Thappad: No mere slap

Since "Thappad" is now on Amazon Prime, got down to watching it. So, had already built my own pre-viewing impressions, basis reviews and tweets I had seen earlier and the tons of other media coverage the movie received.

Very well crafted and directed by Anubhav Sinha - the plot explores a whole set of people around the protagonist - men and women who touch her life, and that makes it all the more real and compelling.

Tapsee Pannu essays the role of chirpy Amrita, (Ammu as she is fondly called), who is content to be a homemaker to a very ambitious, successful Vikram, who is on the verge of a big promotion that would take him to London, wife in tow. Ammu's set upper middle class Delhi life comes crashing apart when the loving Vikram loses his cool over last minute office politics during a celebratory house party - and in misdirected rage, ends up delivering a thunderous slap on his wife's face, in full view of friends and family. That is it. The story begins from here. A shocked Ammu begins to question the marriage and her emotional investment of many years.

The film raises pertinent questions:

Could a mere slap become the cause for a stable marriage to end? Was Amrita making too big a deal about it? Shouldn't she just accept this as part of a relationship and move on?

To be honest, I had the same feeling persisting in my head throughout the film - but something was adding up in Amrita's favor all along. And that was, her husband's abject lack of remorse post the incident. Vikram is certainly not a bad guy - but his blissfully ignoring her anguish over the tingling public slap, and continued self absorption over the office politics and his own frustration - that is the underlying premise of "Thappad". It is not about domestic violence at all - but, about entitlement and taking things for granted. And that certainly adds up to the protagonist losing love and respect for her husband - the man around whom her life revolved for several years. Had he apologized even once with feeling, Amrita would have had no reason to question her marriage so much - forgiveness would have come in early and there would have been no story to talk about, but the apology does come, but towards the end, when the marriage is on its death bed.

It would be good for viewers to watch the movie, divorced of Tapsee Pannu's political beliefs etc - I saw a lot of tweets lambasting her as a liberal, anti-this-that, and a woman who advocates divorce through this movie. To give her the benefit of doubt, there is no divorce advocacy, per se - she has delivered a nuanced performance alongside the rest of the supporting cast.

I would recommend - watch this as a movie and honestly evaluate the situation in the reverse. If it were Vikram to be slapped in a fit of misdirected rage by Ammu, let us accept that she would have been branded as a woman with "a fiery temper and behavioral and anger issues". There would have been no justification for this unimaginable behavior at all. How could someone afford to slap her husband, even accidentally? Not too many of us, not even women,would accept it too well, and would hasten to brand the woman, as "hasty, nasty and full of attitude". I suspect a reverse "Thappad" script would have delved deep into the guilt conscience of the woman over her one-time act, more than anything else. That too, is the underlying message - our conditioning of several generations that can subconsciously accept some behaviors and not others.

In all, "Thappad" sends out a signal that questions these mindsets - there is no room for disrespect - of either gender. No one takes anyone for granted, even in a loving relationship. Accept, apologize or even better, do not commit an act you would be ashamed of, later.

Psychology Note #1 Narcissism and its Entourage: The Personality Disorders

Have you ever wondered that you are dealing with a very difficult person? Or, you are witnessing someone around you deal with a massive tantrum thrower or abuser? That they are putting in all the effort in pleasing the person, pandering to his/her ego, massaging it and comforting it? That it is a one-way street in the relationship?

Have you ever wondered that you are constantly second guessing whether you are going to be found fault at, criticized maliciously in private and in public for little or no fault of yours? That you will be the victim of someone's vicious temper, anytime, any day? Or, as mentioned earlier, you are witness to something on these lines happening to a person around you?

Have you ever felt you are or someone you know is being made to feel like an angry, wicked person who is going insane?

Look no further - you are not dealing with a mere control freak - these symptomatic behaviors have a clear name  and it is called narcissism (a rip off of the Greek mythological character, Narcissus) which is at a base level - about someone who loves himself or herself to an obnoxious level, to the extent of seeing no one else in context. The person in question could be anyone you know - a parent, a caregiver, a colleague, a sibling, an associate, a friend, spouse - just about anybody.

While I had first chanced upon this word in my late teens, thanks to my eclectic, well read elder sibling, my interest in and curiosity about this term led me to read up quite a bit only over the last year or so. The world of psychology dissects narcissism quite thoroughly and you get to understand the existence of  the ensuing narcissistic personality disorder, or "NPD", as it is known.

NPD is perhaps one of the world's oldest psychological anomalies, and has fascinated modern psychoanalysts in the 20th century, who went on to coin the term, and gave it its full definition.

Our interactions and experiences with narcissists fall into two broad categories: if you observe, you will be dealing with either an overt or a covert narcissist.

The overt narcissist is not difficult to identify, thanks to the obvious self aggrandizement that the person would exude.

The covert narcissist is the tougher one to identify.

A covert narcissist is as dangerous or more dangerous than the overt one - this character outwardly projects a great facade, but can go back and be terrible to very close ones, in particular, to a spouse.

After initially love bombing, they gradually lose interest and mentally drain the significant-other (SO) - by devaluing the person for their looks, their skills, among other things. This devaluation, more often than not, will not be very harsh on the face, but, will be consistent and systematic, and over a number of years, the other person starts believing in these criticisms. After all, a lie told a 100 times slowly tends to take the place of truth, doesn't it?  This practice of systematically making another person believe in the devaluation is famously called "gaslighting".

For the uninitiated, there is a famous 1944 Hollywood classic, "Gaslight", for your reference. Some of the scenes between the lead actors Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman (one of which I have shared here) are excellent references to what a covert narcissist can say to make his version sound authentic.



A covert narcissist plays the game in a Machiavellian manner, ensuring that his or her victim is part of a well crafted vilifaction campaign. Many a victim of such a campaign lose face in front of people, sometimes their own dear and near ones, since the covert narcissist would have already played the "victim", thus coloring the judgment of people around.

What piqued my interest as I kept reading was to understand the genesis of NPD. As I understand, the birth of the NPD begins very early in life - as early as 3-4 years of the person, and is generally caused by severe trauma such as abuse by a care-giver (a parent, step parent), or the death of a parent, trauma caused by being uprooted and abused by a care giver due to estrangement or death of parents. The grown-up narcissist becomes the mirror reflection of his childhood perpetrator/trauma. People with NPD generally are "empty shells" within themselves or so, psychoanalysts believe - with very little love and empathy to give to their near ones, since they have huge baggage of early experience which they carry into adult life.

Getting curious? For starters, Quora has some excellent references and answers around questions on narcissistic behavior. There are personality tests online that can give you a bird's eye view about yourself and the persons you are dealing with. Therapy from a good source is the ultimate solution, but when does a thief like to be called a thief? A narcissist can not be called out, unless the other person knows how to go about it, like a therapist.

So, the next time you are interacting with a very difficult person, you might want to step back a bit, and play psychologist in your own mind - what or who is he or she? You might land upon interesting answers that can help you to respond better, and not react. That is, if you wish to play doctor, doctor. It is best advised to leave a person with NPD to his or her own devices, and flee for your dear life, if you have the choice.

Of casteism, discourse, et al…

When I was watching the Netflix series, “Daughters of Destiny”, I walked into it with the back context that the protagonists, about four or five girls, were from the lowest castes in the social order, besides hailing from some of the poorest families. Their “saviour”, was Abraham George, an US returned corporate turned social entrepreneur, who started the Shanthi Bhavan School, on the outskirts of Bangalore. This was clearly a docu drama to higlight the "evil" of the caste system and set the premise for a Christian conversion agenda, my skeptical mind told me, as I ambled along the series.

As I continued to watch, my skepticism gave way to admiration – I would go to the extent to say whatever be George’s agenda or whatever be the motive of that skillfully crafted web series, if one individual has managed to transform the lives of children of so many underprivileged families, then he is a catalyst to social reform. Other assumptions and presumptions be damned.

Post watching this, a lot of questions which keep coming to my mind, resurfaced.

For some years now, many among the privileged castes in this country want to desperately believe that Brahmins and others from the traditionally privileged castes are now being marginalized, that they are being bashed, thrashed, and mercilessly called out for things done by their ancestors. And with the political climate of "pseudo secularism" thrown in, this set of people are deeply angry and unhappy.

While some of their grievances are true, and I do not discount those, I do believe casteism was taken to its deepest nadir in the last few centuries, when the privileged, particularly the Brahmin community, refused to even look at people from the lower castes. There is an infamous parable I have heard about a great grandfather of mine, who would stop eating and walk away from his lunch if he so much as heard the voice of the village tanner from outside. What sort of arrogance and entitlement was that? And why are we planning to forget any of it now? It should serve us as a reminder of an inglorious past - whenever we choose to cry hoarse.

In my 20s and my 30s, I never wanted to be an apologist. I used to abhor the fact that I was having to tell enraged, resentful people I knew that I was not responsible for the excesses of my forefathers. And that I owed no apology to anyone. But now, my views have undergone a fair amount of churn, and I choose to state my view a little differently than before.

My submission is this, and I have been saying this quite frequently to those who do not choose to see: Any social transition is going to bring its share of fair and unfair to all people. There will be a lot of muck that comes forth - 4 of the biggest upheavals in modern history of race (white vs black), gender (man vs woman), caste (privileged vs backward castes in Hindu society) and sexuality (hetero vs same sex) have thrown up the vomit that was buried deep in our underbelly. The narrative has moved or is moving rapidly from the first party to the second in each case, so there will be rage, accusations, counter narratives, slander (justified and otherwise) that will become a part of discourse. Why can we not be objective about this? Each one perceives the truth as he or she has seen and heard it. For every one person who is objective or rational, or data driven, there will be 99 who will be emotional and biased. And so be it.

It will be that we will tend to bucket all discourse and give it names.

When a person from a "privileged" caste speaks up against casteism, he will be labelled liberal or apologist, and when he doesn’t, he will be called casteist.

“The Daughters of Destiny” - at first sight, comes off as the ordinary story of 4 girls moving in and out of their lives, taking video bytes of the principal characters in the docu-drama, including family members. But, what really holds the narrative is the girls and their stories – the dramatic and extraordinary transformation they would have otherwise not been able to get access to, if they hadn’t landed in the place they finally came to be in. The docu drama patiently traces their metamorphosis in first, second and third person narratives over a number of years.

Among the many strong moments, I recall one of the girls poignantly making a remark, and in clear English, “It is simply unacceptable for people to look down upon another human being. I cannot bear to think I was born in a situation where my people have been looked down upon for centuries. I want to change all of it.” A moving statement - it was a teenager, who was asking very genuinely to be treated as a human. In a sense, she was declaring her fundamental right, and she had been empowered with the right skills to make such a matter-of-fact but powerful statement. It is as simple as that. And so be it. Why should we have a problem with her assertion? 

The twistedness of narrative in this day and age is not alien to me. So, if someone were to ask me, "Is casteism dead?", I would explain with a counter, "Has corruption been eradicated from our system?"

 I will not bother to explain myself repeatedly to naysayers of the caste debate, who want to live in constant denial or to the virulent "Brahmin" bashers who are in a tearing hurry to reach their fallacy of an idyllic "caste-free" world. The truth is far more complex. And we are in 2020, mind you - it is just too difficult a time in history for us to say who the victor is, and who the victim.

Kaaga Ka Munder Pe Bolna: The Film Music Connection

My Musings on the phrase, "Kaaga Ka Munder Be Bolna", and its deep rooted connection with Hindi Film Music!





Its references to earlier songs, from songstress Suraiya's croon from the 1947 hit, "Parwana" - my memories go back to Radio Ceylon and childhood!





And then, the reference to the double blockbuster, "Hum Aapke Hain Kaun" - Maayini Maayi Munder Pe Tere" - straight from the teen years (1994)

Bas Pyaar Hi Pyaar Pale : A Chiranthana Dream

I often write my own stuff on my blog - my musings, film and play reviews and other small assorted thoughts, or some random nice things written about me by friends :P, today, deviating from norm and presenting one of the most moving pieces I have read in recent times - penned by my bestie, and my wonder woman friend, Rachana Prasad, this is a mother's narrative. Her inspiration? Her daughter. Her strength? Love and a determination to change the life of every special child she can see. Read on, as Rachana now moves to the next phase of her dream - starting a vocational center of excellence for special children..

 

I dedicate this article to all the lovely parents of children with special needs. Special needs include medical conditions, developmental delays, psychiatric conditions, physical impairments and genetic disorders. Every parent goes through their bouts of victories and challenges, good days and bad days, rights and wrongs, to-dos and not to dos while bringing up these children.

In the initial years, while I was inducting myself into space of special education, inclusion into the mainstream didn’t seem like a distant dream. Thought these children will eventually immerse well into the system like how a stream gently merges with the river, only to prove me wrong later on in life.

We humans are social beings. We need to belong, we need friendships, and we feel the urge to bond with one another. It’s very disheartening to see that children with disabilities are just not a part of our significant mainstream.

I would like to quote five of these important learnings of my life, which my journey as a mother of a very beautiful child has taught me:

      My heart aches when I see my daughter stop by to see girls of her age happily chatting and playing with one another. She waits for a minute to see if she’ll be considered too; but alas, no one actually cares. She has no friends at all…But the girl knows how to bear it all, unlike her mother whose heart immediately breaks. As I look at her; she seems to be saying:

Lesson 1:   “In my loneliness, I learn the ways of the world….. It’s not bad at all”

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     As she sees a toddler in the park, her eyes widen in amusement. She knows she won’t be judged. She is lavish with her cuddles and love. But the child disappears into mother’s arms after a while and the girl just looks on…She says:

Lesson 2: “‘Now’ is most precious. Be in the present”.  

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       She travels in a school van with 8 typical children. She is different and so is deprived of the snacks that other girls happily share with each other in the van. I see girls with big pack of lays and Kurkures happily singing, eating and making merry. I know she hasn’t been given a single wafer till date and she doesn’t complain. Should I sponsor for all I ask! The girl proudly refuses …. Says: Amma, it remains the same, no matter what you do! She means:

Lesson 3: “Don’t live your life impressing others... In the end, people will judge you anyway”.

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     It's 11:00 pm and I get back home after a horrible day at work. Immediately, the lights get brighter, kitchen gets its aromas and there she is, my little girl - laying my dinner, when everyone else at home is asleep! Cuddles and hugs follow through with a long pending gossip session. Mom is her world!

Lesson 4: “The best feeling in the world is to be with someone who loves you as much as you love them. Nothing else matters. Surround yourself with positive people”.

_____________________________________________________

   
      Her little brother is her favorite.  I would say, she is his first mother. Such is the unconditional love and support she showers on him. Lucky are we to have such a beautiful soul in our lives. Her gifts, her snacks, all go to him, without an ounce of expectation. Just pure and so selfless I must say. She indicates:

Lesson 5:” Love is an unconditional commitment”                     

Now I wonder if there is a place for such rare, gentle, precious souls in this polluted, adulterated world. As I set out with my new Center for development, I only hope I will be able to take them to a dreamscape, where love blossoms, where there is abundant friendship, no hate or remorse. Only happiness! They so deserve it.

This reminds me of Kishore Da’s song: So simple…. Yet so profound!! 

“Aa chal ke tujhe main le ke chalu,

Ik aise gagan ke tale

Jahan ghum bhee Na ho aansu bhee Na ho

Bas pyar hi pyar pale"

Ultimately, every individual deserves a right to live with dignity, respect and pride. Isn’t it? That’s what we at Chiranthana have set out to do!!

Yours truly,

Rachana Prasad

Rachana Prasad is Founder Director, Chiranthana, an NGO dedicated to life artistry and holistic development of communities, particularly children, using art forms such as theater as a powerful medium. For more information about her work, do visit www.chiranthana.in

Tikli and Laxmi Bomb: Of overthrowing a system, and feminist sex workers

In our upwardly mobile urban society, we would want to believe, in this day and age, that hell truly hath no fury than a woman scorned, mocked and whose dignity is at stake, particularly in public.

She has the choice to make light of the situation - use her presence of mind and her sense of humor to shrug off the situation nonchalantly. She has the choice to get ruffled. She has the choice to keep a stern face. She has the choice to burst into tears. She has the right to blow the whistle. And most importantly, she has the right to be safe, be dignified and keep or blow up her earnings. Or better, blow up her husband's money too.

But, hey wait. What if she were to be, what we call, a hooker, a woman on the fringes of respectable genteel society?  What happens to her then? Will this "man's world" accord her the same privilege?

For all of this and many more reasons, "Tikli and Laxmi Bomb" is an important film - for the uniqueness of plot, the lack of facades, the realness in the way the lives of sex workers is depicted. And most importantly, for the sheer lack of martyrdom or moral high ground that is otherwise so important for formula cinema. This plot is not a quintessential preachy tale of "the road to becoming respectable" ; it is a calculated journey of overthrowing a deep-seated patriarchal arrangement that purports to protect sex workers, but which ends up relentlessly exploiting them. This is a story of two gutsy women who take on the tide, and how they systematically plan their way out of the "system", to create one of their own, and quite successfully at that. But, how easy or tough is the journey to this kind of freedom?

Aditya Kriplani, the maker of the film, surely knew he had a winner on hand. This movie, based on his own 2015 novel, rides on all new age disruptive thinking right from the story to the cast, to the way it has been funded and marketed - every single aspect challenges conventionally accepted models. Currently showing on Netflix, the movie is suddenly grabbing cine-goer eyeballs.

The plot gets a little lethargic in between, picks up pace again.  The ending could have been orchestrated way better - it was a bit cliched and rushed.
Nevertheless, Chitragandha Chakraborty (as Tikli) and Vibhavari Deshpande (as the older Lakshmi) live their roles well - this is a gritty dark film, reminiscent of the noir genre, but with a firm thread of humor running across the seediness. The women here are not teary eyed losers - they are wise girls who court the rough ride to real, raw danger every night of their professional lives, since there is a masochist male world out there that believes they are even less than objects. From there, at rock bottom, the path to safety and dignity seems impossible to the ordinary girl of the town - but, not to this select band of Mumbai women, who do not shy away from hatching their plots - beat the system by using the tricks of the very same system - find an alternative person whose palms can be greased, override a local authority and directly approach the higher authority with a carrot of more bribes et al. They even use GPS technology to track a sister in trouble. Smart, eh?

A must watch film - and thank god for recent cinema - we can escape the horrors of unreal tele-soaps, the ones our mothers are interminably hooked to, for what they claim, the want of viable options. I suspect, what our poor mothers lack are not options, but the nerve to confront and watch something this real, ripped off any sweet masquerade. So, while the world of tele flourishes, we feed on alternative media for newer, bolder stories waiting to be told. Tikli and Lakshmi Bomb is certainly one of those.

Talvar: Why Vishal Bharadwaj’s brand of cinema has begun to freak me out

Everybody was talking about the movie. The critics said dispassionate, disturbing, hard hitting, great drama. “Oh, the poor Talwars! They have been wronged and wrongfully ostracised all these years!” were among the remarks I was hearing among friends, colleagues. 

My landlady came out excitedly one morning the same week, stopped me by the gate, saying, Shruthi (her daughter) watched the movie and came back so disturbed; what a movie, great cinema. 




Twitter was abuzz too with #Talvar and #FreeTheTalwars going berserk with tweets. Wow. I have to watch this, I thought. The first chance, on a public holiday and I knew where I was headed the evening. The show went - what we used to term during the pre-multiplex days - houseful.  

Talvar was very impressive, no songs, no melodrama. Just documentary, reality drama style.
The movie definitely had the audience engaged. There was pin drop silence. The casting ensemble was impeccable – Irrfan (he spells it that way) Khan, Neeraj Kabi, Konkona Sensharma and a host of other seasoned support artists, including Prakash Belawadi in a memorable cameo. Names had been changed, but the world knew this was based on the infamous Aarushi Talwar case.  As it tries to reconstruct what might have happened that night in May 2008, when a 14 year old girl and the household help lost their lives, the movie takes us through a journey that can stay on the mind for a while. Director Meghana Gulzar had skilfully adapted Vishal Bharadwaj’s script to make a drama that had people coming out of the theatre wondering, wondering…Are the Talwars guilty? Maybe not, is what is gaining credence among people.

I began to wonder too. It was during my wonderment that my problem with Talvar began.

Why did Vishal Bharadwaj choose the Talwar case 5 years (the team started scripting in 2013) after the incident?

That the girl belonged to the more privileged class of society by virtue of her parents being dentists, that this case attracted the kind of attention it did and perhaps is still sale-able enough for a movie script – is a fact we can’t sideline. And the fact that there was so much media sensation that it still sells as a story like the Sheena Bora case does, is another consideration too. Real life stories, no fiction here. Great scope for real storytelling. Also, that the passage of time has allowed for more facts to emerge. All good points, in favor of the makers of the film, but, Bharadwaj & Co have not played this one straight.

Close on the heels of a book on the Aarushi case by journalist Avirook Sen, that came out this year, of all the years,  and despite claims of being an objective analysis in a "Roshomonisque" mode, the movie clearly, very evidently, just like Sen's well timed book, roots for the innocence of the parents, with one version of the CBI (called CDI in the movie) being given the maximum footage.  The other version, the parents being shown guilty, is played up as a “trumped, cooked up” version. Trust me yes, that is what has been done. 

Interestingly, there was a movie by name “Rahasya” that was made last year and that was supposedly based on the same case. The Talwars filed an objection with the Censor Board, since the timing of the movie had an unfortunate co-incidence with a hearing on their appeal to the Allahabad court. Apparently “Rahasya” had depicted the parents as guilty of the heinous crime. The family "did not want public opinion to be vitiated intensely against them", or so the objection noted.

Switch to 2015, here comes Talvar. Junior Gulzar states, rather justifies, in an interview, “that she did not feel the need to take the consent of the Talwars”, and why not? With a movie script that backs them, why would the Talwars have any bone to pick here? This movie is like that authorized biography of controversial celebrities, where difficult questions are sugar coated with sweet answers. No one is bound to have a problem anywhere. All are happy. 

If the Talwars were really such a conscientious lot, they should have evenly objected to this movie as well (the stand in the movie being immaterial), on the sheer grounds that their lives, their family was being turned into another nationwide tamasha, all in the name of cinema. Point here? Makes one wonder who is really backing this venture, in the real sense of the word, even if it is the Times Group on paper. I am not insinuating here, just calling for some thought. 

Like all tales of mystery, the truth, in this case too, will perhaps, remain unresolved. But, the larger disturbing fact is that of the Vishal Bharadwaj-Meghana Gulzar combine actually using their astute cinematic aesthetics for a venture such as this. The movie does not make the customary claims of a fictionalized account. Meaning, implying that whatever is being shown to us is nearly the authentic, indepth, investigated truth. Really??!!

And unlike "Rahasya", which critics dismissed as a fictionalized mediocrity,and which sank without too much public attention, “Talvar” has managed to do what no media, no court, no police, no CBI has done so far, and perhaps what even the best efforts of the Talwars have been able to accomplish all these years. The next time, any major move happens in the Talwar case, one should not be surprised to see people holding candlelight vigils for the Talwar couple.

The family and their champions are clearly capitalizing on the movie and Sen's book on all the platforms – social media, the works. And the Times Group, the financiers for this film, are sponsoring a campaign to "Fast track the Talwar case". And also, the Times Group is rekindling interest towards the case, with the former CBI officer, Arun Kumar who had done the initial probe, speaking freely about why he believes the parents are innocent and why Talvar is such a masterpiece. Really, why so much interest? Is it all truly altrustic? Can one book and a movie in the same year be dismissed as a co-incidence? Hmmmmm....

That is when I say, Vishal Bharadwaj’s brand of cinema freaks me out, or rather, it has begun to freak me out - for the kind of perceptions it builds, for the way it turns the mind of the cine-going people. I do not want to talk at length about "Haider" here, or the movie's open tirade against the armed forces, God help me, since that is a separate story in itself - when I made an innocuous remark praising the movie on Facebook and I got to hear the rants of some friends! I still have to thank the people who made me think. This post is a result of some reflection after that as well, when you start connecting the dots. Haider was still a "fictionalized Shakespearean adaptation", set in Kashmir; we can seek refuge in that theory. But Talvar? It is real, and it is officially played up as a real life account.  I can now well relate to and empathize with the irritation of the people who commented on my earlier Facebook status message on "Haider". There is no way to justify Vishal Bharadwaj's brainwashing projects anymore, as a film maker's right to interpret. 

The point is, it is no secret that cinema can influence audiences, no matter where they are. And if it comes from such an authentic stable as this, then the multiplex audience is definitely hooked and booked. 

One movie has definitely tilted the balance of opinion, if not justice, in the minds of the people, towards the dentist couple. If they well merit it, so be it, if they don’t, then Mr Bharadwaj, I have been a fan of your music, your movies too, but in this case, and for some time now, as I have been observing your brand of cinema, I am disappointed. What will be your next mission? Establishing Indrani Bora as the innocent, wrongfully vilified victim??