Sunday, July 22, 2012

The Cocktail of misogyny.

I know a lot has been written over the movie Cocktail till date. Nothing I write will be original. But it is not about being original, but saying what has to be said.

I had the immense privilege of watching ‘Cocktail’ yesterday and I don’t regret it. For one, I needed mindless fun and that’s what it gave me and for another it reinforced my belief that mainstream Bollywood movies are the biggest pieces of turd on the pile of shit that is mainstream Indian cinema.

Looking at the characters and the storyline, I can’t get over the question as to what makes Gautam so charming that no girl can resist him. He is obnoxious and disgusting. Even if you are going for the obnoxious kind of manly man, he falls short. He is a playboy and unlike many playboys (somebody tell me what is wrong with sleeping around.), he is a huge jerk. The defining moment came when he called the hot ‘gori’ in Capetown, an ‘item’. That is what women are to him. Pieces of body parts. I cannot imagine anyone wanting to fall in love with him unless she has a very, very low esteem. The director seems have a very low opinion of Indian women.

Then let us go to the ohsodesi Meera. Ewwww. As in ewwwwww. Where is the Indian woman in Meera? Where are the loud, giggly ones? Where are the ones who would beat you to a pulp if you do wrong by them? Where is the lovely gregariousness? Apparently all good women have found religion and we pray all the time and we pick after other people’s clothes and make an apartment ‘homes’. Seri-fucking-ously? When Gautam fell in love with Meera, I found myself asking if all the women empowerment in India had failed. Here was apparently the epitome of ‘desi’ness where there… nothing. Meera hardly has any quality which surpasses those you could get in a good maid. A quiet, invisible, maid with a very weak screen presence, if I may add. So the makers of the movie just wanted to emphasize the caution that the men of the house always wants to fool around with the maid. Even while Veronica says that she can manage everything except what Meera has ‘from within’, I am confused. What exactly is that? The dumb look she constantly has on? Or is it that big void that Indian women are urged to cultivate? The drama of domestication. Also, while Veronica is damaged because of her parents’, there is not even a glimpse of the manifestation of Meera’s loss. What her parents’ death did to her. It seems like the premise was written into the script to elicit a collective sympathy sigh from the audience for the poor homely, humble, pure Indian girl with the long black hair.

I have to say that the saving grace of the movie was Veronica. At least till the Director decided she needs to become a whiny piece of mess as to elevate the relative status of the infantile hero and the invisible heroine. I loved her from the moment she came on screen. Unabashedly free, independent spirit, fierce, able to do anything she wants, she is what life is all about. She doesn’t say sorry to anyone. And the high point of her character was her resilience. Who wouldn’t want an honest woman like that? In the era when the urban Indian woman celebrates series like Sex and The City, it seems an abomination to not have let Veronica have the guy. Frankly, I am a bit repulsed that she would want a guy like him for anything more than sex. But unfortunately for us, the repulsive guy has the best sperms in the gene pool and he is a gem. Unless he has one shoved up where the sun doesn’t shine, I fail to see where the gem is. 

So all in all, Cocktail is what every feminist and every self respecting woman loathes. A mish mash of age old concoctions of the wisdom in covering up and ‘acting like a girl’ (Pro-rapist film indeed.) masqueraded as a chic, urban trope which would please the middle class Indian audience. It is like marinating your brain in morphine, adding some garam masala in it and frying it with some rubbish. Well… at least you can save money on your movie snack.

Sunday, July 15, 2012

Flatline (unedited)


A strip of life, sliver of hope,
waves pushing against the
pulsating constraints of death.

A prayer went through her
womb, battling the wrath of
despair; dark, deep and numb.

Her finger entwined with his,
ablaze in fear, shadows creeping
along the fogs of doubt, battles
sunk by horrors of likely loss.

Wishes fly, star upon star, hopeful
sighs dash on rocky shores,  her
touch barricades the flailing pulse,
as the flatline marches to conquer.

A prayer lingers… as she removes
her finger.