offended then you should leave right now”.
Aamir bizarrely calls the comedy show a violent event. This is what he said. “I felt it was a very violent event. There was lot of violence in that event. Dekhiye violence sirf physical nahi hota ke main aapko 2 joote maarun, violence verbal bhi hota hai, violence emotional bhi hota hai. Jab aap kisi ko insult karte ho, toh aap violence perpetuate kar rahe ho. Aap ek bahut violent cheez kar rahe ho aur aap duniya ko dikha rahe ho ke dekho main kitna violent hun. Toh mujhe wo cheezen pasand nahi hain ke main aapko violence dikhaun chaahe wo physical ho aur usko main aapko bataun ke wo kitne kamaal ka hai, I don’t like it.”
Now this is the same Aamir Khan who had starred in the violent movie Ghajini. He had no issues showing all the physical violence in Ghajini but apparently verbal “insults” are “very violent” and should not be shown. He was perfectly fine with all the verbal insults and abuses in Delhi Belly and had not called them “violent” back then.
And Aamir apparently did not find this Chatur’s Speech from his movie 3 Idiots “violent” with jokes on rape aka “Balatkar”.
He goes on to say “Kisi ke rang pe comment karna, kisi ke sexuality pe comment karna aur usko joke banana aur main aapke saath hasun, mujhe toh hasi nahi aarahi bhai isme.”
According to Aamir its wrong to comment on somebody’s color or sexuality and joke about it. Fine. But what about making fun of somebody’s accent which his character did in 3 Idiots? What about making fun of somebody’s flatulence? Chatur’s flatulence was made fun of throughout the whole movie. One can’t be selective about who/what one can be made fun of and who/what cannot be made fun of. If its wrong to make fun of someone’s color or sexuality then its not ok to make fun of someone’s height/weight and so on. Any one who laughs at Sardar jokes or Blonde jokes should not complain about jokes on color/sexuality.
“Aur 25 gaaliyan deke aap soch rahe ho ke main impress hojaunga, gaaliyon se impress hone ki umar meri nikal chuki hai ke main 14 saal ka nahi hun ke main gaali sunke hasunga ha ha ha gaali di usne. I am not impressed by a bad language.”
May be he should have used this advice for Delhi Belly because it wasn’t even half as funny as AIB’s roast despite using all those Gaalis. Now if Aamir says that he is “not impressed by bad language” and if he thinks only 14 year olds laugh at “gaalis” then why did he need “gaalis” in Delhi Belly, a comedy for Adults?
“Aap agar mujhe hasana chahte ho toh aap bagayr kisi ko chot pahuchaye aap mujhe hasake dekho toh mujhe mazaa aayega usme.”
Some people were hurt with the Lord Shiva scene from his last movie PK but he was defending the scene and the movie back then using the rising box office collections. Wasn’t that scene also there for cheap laughs? He should have had Raju Hirani delete that scene and every other scene that anyone complained of hurting their sentiments. Why did he not do that?
He says with Delhi Belly they had applied for a Adults certificate so its ok. But then AIB was also for Adults and was on you tube with a warning by Karan Johar. To his credit he does say that he is against banning and that lynching AIB is wrong.
Here is the ad of Delhi Belly where even Aamir abuses which is beeped out.
Here is the video of Aamir telling “Don’t Watch Delhi Belly, If You Can’t Stand Abuses”.
Its completely fine if Delhi Belly or AIB Roast have Gaalis or abuses as both are intended for adults and one can watch them only if they want to. But what about the Bhaag DK Bose song which was played everywhere from TV channels/Radio to malls/shops and street corners at all times without being beeped? When some interviewer asked about the abuse “Bose DK” in the song Aamir termed it as a “technical issue”.
Now coming to AIB which did the actual roast they did not have the balls to stand up for their stand up comedy or roast. They shamelessly and spinelessly removed the video from you tube and then apologized to the Archdiocese of Bombay. If AIB did not believe that what they were doing was right then they should have not have done that in the first place.
The late George Carlin who is arguably the greatest stand up comic ever was arrested for his routine of “Seven Words You Can’t Say on Television” back in the 70s but unlike AIB he did not apologize. Instead he did the same routine again as can be seen here. That’s how you stand up for something you believe in.
As Fan movie is being watched by lovers and haters alike, I need to write this honest write up on my connection with Shah Rukh Khan. Seems pointless that my nemesis Ritz is gone, no one has fan wars on the comments page, Naachgaana is defunct and so my favorite SRK fans no longer found.
Best Picture
