What I say three times is true.

Aamir Khan and Juhi Chawla rose to stardom thanks to their performance as star-crossed lovers in Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak,  and they spent much of their early careers playing opposite each other as star-crossed lovers.  Love Love Love (1989) is one of those movies.

Perennial bad guy Gulshan Grover plays Vicky, son of local Don Sudhir Bhai (Raza Murad).  Vicky behaves like the wicked prince in a fairy story; he's tremendously entitled, cruel for cruelty's sake, and he does not think things through.  In theory, Vicky is a college student, and he introduced himself as "The Don of the college," but he spends most of his time going into dance clubs and humiliating everyone who annoys him.  (Grover was thirty four when this move came out, and he looks it.)  naturally, Vicky has a small coterie of sidekicks and hangers on, the most important being his girlfriend Reema (Juhi Chawla) and her brother Mahesh (Anand Balraj).  

Reema is visibly annoyed by Vicky's casual cruelty, but she never does anything about it.  And then one night, as Vicky and the gang are mugging an old man for money to buy a VCR (they can easily afford it, but Vicky gets bored if an activity doesn't involve hurting people) they are interrupted by good Samaritan Amit (Aamir Khan), who studies at the same college.  Vicky is obviously furious, but Reema is delighted, even if she still doesn't do anything about it.

And then . . .  well, it's Eighties Bollywood, so the romance is going to be weird for a while.  Vicky and his goons steal Amit's new bike, ride it around the campus (this time Reema is an active participant) and then destroy it in front of him.  (Reema did not participate in that part.)  Amit bumps into Reema at a disco and forces her to dance with him, which is seriously not cool.  Vicky arrives and makes some threats, and it's all kind of pointless because the actual plot hasn't kicked off yet.

The college principal (Chandrashekhar) selects Amit and Reema to represent he college at a quiz competition in Delhi.  He also insists that they travel by train together, unsupervised, in order to build team spirit.  That gives the young soon-to-be star crossed lovers a chance to get to know one another on equal terms, without either one coming across as a creep.  There's definitely a spark there.

Reema and Amit return victorious to Mumbai, and their classmates pressure Amit to hold a party the tiny house where he lives with his taxi driver father (Dalip Tahil).   Reema promises to come, but she literally cannot get away.  During the next attempted date she has to attend a boring cocktail party with her father (Om Shivpuri) and Vicky's father.  Amit tries to arrange more dates, and she never manages to show up, leaving his friends to darkly mutter that "rich girls can't be trusted."  

Finally Reema manages to sneak away long enough to meet Amit at the Disco Dandiya, and they declare their love for one another.  Amit and Reema make a plan to secretly meet every morning while jogging, And then Reema ruins everything by telling Vicky and her father that she's been meeting Amit, which leads to more threats, more beatings, and Vicky's terrifying father meeting Amit's father to make threats.  Amit is a dutiful son, so he agrees to leave Reema and go away when his father asks him to.

Reema is sad for a while, then she takes the initiative and tracks Amit down, leading to more happy dancing and frolicking.  Sudhir Bhai is forced to elevate his threats - either Reema agrees to marry Vicky, or he will have Amit killed; the fact that he makes this threat as they watch one of his goons try to run Amit over makes it especially convincing, so Reema agrees.

And then Vicky ruins everything, because he does not think things through.  He makes a point of taking Reema with him to deliver a wedding invitation and to invite Amit to attend Reema's birthday party, where the engagement will be formally announced.  The evil plan is to insult Amit so much that he doesn't even think of approaching Reema ever again, and Vicky and his friends are a bit mean, but the Reema publicly sings about her love for Amit to the tune of "It's A Sin" by the Pet Shop Boys, dances with Amit in front of everyone, and ends by kissing him on the lips, which is humiliation stacked on humiliation for Vicky.  The good guys escape, the bad guys are out for blood, and it all leads to a climactic showdown in an unlicensed Disney theme park.

There's a reason why I started by talking about Vicky rather than the actual protagonists.  He's a much bigger presence in the film than the usual unsuitable suitor.  That's an interesting choice, and it would be more effective if Vicky weren't so cartoonishly evil.  He starts chewing the scenery the moment he appears on screen, nearly every line is delivered with a snarl, and because he starts by threatening violence the moment he's thwarted in any way, he really doesn't have much room to escalate.  Gulshan Grover is great at playing scenery chewing villains, but this movie gives him more scenery to chew than usual, and it's a bit of a struggle for him to get through it all.

Aamir and Juhi have a bit more to work with, especially Juhi.  Reema has to walk a careful tightrope at the beginning, because she needs to be at least somewhat complicit in Vicky's bad deeds without becoming totally unlikable.  Reema also has more agency than a lot of the Bollywood heroines of this era, and even gets to join in on the last fight scene.  Amit is a more solid and traditional character, but he gets plenty of chance for heroic speeches and noble self sacrifice.

All that said, this is Eighties Bollywood, and it does showcase some of the flaws of that era.  The incidental music is largely lifted from western movies, with the Star Wars theme playing at key points and a chase scene accompanied by the music from Chariots of Fire.  The movie is set at a college campus where nobody ever goes to class.  The plot goes around and around in circles, especially as the film approaches the climax.  And unfortunately Vicky does end the movie threatening to rape Reema, which is a jarring shift in tone form the rest of the movie, making those scenes grimy and horrible, rather than the fun melodramatic romp it had been up to that point.

On the other hand, the hero's sister makes it through the entire movie without anything terrible happening to her, and Bob Christo, one of my favorite Bollywood henchmen, makes a brief cameo as an assassin named Bob.

Jaanemonth: Dil Chahta Hai

 On June 12, 2003, Turner Classic Movies continued its "Hooray for Bollywood" marathon, and I was . . . not really paying attention, honestly.  The movies looked interesting, but subtitles can be hard to follow if you're not used to them.  And then, in the middle of Dil Chahta Hai (2001), they played a song.  It was a pitch perfect skewering of romantic tropes while simultaneously being frothy, fun and sincere.  It was a love song that included the line "I think you are deluded."  And it ended with a sudden crumbling of the fourth wall, and suddenly I was paying very close close attention indeed.  Twenty years later, here we are.

Dil Chahta Hai unfolds as a series of flashbacks.  In the framing story, Sid (Akshaye Khanna) reunites with his old friend Sameer (Saif Ali Khan) at the hospital, after a sudden, tragic, and as yet undisclosed event.  They talk about their mutual friend Akash, whom Sid is certain will not be coming, and reminisce about days gone by, starting with their college graduation party.

At the party Sameer quickly establishes himself as the hopeless romantic, currently besotted by his controlling girlfriend Priya (Suchitra Pillai).  Akash is smooth, kind of a jerk, and doesn't believe in love.  He's currently being pursued by Deepa (Samantha Tremayne), but he doesn't take her seriously.  And Sid is the sensitive artist who ignores the drama going on around him because he's busy sketching a girl he spotted across the room.  

After a frenetic song and dance about how they're young and carefree and nothing is ever going to change them, Akash makes his move on the mystery girl, who turns out to be named Shalini (Preity Zinta.)  Turns out he's not as charming as he thinks he is, and he winds up getting punched by Shalini's fiance Rohit (Ayub Khan.)  

Priya is horrified by Akash's behavior (fair!) and demands that Sameer never speaks to him again (less fair!).  Things don't work out the way she planned, however, and after the breakup Sameer joins Sid and Akash on a road trip to Goa.  It's one of the most beloved and iconic sequences in the movie, but very little actually happens, apart from some foreshadowing about life taking the friends in different directions and Sid giving Deepa some very good advice.

After the road trip, life starts taking the guys in different directions.  Sid's art career begins to take off.  At the same time, he finds himself drawn to his new neighbor Tara (Dimple Kapadia), who is beautiful, troubled, divorced, and a good fifteen years older than he is.  He has no intention of pursuing a relationship, but he does tell Sameer and Akash about his feelings.  It doesn't go well.  Akash makes a very inappropriate joke, Sid punches him, and that leg of the friendship triangle is basically gone.  Sid leaves for an artist's retreat soon after.

Akash is sent to manage the family business in Sydney, and on the plane he's seated next to Shalini, who's off to visit her uncle Mahesh (Rajaat kapoor).  Akash apologizes for his behavior at the party, and by the time the plane lands they're friends.  They spend a lot of time together, much to Rohit's dismay, but he's in still in India and can't really interfere.  Akash is still his cynical self, but Shalini is a romantic, despite (or perhaps because of) her impending loveless marriage, and so she dedicates herself to convincing Akash that love is a thing that exists.  They even debate the issue in song.

And Sameer has been left alone all this time, which is usually a recipe for trouble.  His parents try to arrange a marriage for him with Pooja (Sonali Kulkarni), but but while Sameer is instantly smitten (as usual), she's got a boyfriend, so Sameer becomes her friend instead.  He's still carrying a torch, and there's definitely a spark there, but when he tries to confess his feelings, she doesn't take him seriously . . . until they go to a movie and watch a certain life-changing musical number.

Meanwhile in Australia, Shalini demonstrates her thesis by taking Akash to the opera, explaining the plot, and when Troilus stands at the gates of heaven begging to be allowed one last moment with Cressida, she asks Akash to close his eyes and picture the one person he would give up everything for.  He does, and spoiler: It's Shalini.

Of course, when they're walking home from the opera and Shalini asks him who he saw, Akash can't resist making a joke out of it, spoiling his one perfect chance.  And that's when Rohit appears.  Akash tries to be graceful, and doesn't stand in the way as Rohit and Shalini return to India.  But Akash is utterly miserable, and it's clear that the situation is not going to resolve itself for him; this is a Bollywood movie, and he's got a wedding to crash.

Dil Chahta Hai was a moderate success during its initial run in the theaters; young urban people loved the movie, but it didn't do well in the villages.  However, the critics adored the film, and it quickly became one of the most influential films in Bollywood history.  The production values were a step up form the industry standard of the time, but the real innovation was the dialogue.  Writer-director Farhan Akhtar worked very hard to ensure that his young Mumbai-dwelling characters spoke like real young people who live in Mumbai, and as a consequence the acting was more naturalistic than the melodramatic filmi standard.

While the new and slick style changed the industry and launched a fleet of imitators, though, it's the movie's heart that really makes it work.  Sameer's plotline is a little underdeveloped compared to the others, but all three romances work, because they all grow naturally.  It's no coincidence that all three plotlines feature the respective couples starting out as friends, and love doesn't come for free to anyone.  Both Shalini and Sid argue at various points that love is something that happens rather than something you choose, but in each case love is something you have to work at if you want it to succeed.  And as it turns out, maintaining and reviving friendships takes work, too.

With all that, though, Dil Chahta Hai feels effortless.  It shifts between clever and naturalistic dialogue and the world's most filmi musical number and it makes the shift look easy.  It's not a perfect film, but even after twenty years, it still feels fresh.  I am still paying attention.

 

Turns out a serpent's tooth is also pretty sharp.

Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak, Mansoor Khan's story of star-crossed young lovers, was a huge success, launching Aamir Khan and Juhi Chawla into stardom.  Naturally, Bollywood producers set about trying to recreate the magic, and Khan and Chawla were cast in a number of films about young lovers with varying degrees of star-crossedness.  Results were . . . mixed.  Tum Mere Ho (1990), for instance, is notoriously bad.  On the other hand, it's a schmaltzy melodrama with Juhi Chawla, an angry naga, and black magicand I like all those things, so if anybody's going to like the movie, it'll be me.  Let's dig in.

When wealthy Thakur Choudhary (Sudhir Pandey) catches sight of a Naagmani (a magical gem set in a cobra's head) he is consumed by a Tolkeinian desire to possess it, so he kills the snake.  Unfortunately, the snake's mother (Kalpana Iyer) is nearby.  Choudhary pleads for mercy, telling her he was blinded by greed when he casually murdered her son, but for some reason she is not impressed.  She vows revenge, and later bites Choudhary's four year old son, apparently killing the boy.  The parents sadly set the body adrift on the river, while the angry snake watches.

I say that the boy was "apparently killed, because he's pulled from the river by Baba (possibly Ishrat Ali, but the IMDB entry isn't really clear), a kindly snake charmer and black magician.  Baba draws the poison out of the boy's body using his magical powers, then decides to raise him as his on son and apprentice, because, hey, free son!  he names the boy Shiva, and by the time Shiva has grown up to be played by Aamir Khan, he has mastered both his adopted father's crafts.

 

While performing at a village fair, Shiva catches a glimpse of Paro (Juhi Chawla), daughter of the wealthy and powerful Choudhry Charanjit Singh (Ajit Vachani).  Shiva is immediately smitten, and surprisingly, so is Paro!  When they meet later, she asks him to sjhow her his snake-charming technique, and soon they're wandering the hills together, singing about love and occasionally getting caught in the rain.

 

It can't last.  When Paro's father finds out, he hires another black magician (Anirudh Agarwal) to deal with the upstart.  Shiva easily wins the magical duel, so Singh decides on a more direct approacjh; he gathers a band of ruffians and has them beat up Shiva, but before he can shoot the boy, Baba arrives and pleads for his son's life, promising that he won't come around Paro anymore.

 

When Paro finds out about the beating and attempted murder, she's furious and confronts her father, but her mother takes her aside and explains just how starcrossed she actually is.  It's not just that Shiva is a poor traveler and therefore not husband material; Paro's marriage has already been arranged.  In fact, she's already married, and has been since they were small children.  In fact, she's already a widow, since her husband was bitten by a snake and died soon after the wedding.  (And at this point you've probably already figured out how the story will end.) In fact, in a few days Paro will go to her in-laws home to live out the rest of her days in miserable solitude as a widow, because there's no possible way she could ever remarry.  Paro agrees that this is completely logical, and meets Shiva one last time.  She pretends that she never loved him, he lashes out angrily, and stalks off, apparently never to return.  Paro makes the sad journey to her in-laws' home, content that at least Shiva will be safe.

 

Of course, Shiva discovers that she lied and really does love him almost immediately, so he convinces Baba to move the entire band north, ostensibly in search of better snakes, but mostly so that he can stalk Paro.  He hangs around outside her house, playing snake charming music, hoping to draw her out.  It works.  Shiva suggests that maybe Paro shouldn't have to spend her whole life alone and miserable because of a marriage that she didn't consent to and wasn't even told about for years.  Paro is torn. She really does love Shiva, but nothing has really changed, and they still can't be together without leaving everything behind.

And then there's the angry snake lady.  When she discovers that the boy she bit all those years ago is still alive, she tries to finish the job, but Shiva is a powerful magician, so she can't get to him.  Paro, however, is not so well protected . . .

First things first. This movie is a product of the late eighties/early nineties Bollywood film industry, which means that the treatment of women is pretty bad.  Paro in particular is seemingly born to suffer, and she's betrayed and abused at various points in the film by pretty much everybody she loves, and that does include Shiva.  In the end everyone is forgiven because this is late eighties/early nineties Bollywood and the family unit must be preserved at all costs, but that doesn't make it okay.

On the other hand, Paro has a surprising amount of agency for a heroine of the period.  Shiva doesn't rescue her from her dismal life as a widow, he convinces her to rescue herself, and it's not a decision that comes quickly or easily.  Paro makes a choice, and it is definitely her choice.

Juhi does a fine job as the long-suffering Paro.  Snake movies are essentially a subgenre of supernatural melodrama, and they demand a kind of heightened reality in the performances.  Naturalistic acting wouldn't work at all.  Juhi commits, and so does Aamir; they are acting well for the genre of movie that they appear in.

So, does Tum Mere Ho deserve its bad reputation?  Maybe?  I'm pretty sure it's not a good movie.  It's dated, it's often silly, and it's certainly problematic, but I also found it compelling.  It really needs more snakes and a lot less suffering, though.

I was kind of expecting the Spanish Inquisition.

Aamir Khan and Juhi Chawla got their big break  in Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak, so the producers of Daulat Ki Jung (1992) don't waste much time in establishing the premise of the movie; they assume the audience is already familiar with Khan and Chawla as star-crossed lovers kept apart by their feuding families.  The two houses both alike in dignity are headed by Bhushan Chaudhry (Shafi Inamdar) and Mr. Agarwal (Tiku Talsania.)  The feuding fathers are rival builders, both attempting to conclude a shady real estate deal with Haribhai (Paresh Rawal.)

Their children, Rajesh (Khan) and Asha (Chawla) attend the same college, and they are secretly already in love.  Everything is fine until the young lovers are cast as young lovers in the school play, and Asha's father Agarwal happens to attend the performance.  He is instantly (and correctly) convinced that the pair are really in love, so he hires a goon named Zorro to keep the pair apart.  Zorro fails, because he's an idiot who can't help playing with his suspenders whenever he's on screen.

The next step is to lock Asha in her room, which prompts Rajesh to rescue her.  The two drive off in search of the nearest temple so they can get married, and that is where the plot starts to go off the rails.  They run into a wounded man on a motorcycle (literally), and while taking him to the hospital are surrounded by a motorcycle gang led by Rana (Kiran Kumar.)  The bikers are in search of a treasure map, and since the wounded man has conveniently died,  they are convinced that the young lovers have it.  Asha finds the map, and Rajesh memorizes it (it's established early in the film that he has an eidetic memory) and eats it, forcing the bikers to keep the pair alive if they want to find the treasure.

And the plot goes a little further off the rails when it turns out that there are two criminal gangs, also both alike in dignity, looking for the treasure.  The other gang is led by Mike (Dalip Tahil), and the two gangs are about to start killing each other when they are interrupted by K.K. (Kader Khan), an eccentric assassin who sleeps in a coffin pulled by a donkey.  K.K. invites himself along on the treasure hunt, and by the time the little group stumbles across a tribal village filled with ridiculous stereotypes, the plot has left the tracks behind and is running screaming into the sunset.

I'm not sure what to make of Daulat Ki Jung.  It's definitely a movie, in which events occur and dialogue is spoken.  The early part of the movie is rather charming; Rajesh and Asha are surprisingly level-headed for star-crossed lovers, and the school play makes some amusing references to Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak.  At its best, the rest of the movie is pleasantly unhinged, with Kader Khan in particular infusing a great deal of charisma into a very silly role.  But the tribal stuff is just embarrassing, with ooga booga gibberish dialogue and the threat of human sacrifice, which is thwarted by a combination of Asha dancing and the men exploiting primitive superstition.  I've seen more nuanced portrayals of tribal life in old Tarzan movies.

Tribal nonsense aside, the things that happen are at least interesting, but by the end I was greeting each new plot twist with a hearty "Sure.  Why not."  Still, in the end, this is absolutely a movie that I have seen.

You know, for kids.

I have very eclectic tastes when it comes to Indian cinema, but I have to admit I've got a  soft spot for the Bollywood romantic comedies of the nineties and early oughts. They really don't make them like that any more, but luckily for me, they made a lot of them like that at the time, and I've got a backlog of movies I haven't seen yet. I can scratch Hum Hain Rahi Pyar Ke (1993) off the list. 

After the death of his sister, Rahul Malhotra (Aamir Khan) has taken charge of both the family garment factory and her three children, Vicky (Shahrokh Barucha), Sunny (Khunal Khemu, who years later went on to co-write and star in the slacker zombie comedy Go Goa Gone), and Muni (Baby Ashrafa).  Rahul is basically a good guy who's trying his best in a difficult situation, and the kids are little hooligans, who keep pelting the servants with eggs.  Clearly Rahul needs help, and he's not going to get it from Maya (Navneet Nishan), an old college friend who clearly would like to be more, but doesn't want to deal with the children.

Across town, Vaijanti Iyer (Juhi Chawla) has her own problems.  Her traditional Brahmin father (K. D. Chandran) is determined to marry her off to someone of her own caste, but the best he's been able to find is an oily dancer (Veeru Krishnan), to whom she takes an instant dislike.  Vaijanti runs away and hides out in a nearby fair.  Meanwhile, Rahul's charges have also crept out of the house to go to the fair.  They meet Vaijanti, and after some hijinks, the theft of a harmonica, and an impromptu musical number, they become fast friends. 

Since Vaijanti has nowhere else to go, the children decide to sneak her into the house, without telling Uncle Rahul.  Now you may think you know where this plot is going, but you are completely correct.  There are humorous misunderstandings galore, followed by valuable life lessons and our young attractive protagonists falling in love and not bothering to say anything.

Meanwhile, cartoonishly evil businessman Bijlani (Dalip Tahil) has placed an order for 100,000 shirts, an order which Rahul's late brother-in-law has failed to deliver because he died.  According to the terms of the contract the brother-in-law signed, if the shirts are not delivered in fifteen days, Bijlani will take possession of the factory and the family home.  (That is some contract.)  Bijlani is willing to be merciful, but only if Rahul agrees to marry Maya, who happens to be Bijlani's daughter.

Hum Hain Rahi Pyar Ke was an enormous hit when it was released, and I can see why.  There are no  real surprises here, but that's part of the charm.  This is a movie that chooses its formula and then executes it well.  The leads are charming, the villain daintily nibbles on the scenery, the gratuitous comic relief (Mushtaq Khan) is only kind of annoying, and Juhi wears an array of dowdy dresses in a rainbow of pastel colors, as if a closet full of Sunday dresses and a basket of Easter candy were fused together in a transporter accident.  It may sound like I'm damning with faint praise here, but I love this stuff.  It's cinematic comfort food.

What can change the nature of a man?

Thugs of Hindustan (2018) is a movie about thugs.  In Hindustan.  These are not the murderous Kali cultists you may know from pulp fiction and British propaganda; these thugs are heroic freedom fighters, led by noble badass Kudabaksh (Bollywood legend Amitabh Bachchan) and his ward, literal warrior princess Zafira (Fatima Sahna Shaikh, who played one of the kids in One 2 Ka 4 and suddenly I feel so very, very old.)  Kudabaksh and Zafira have a tragic backstory, but the film explains it right away, so I'm not going to bother. The thugs are fighting against the tyranny of the British East India company, personified by the nefarious John Clive (Lloyd Owen), and their first move is to steal a British ship because in addition to being a drama about the struggle for Indian independence, this is also a pirate movie.

In order to locate Kudabaksh, Clive hires charming scoundrel Firangi Sailor (Aamir Khan), and I am deeply disappointed that this movie has a lead character whose name literally means "foreign sailor" and nobody ever makes the obvious "named after his father" joke.  Firangi manages to feign heroism long enough to join up with the thugs, betrays them, betrays the British, and so on.  One of the many criticisms of this movie is that Firangi is just a copy of Captain Jack Sparrow, but while there's an element of truth there (they're both weirdos with questionable loyalties, awesome hats, and eye makeup who somehow manage to convince people to trust them), Firangi is a more self-aware character than Sparrow is.  The movie is at its best when it's  about Firangi and Kudabaksh, two strong characters played by two great actors musing about human nature and whether change is really possible.

But the movie is not always at it's best.  A good masala movie will leap over genre boundaries with purpose, while Thugs of Hindustan just sort of meanders from one genre to the next.  There are pirates, and then Firangi is dressing up as a British officer to woo a courtesan (Katrina Kaif) and then there';s a literal Benny Hill chase scene, and on to the next thing, over and over.  The same meandering spirit affects the fight scenes, which should be great.  Kudabaksh glowers impressively, Zafira is fast and acrobatic and seems to have the bow from Hawk the Slayer, and Firangi swashes all the buckles, but there's no real weight to anything, so it all comes off as very by the numbers - pretty numbers, but numbers nonetheless.

I'm a little frustrated.  Thugs of Hindustan is not a bad movie, but it could have been a really good movie.  Like Firangi, it needs to commit.

The kids are not okay.

It’s no secret that the Bollywood viewing sections of the internet and I don’t always agree about movies; I am an open, admitted, and unironic fan of Johny Lever, after all. Mela (2000), however, may finally be proof that I am living in Bollywood Bizarro world.

Roopa Singh (Twinkle Khana) is a free-spirited young woman who is loved by all of the happy villagers of Chandanpur, but especially by her brother Ram (Ayub Khan) and Gopal (Omkar Kapoor), a young boy with a serious crush. Ram has fixed Roopa’s marriage to a colleague in a distant vilage, and while Roopa doesn’t want to leave her brother and her home, the other happy villagers convince her to cheer up and come to the village fair, because nothing bad ever happens at village fairs, right?

Something bad happens at the village fair. Bandit leader and part time terrorist Gujjar Singh (Tinnu Verma), in town to assassinate a visiting government minister (Kulbushan Kharbanda), notices Roopa dancing, and decides to abduct her. Before long the village is in chaos, Ram and Gopal are dead, and Roopa has thrown herself off a cliff in order to escape Gujjar’s lecherous clutches.

Roopa survives the fall, miraculously unscathed. She’s angry, afraid, and a little unhinged, and she fixates on the idea of finding her fiance-to-be so that he will protect her and avenge her. To this end, after the usual misunderstandings, she hitches a ride with truck driver Shankar (Faisal Khan) and his sidekick, aspiring actor Kishen (Aamir Khan), who happens to be looking for an actual woman to costar in his new production.

Roopa’s intended turns out to be a huge disappointment, almost as bad as Gujjar. While escaping from him, Roopa runs straight into a band of Gujjar’s henchmen. Fortunately, Shankar and Kishen come to her rescue, and she decides that her avengers and rescuers have been in front of her the whole time.

Roopa may have found her champions, but she still doesn’t really trust them, so rather than tell the truth and ask for their help, she decides to make the already smitten Kishen fall in love with her, thus cementing their loyalty. This . . . is not a great plan.

Mela was a box office disaster. One of the most widely criticized aspects of the film was Twinkle Khanna’s performance, but, and this is probably evidence of my being a resident of Bizarro World, I thought she was really good. Women in Bollywood movies tend to react to atrocity in one of two ways, either lapsing into stereotypical Bollywood insanity, or becoming Kali and killing absolutely everybody. Khanna’s Roopa behaves more like . . . well, like a woman who’s just been through a profound trauma. And a lot of this is conveyed through body language and facial expressions; Roopa visibly shrinks whenever anyone tries to touch her, and during Kishen’s show (which is attended by some of Gujjar’s goons) she alternates between bravado and abject terror. She’s clearly not okay, and it colors every interaction she has.

I won’t pretend Mela is a good movie; it’s a standard Sholay flavored revenge melodrama and Western homage, with broad comedy, a heroine more consistently imperiled than Pauline, a villain who looks like he should be in the Village People, and a plot that doesn’t make an awful lot of sense. On the other hand, the movie features one surprising performance, colorful dance numbers, a few literal cliffhangers, plenty of last minute rescues, and the mighty sideburns of Johny Lever. It may not be a good movie, but it’s certainly not boring.

This one's for you, Carrie Pipkin!

3 Idiots (2009) has all the hallmarks of a typical college comedy: hazing, wacky pranks, the crusty old Dean, the crusty old Dean’s beautiful daughter, and the free-spirited outsider who changes everybody’s lives, sometimes for the better. And that’s okay; I don’t mind formula as long as it’s executed well, and 3 Idiots is executed well.

The film opens with former roommates Farhan (Madhavan) and Raju (Sharman Joshi) rushing back to the Imperial College of Engineering to meet their old friend Rancho (Aamir Khan), who vanished right after graduation, five years ago. When they arrive, though, it’s not Rancho waiting for them, it’s former college rival Chatur (Omi Vaidya), who reminds them of a drunken challenge he issued to Rancho years ago to meet up on the same date and see whose life has been the most successful. Rarhan and Raju are not impressed, and they’re about to leave when Chatur announces that he’s traced Rancho to Shimla.

From there the film alternates between Farhan and Raju trying to unravel the mystery of what has happened to their friend, and flashbacks of Rancho clashing with college chairman Viru “Virus” Sahastrabudhhe (Boman Irani) and the rest of the faculty over the nature and purpose of education, wooing Virus’s beautiful daughter Pia (Kareena Kapoor), and inspiring his friends to follow their dreams.

The mystery deepens when the group arrive in Simla and meet with Ranchoddas Shamaldas Chanchad, and discover that he’s someone else entirely and played by Javed Jaffrey. They’re a bit disturbed to find out that their friend wasn’t who he said he was, but the real Rancho does point them in the right direction, and after a quick stop to pick up Pia, and the little group are on the road again.

Often in this kind of movie the college faculty are stuffy to the point of caricature, obsessed with maintaining order above all, while the nominal protagonists are borderline sociopathic jerks who just want to have fun and drink beer. In 3 Idiots, on the other hand . . . well, Virus is a bit of a cartoon tyrant who is so obsessed with the rules that he drives more than one student to attempt suicide, and Rancho enjoys the occasional drink and likes to use pranks as object lessons, but isn’t always as careful as he should be about who his object lessons hurt, but there’s an actual argument there. Virus is preparing his students to be the best of the best, to thrive in a difficult world. Rancho, on the other hand, is interested in education for its own sake; he doesn’t care about passing the test, he just wants to learn about engineering. That’s an argument worth having.

While 3 Idiots does raise some big questions about the nature of education and the high suicide rate among Indian college students, it’s still a comedy, and a silly one at that. There are more fart jokes than I would have preferred, but the protagonists are flawed but likeable, the friendship is believable, the romance is charming, and the Zoobi Doobi song is guaranteed to get stuck in your head.

It's like Lagaan, but with violence instead of cricket.

The Rising: Ballad of Mangal Pandey (2005) is based on the legend of Mangal Pandey, rather than the historical figure. Depending on whom you ask, Mangal Pandey was either a brave martyr who kicked off India’s first War of Independence, or an intoxicated rabble-rouser who picked the wrong day to attack his superior officer; it’s very similar to the conflicting accounts surrounding American Revolution figure Crispus Attucks. The film takes the “heroic martyr” position and runs with it, which is probably a wise choice since legends have clear heroes and villains, while history tends to be terribly complicated.

Mangal (Aamir Khan) is a Sepoy, a soldier working for the British East India Company. Years ago, he saved the life of his superior officer, William Gordon (Toby Stephens), and the pair are now close friends and drinking buddies. Gordon is something of an outsider in the Company hierarchy, a Scottish Catholic surrounded by an English Protestant old boy’s club. He’s well aware of the Company’s various abuses, but can’t really do anything about them, so he restricts himself to making sarcastic comments to his superiors.

The pair have various misadventures. Gordon flirts with Emily Kent (Coral Beed), daughter of the local Company representative (Kenneth Cranham). Mangal saves a native waiter from a brutal beating at the hands of Hewson (Ben Nealon), and is rescued from a similar fate by Gordon. Mangal and Gordon also manage to rescue some love interests; Gordon rescues Jwala (Amisha Patel), a widow, from being cremated on her dead husband’s pyre, while Mangal rescues prostitute Heera (Rani Mukherjee) from an overly amorous Hewson. (Hewson is not a nice guy.)

Meanwhile, trouble is brewing. The company plans to introduce the new Enfield rifle. Loading the rifle will require the Sepoys to bite into the cartridge. Rumor has it that the cartridge is greased with pig and cow fat, making firing the rifle a sin for both Hindus and Muslims. Gordon urges his superiors to reconsider, but they insist that they will not bow to superstition. Gordon is told that the rumors are not true, however, and so he reassures the men. Based solely on his word, Mangal is the first to bite the bullet. Unfortunately, while there’s some question about the historical record, within the universe of the movie the rumors are absolutely true, as Mangal himself discovers.

The Rising is not a documentary, and doesn’t pretend to be an even-handed examination of historical realities. It’s a rah-rah historical epic, complete with clearly defined heroes and villains, grand passions, and many speeches about “FREEDOM!”; Braveheart in a dhoti, in other words. That said, I’m surprised by the amount of nuance in The Rising. The East India Company are very clearly the villains and Mangal and friends are just as clearly the heroes, but the film does not shy away from depicting some of the uglier aspects of Indian society of the time, and even Mangal himself isn’t perfect. He isn’t a saint like Bhuvan (from Khan’s earlier film Lagaan). Instead, Mangal is (at least initially) deeply concerned with his own caste status rather than the welfare of his fellow Indians.

(I’m also pleased that the movie managed to work in a cameo appearance by Rani Lakshmibai, my personal favorite legendary Indian freedom fighter and one of history’s actual warrior princesses.)

Aamir Khan is a great actor, and he easily carries the movie, investing Mangal with a tremendous sense of stature. If the film has a weakness, though, it’s in the writing. The dialogue is fine, if a bit overly dramatic, but the main plot takes a little too long to get started, and entire subplots abruptly vanish. Still, while the film can get sloppy, it is always watchable.

They never do go to Khandala.

Rani Mukherjee may be my favorite Bollywood success story. Her debut film, Raja Ki Aayegi Baarat, was a box office disaster. Her second film (and the subject of this review) was Ghulam (1998), in a forgettable, eye-candy role. Rani’s naturally low, hoarse voice is one of the most distinctive in the industry; the producers of Ghulam considered it a liability, and so, in only her second film Rani’s lines were dubbed by another actress. That should have been enough to end her career, but before she could go the way of Kirti Reddy, she was saved by another distinctive voice.
It’s rare for a Bollywood actor to sing his own songs. For whatever reason, though, Aamir Khan provided his own singing voice for the song “Aati Kya Khandala”. (And while he shouldn’t give up his day job, Aamir does have a nice enough singing voice - it reminds me strongly of the late Jake Thackray. He’s certainly a better singer than Shahrukh.) “Aati Kya Khandala” became an enormous hit in India, keeping Rani in the public eye long enough to land the part of Tina in the enormously successful Kuch Kuch Hota Hai, and the rest, as they say, is history.

Ghulam is a remake of the Marlon Brando classic On the Waterfront, and from what I can gather, a fairly faithful one. Before we get to the heavy drama, though, the film meanders into 50’s teen rebel territory. Siddhu (Aamir Khan) is one of the roguish but essentially good-hearted orphans who inhabit Indian cinema. We first see Siddhu in court, and as his lawyer (Mita Vasisht) gives a passionate speech about how she believes in his essential goodness, he helps himself to the contents of her wallet. Of course, he is very quick to defend her honor later when a friend jokes that she must be getting “something else” in exchange for her services, thus establishing that yes, deep down Siddhu is a Good Indian Boy. All is quickly forgiven, though, and the boys have a fun day out on the town, shopping, picking pockets, and generally being criminal but not malicious.

Siddhu’s brother Jai (Rajit Kapoor) works as an accountant for Ronnie (Sharat Saxena), who is both criminal and very, very malicious. Ronnie used to be a boxer, and after discovering that Siddhu is an avid boxer himself, he decides to help the kid out by throwing a little goon work his way. Jai is clearly not happy about this, but doesn’t raise any strong objections. After all, it’s just this once, right? Siddhu doesn’t seem terribly enthusiastic either, but rather than offend the bad-tempered crime lord, he does the job, convincing a local cricket player to throw the next match.

A little later, Siddhu is riding his motorcycle when he’s passed by a biker gang lead by Charlie (Deepak Tijori). Since we’re still in 50’s teen rebel territory here, he engages in a little macho competition with a Mysterious Helmeted Rider, and winds up falling off his bike in order to avoid a serious accident. The Mysterious Helmeted Rider turns out to be a girl (Rani Mukherjee), of all things, and when the rest of the gang shows up there’s a little scuffling. The police arrive, though, and Siddhu and Charlie make arrangements to settle things later that evening with a “10:10 run”.
The rules for the 10:10 run are very simple; a train comes around the corner at 10:10. Siddhu is to run at full speed directly toward the train, jumping out of the way at the last minute and planting a little flag at the point where he left the tracks. If he fails to beat Charlie’s record, he’s supposed to bow every time they meet. (I’m really not sure what’s supposed to be in this for Siddhu, but oh well.) Siddhu makes the run and beats the record. Then, when Charlie trips while trying to set a new record, Siddhu pulls him out of the way of the train. Then, for an encore, Siddhu pulls the mystery girl (who I shall start calling Alisha, since that is her name) on to his bike to escape from the approaching police, thereby handily winning her heart.

So Siddhu is now a charming good-natured rogue with a motorbike and a girlfriend. But he can’t escape heavy social drama for long; things change when he meets Hari, a crusading social worker who is encouraging the people of the neighborhood to stand up to Ronnie. Siddhu believes in staying out of the way, and he tries to get Hari to give up his crusade, but to no avail. When Jai asks him to set up a meeting between Hari and Ronnie, he thinks he’s helping his friend, and is rather unpleasantly surprised when he sees Ronnie casually toss Hari off a bridge into the path of an oncoming train. A guilt-ridden Siddhu turns to Alisha for comfort, but she is mourning the sudden death of her brother Hari.

There’s nothing terribly surprising about Ghulam - Siddhu finds the inner strength to stand up to injustice, and wins back his girl in the process. The end. And since both the hero and villain are established as boxers, there’s a good chance that the climax will revolve around Siddhu’s ability to take a punch.

Still, while Ghulam is formulaic, it executes the formula well. I was particularly impressed with the handling of Siddhu’s redemption; all too often (in both Bollywood and Hollywood), a character can simply declare “Okay, I’m a good guy now” and the sins of the past are promptly forgiven. Here, though, Siddhu makes a real effort to make amends with the people he’s wronged in the past.

Aamir Khan is, as always, quite good. The relationship with his brother is particularly well done, especially in the “I could have been a contender” scene. (And no, he doesn’t actually say “I could have been a contender.") As for Rani, she’s there to look pretty and occasionally be sad. The dubbed voice is a little distracting, but she’s really not on screen long enough for it to be a problem.

Ishq happens.

A friendly word of warning - this review of Ishq (1997) is a bit more spoiler heavy than my usual reviews. So if you don’t want to know in advance whether young love triumphs in this particular formulaic Bollywood romantic comedy/drama, you should probably turn back now.

From my very first review onward, I have compared a number of Bollywood movies to Shakespeare, and I’m about to do it again: Ishq is the single most Shakespearean film I have seen come out of Mumbai yet. In fact, if I didn’t know better, I would swear that it was deliberately modeled on Much Ado About Nothing.

Ranjit Rai (Sadashiv Amrapurkar) is a very rich man with a near pathological hatred of the poor. As a result, he’s horrified that his son Ajay (Ajay Devgan) insists on hanging out with Raja (Aamir Khan), a lowly mechanic. In an effort to keep his son under control, Ranjit has cut off Ajay’s allowance, so Ajay and Raja resort to a number of wacky schemes in order to get money, including exploiting the new bank manager in order to commit fraud. (It’s funny because his life is ruined!)

Harban Lal (Dalip Tahil) is, if anything, even more consumed by his hatred for the poor. He’s shocked to learn that his niece has married the son of her family’s chauffeur, and becomes obsessed by the fear that his own daughter Madhu (Juhi Chawla) will similarly disgrace him, especially since she’s been spending all her time with her poor friend Kajal (Kajol).

Harban and Ranjit meet, and after bonding over their mutual hatred of poor people, they head off to a lawyer to find out how they can legally prevent their offspring from marrying poor people. The lawyer tells them that they can’t, and instead suggests that they get their children to sign marriage certificates along with the spouse of the parents’ choice; that way they’ll be legally married, and there’s nothing they can do about it. After seeing how easily Ranjit tricks Ajay into signing the papers (despite the best efforts of Ajay’s uncle (Johny Lever)) Harban suggests that they get Ajay and Madhu married to one another. Madhu is tricked just as easily.

Meanwhile, Ajay and Raja bump into Madhu and Kajal. Ajay falls in love with Kajal at first sight, while Raja and Madhu take an instant dislike to each other. And at this point, things get kind of complicated. I’ll just say that wackiness ensues, and the wackiness involves a potentially lethal practical joke, a ghost, James Bond the monkey, and public kissing (!) and get to the important part. Ajay and Kajal are in love. Raja and Madhu are in love as well, which should surprise no one. The fathers are horrified, but the marriage contract plan fails dismally, as does bribery and hiring a hit man. After Ajay is injured by said assassin, Ranjit finally declares his acceptance of his son’s love, and agrees to shelter Raja and Madhu as well.

Sharing a cab on the way to the engagement ceremony, Raja and Kajal are attacked. As Raja is distracted, Kajal’s uncle is incapacitated and Kajal herself is dragged off for a presumed fate worse than death, only to be rescued by Raja. As he comforts her, an unseen figure takes pictures. When the pair finally arrive at the engagement ceremony, Ranjit gleefully displays the photographs as evidence of their “affair”, and Kajal’s uncle agrees, claiming that the pair have been carrying on for months. Despite the flimsiness of the evidence (testimony which directly contradicts their own experience, coupled with perhaps the world’s tamest incriminating photos) Ajay and Madhu leap to the worst possible conclusion. Raja and Kajal are thrown out. As they try to rebuild their lives, they are continually harassed, mocked, and humiliated, both by the fathers and their former fiancés. Raja is finally pushed too far, and vows to fight back, prove their innocence, and teach their tormentors a lesson.

The plot is, if anything, even more complicated than the above summary implies, but the Much Ado About Nothing parallels are strong. Like Ajay, Much Ado‘s Claudio falls in love quickly, without knowing much about his choice (Hero). Like Ajay, Claudio has a cynical friend (Benedick), who reluctantly enters a relationship with a woman who is at least his equal (Beatrice). Both Ajay and Claudio immediately believe the worst of their love, and both become almost joyfully cruel and self-satisfied, alienating their friend in the process. Finally, when the truth is revealed, both men receive forgiveness and a happy ending that they really didn’t earn. (Claudio is very high on my personal list of Shakespearean characters who need to be punched in the face.)

The real difference is that after being publicly betrayed, Hero has the luxury of being presumed dead, and is protected, supported and sheltered by the community of women. The only other important woman in Ishq is Madhu, and she is clearly on the side of the accusers. Kajal has nowhere to hide and literally no one to turn to except Raja; I really can’t quite blame her for occasionally trying to set herself on fire.

The Shakespeare parallels go beyond the plot. Even more than usual in Bollywood, everyone is operating on the same level of heightened reality, with virtues and vices equally magnified. The performances reflect this; there is much chewing of scenery, and while no one is actually speaking in blank verse (though Raja does recite the occasional ghazal), they may as well be. This might be why Johny Lever has been so well reviewed in this movie. With everyone operating on the same level, it’s much easier to see just how good Lever is at what he does. (Whether one likes what Lever does is another question entirely, but he’s very good at it.)

Aamir Khan and Kajol have to do most of the dramatic heavy lifting here, and they acquit themselves wonderfully. They are both as over the top as everyone else, but they bring a real emotional truth to their characters, and the compassion Raja and Kajal display for one another is very genuine and very moving. Thanks to clashing personalities and Kajol’s retirement, this is the closest we’ll ever get to an Aamir/Kajol pairing, and that’s a pity; despite their different acting styles, both actors are brilliant, and they demonstrate real chemistry.

This is a whole lot of movie crammed into two and a half hours. During the overtly comic first hour and a half, there‘s a gag about every thirty seconds; .when the plot switches to melodrama, it’s almost a relief since the breakneck pace finally slows down. The songs are almost an afterthought; while the dance numbers are lavish, they seem to come out of nowhere, and are forgotten just as quickly. No time to linger.

Romeo Aur Juliet

A few months ago, I was a substitute teacher for a Middle School honors English class which was preparing for a performance of Romeo and Juliet. When the regular teacher found out that I was a theater major in my wasted youth, I was quickly roped into helping with rehearsals. At about the same time, I also watched the Govinda/Karisma film Hero No. 1, in which the children of feuding parents fall in love, but rather than elope, Govinda works incognito as a servant in Karisma’s house, both to be near her and to try and find away to win her family over. This led me to one of those strange cultural disconnects that you get sometimes after too much Bollywood; I knew that Romeo and Juliet were supposed to be tragic, doomed and heroic lovers, but I just couldn’t sympathize with them - after all, they were disobeying their parents! Why couldn’t they be more like that nice Govinda?

Which brings me to Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak, which is very much an Indian spin on Romeo and Juliet. Dhanraj Singh (Dalip Tahil) was sent to prison after killing a man to avenge his sister’s dishonor and subsequent suicide. He’s served his time, though, and is released to be happily reunited with his family, and especially his son Raj (a very young Aamir Khan).

Raj is a recent college graduate, and soon goes to work for the family business. While on a brief business trip to the old village, he and his cousin Shyam (Raj Zutshi) crash a local party. There, Raj catches a glimpse of Rashmi (a very young Juhi Chawla) and falls instantly in love. Unfortunately, she’s the daughter of Randhir Singh (Goga Kapoor), brother of the man Dhanraj killed.

Due to a misunderstanding, Raj flees the party before getting a chance to speak to Rashmi. That would be the end of it, except that both families independently plan vacations at Mount Abu. (I suppose the blood feud keeps them from calling each other up to coordinate these things.) Raj and Rashmi meet, and are later forced together when both are lost in the woods. Raj tries valiantly to resist his feelings, but soon the pair are in love. Before Raj can reveal the truth about his family to Rashmi, though, she bumps into Dhanraj . . .

It’s at this point that the plot really deviates from the Shakespearean model. In QSQT, the ensuing tragedy really is the fault of the parents; both families do their level best to destroy the blossoming romance, upping the ante until the couple is forced to elope. In Romeo and Juliet, on the other hand, the Montagues and Capulets don’t have a chance to stifle anything because they don’t find out about the relationship until the young lovers are already dead. We never do find out how they would have reacted to the relationship. I have to say that I prefer QSQT’s approach, because it makes Raj and Rashmi more sympathetic. They are rebelling against something concrete, instead of being stupid melodramatic teenagers, so I can accept their disobedience.

This film came very early in both Aamir Khan’s and Juhi Chawla’s respective careers. They both give adequate performances, but clearly neither actor has had a chance to discover his or her true niche; Raj is a generic well meaning young man in love, and doesn’t provide much scope for Khan’s gift for characterization, while the part of Rashmi is Bollywood-spunky but doesn’t display any of Chawla’s comedic talents. The supporting cast is much more interesting, in particular the two fathers.

Because the parents in QSQT are active rather than passive, the tragedy in the film is all the more compelling. The lovers are believably cast as pawns in a conflict they had nothing to do with, and because the parents really are responsible for the ensuing tragedy, it makes their reactions all the more important. I was actually disappointed that the film ended when it did, because I was interested in seeing the aftermath.

Brutal Youth

There’s a scene in Dil that disturbs me. A lot. Madhu (Madhuri Dixit) and Raja (Aamir Khan) hated each other at first sight, and have engaged in a rapidly escalating war of pranks which went beyond the pale when Madhu tricked Raja into entering her hotel room, and promptly accused him of trying to rape her. Raja was thrown out of college on the spot, and he returns in the middle of the night, drags Madhu from her bed, and takes her to a nearby barn. “I’m going to show you what rape is,” he tells her, and proceeds to hunt her with slasher-flick efficiency. Finally, Madhu is cornered. Raja repeats his threat, then tells her about what happens to someone, emotionally and socially, after a rape. “That’s what you did to me,” he says, then, seeing that Madhu is shivering, he gives her his coat and leaves.

I knew going in that there was no way Raja would actually rape anyone; he is the hero, after all, and in the Bollywood universe, a Fate Worse Than Death is a real threat. And the horror-movie style cinematography in the scene is completely overdone. But it’s a brutal scene, made all the more brutal by the quality of the acting; Khan is rightfully called the finest actor in Bollywood, after all, and while Dixit doesn’t quite have his range, she’s an impressive actress as well.

And I’m not sure what to think about the scene. Dragging a woman from her bed, threatening to rape her, and chasing her around a deserted barn certainly isn’t a good thing to do, by any stretch of the imagination. And yet when he accuses Madhu of trivializing the suffering of actual rape victims, he’s completely correct. For that matter, Madhu crying rape was completely over the top; the prank she was retaliating for involved Raja switching the signs on the public bathrooms, which hardly merits destroying his life. Ironically, while the scene hangs over the rest of the movie, it really has very little to do with the plot; it leads to a cessation of hostilities, but another device could easily be found.

Since I have no easy conclusion, I’ll talk about the rest of the movie. Raja’s father (Anupam Kher) is a miser, obsessed with the notion of marrying his son into a wealthy family. He even tells the father of a potential bride as much, in a speech that only lacks a hearty “Mwa ha ha.” Raja, meanwhile, is a spoiled playboy, more interested in partying with his friends. Raja and Madhu meet when she drives past him and splashes him with mud, leading up to the aforementioned war of practical jokes; much of this war is played out with a rockabilly soundtrack (including rockabilly sitars!) and Madhu really plays dirty, goading Raja into a fight with Shakti, the school karate champ.

The Shakti fight is disturbing on a completely different level; the winner gets to publicly kiss Madhu, but the loser has to kiss her friend Lilly. This leads to “Make fun of the fat girl” “humor”; both combatants are driven to desperate lengths in order to avoid having to kiss Lilly. Raja finally wins, then publicly refuses to kiss Madhu, ramping the conflict up yet another notch.

Meanwhile, Raja’s dad has spotted a potential in-law (Saeed Jaffry) He goes to great lengths, even hiring actiors, in order to establish himself as a man of wealth, befriends him, and at last finagles a marriage offer. But when he drags Raja to meet the future bride, Raja discovers that it’s Madhu! The pair declare their mutual dislike, and each refuse to marry the other. The fathers are crushed.

Then comes a college class trip, and the aforementioned near rape scene. After Madhu comes clean, this leads to a cessation of hostilities, which comes as a relief; up until this point, both Madhu and Raja come across as really unpleasant people, but when they start acting like human beings they become quite likeable. The marriage is finally arranged, but at the wedding party, Madhu’s father discovers just how much Raja’s father has lied. There’s a public humiliation, vows of revenge, and then the lovers are separated.

The pair can’t stay away from each other, but their fathers’ feud makes things difficult. In the end, the pair are forced to . . . well, not elope, exactly. Raja takes matters into his own hands in a wonderful scene. But this being Bollywood, marrying without parental approval, no matter how justified, leads to suffering and eventual reconciliation all around.

Aamir Khan has either aged well, or he youthed badly; this movie was made 14 years ago, and he hasn’t really visibly aged since then. Madhuri hadn’t developed into the classic Indian beuty she’s later become in this film, but she has her moments. Both the leads put in fine performances here, as do the actors playing their respective fathers.

Dil created many of the “poor boy/rich girl” cliches. It’s an odd dish of masala; low comedy, heavy melodrama, and hovering above it all, that scene. I still don’t quite know what to think.