Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, Those with a heart will take the bride, is regarded as one of the great films of Bollywood, first released in 1995, and was still running in one cinema in April 2007 completing 600 performances. Given how Indian cinema had developed by that date, the film broke new ground, featuring the life of British Indian young people as they attempted to balance the traditional family life and expectations with the freedoms of their non Indian contemporaries. The story is a simple one. A young girl dreams of falling in love and is appalled when her father announces that she is to marry the son of his best friend back in his Indian homeland and which he has not visited for many years. She has never met her the young man. On the promise that she will marry his choice and not do anything to dishonour the family he allows her to go on a holiday in Europe for a month, and as she sets off on the journey she encounters the son of a wealthy Indian who has integrated fully into the Western way of life, and who rewards his son for failing to graduate with a degree at university, thus keeping the family tradition of being poor in education and successful in business. The young man behaves as other western teenagers and during one escapade upsets the father, unknown to him, of the girl also having an adventure before settling down to marriage and domesticity in a country she does not know. Unknown to either the girl or her parents future her husband to be a playboy gang leader who plans to leave his wife from time to time to enjoy the freedoms of London.
In the long standing tradition of such relationships the girl cannot stand the behaviour of the young wealthy Indian determined to sow a few wild oats before joining in his father's business, and the girl does her best to discourage his attention, well at least in the beginning. At core she is much more a passionate and wilder young woman than he is a young man. There relationship develops into love as they become separated together from their rest of their travelling companions as they journey through Switzerland. The girl explains about the engagement and despite his outward behaviour he understands and respects the Indian traditions, and is prepared to accept the situation until encourage to follow his heart as well as his dreams, by his father.
The young man then finds that angered by learning what he has been told of her falling in love, her father has taken the family straight back to India to begin the preparations for the wedding. This is an elaborate and long procedure involving both extended family networks. The wealthy and talented young man who can play the piano, sing and dance also makes his way to India where he deliberately makes friends with the family of the groom and begins to establish a relationship with the father of the his true love, admitting his shortcomings and their previous encounter to the man. The young man plans to persuade the father to shift from the long standing commitment to his friend's daughter, but this falls apart when the marriage is brought forward and then the two male heads of household find out that the couple have had an affair dashing all hopes of as amicable settlement.. The father of the young man has come to India to help his son and the girl's, mother also becomes complicit, urging the two lovers to elope because she believes her husband will never give his permission. This appears to be how the situation will end but in a dramatic fight in which the young man takes a beating, the girl's father relents and allows her to go off with her life's love back to England.
As with all the Bollywood films I have seen, they are very colourful, with long musical numbers involving lots of dancers, reminding of the heyday of the Hollywood musical; the behaviour of the young people leads to romantic kissing and sexual behaviour is inferred but not depicted. It is the kind of film one can enjoy with grandparents and grandchildren. The films are also technically of a very high and latest standards, and acting is also skilful, if ritualised . Hopefully I will live to see the development of a new cinema on mainland China.
Later in the day I could not resist also viewing the latest Casino Royale Film, I have the Fleming novel and saw the original 1967 spoof film made with a host of stars including Peter Sellers and Peter Ustinov. There are interesting aspects of this later film in some fifty years of 007 including that it also opened in China, in slightly amended version. The story begins at the outset of the Bond career, enabling a new depth of character and the development of relationship from their usual superficiality and avoiding references to the anti Russian and China cold war situations.
This is the second film of the week which also tries to avoid alienating Muslims by the device of painting the terrorists as commercially orientated criminals exploiting the beliefs of extremist and fanatics. There is real violence and real pain in this film which is not suitable for children.
Of course there much unbelievable spectacular action and despite attempts to plant false trails and explanations, the outcome is predicable as Bond learns the hard way that to survive, let alone win out, he has to trust no one especially any woman who appears to fancy him and to remain professionally on guard day and night.
In terms of plot specifics, the principal baddy in this film is a man who acts as the banker for dictators and fundamentalists, and make his money by gambling with this money. His bets 100 million pounds that the shares of a company producing a new airbus will plummet after he arranges the prototype to be blown up in a terrorist attack, but this fails because of the intervention of 007 and he loses the money, temporarily, because as a skilful poker players, he does not cheat, he plans to gain £150 million in a game where the entrance sum is £10million and re-entry is only possible with another £5. Missing from this film is the throw away humour, the latest up to-date devices designed by Q and Miss Moneypenny, with M and her department relying on the latest mobile SatLap E communications. Who needs yer Baby?
During the last seven days I also saw a gambling based British film, called The Big Game. These days it appears everyone has learnt how to play poker and plays via the TV or on line, the new legal way of breaking into people's homes and their bank accounts. The amusing aspect of the Big Game is that it is a childhood board game which looks very much like Monopoly, except that the players bet a hundred pounds on four player games, with a number of games played in long sessions until the early hours. The story centres on a worker in a pie factory and his girl friend who works in a chippy saving up to buy a home of their own. The young man also studies business and the stock market and pretends he is a stock broker to his playing friends who include a professional footballer who scores a hat trick against Newcastle after spending the greater part of the night gambling and a business man whop backs the winning stock market tips. A new player in he group, friend of the friend talks of games in London where the stakes are even higher and where entry is as high as £40000, and the friends of the young man push him into representing their collective financial interests in such a game not knowing that the game will be fixed one way or the other and that their new contact is on a retainer to find suitable victims. There is a nice twist to this film which leaves everyone happy except the crooks.
I listen to a radio programme on the merits of eating porridge for breakfast and returned to my microwaves instant preparation, and kept up the good work with a roasted bream and vegetables for lunch and a small omelette for tea and then undid the good work with a bag, a small bad of chocolate covered peanuts and a large glass of red. Well it is my birthday week.
In the long standing tradition of such relationships the girl cannot stand the behaviour of the young wealthy Indian determined to sow a few wild oats before joining in his father's business, and the girl does her best to discourage his attention, well at least in the beginning. At core she is much more a passionate and wilder young woman than he is a young man. There relationship develops into love as they become separated together from their rest of their travelling companions as they journey through Switzerland. The girl explains about the engagement and despite his outward behaviour he understands and respects the Indian traditions, and is prepared to accept the situation until encourage to follow his heart as well as his dreams, by his father.
The young man then finds that angered by learning what he has been told of her falling in love, her father has taken the family straight back to India to begin the preparations for the wedding. This is an elaborate and long procedure involving both extended family networks. The wealthy and talented young man who can play the piano, sing and dance also makes his way to India where he deliberately makes friends with the family of the groom and begins to establish a relationship with the father of the his true love, admitting his shortcomings and their previous encounter to the man. The young man plans to persuade the father to shift from the long standing commitment to his friend's daughter, but this falls apart when the marriage is brought forward and then the two male heads of household find out that the couple have had an affair dashing all hopes of as amicable settlement.. The father of the young man has come to India to help his son and the girl's, mother also becomes complicit, urging the two lovers to elope because she believes her husband will never give his permission. This appears to be how the situation will end but in a dramatic fight in which the young man takes a beating, the girl's father relents and allows her to go off with her life's love back to England.
As with all the Bollywood films I have seen, they are very colourful, with long musical numbers involving lots of dancers, reminding of the heyday of the Hollywood musical; the behaviour of the young people leads to romantic kissing and sexual behaviour is inferred but not depicted. It is the kind of film one can enjoy with grandparents and grandchildren. The films are also technically of a very high and latest standards, and acting is also skilful, if ritualised . Hopefully I will live to see the development of a new cinema on mainland China.
Later in the day I could not resist also viewing the latest Casino Royale Film, I have the Fleming novel and saw the original 1967 spoof film made with a host of stars including Peter Sellers and Peter Ustinov. There are interesting aspects of this later film in some fifty years of 007 including that it also opened in China, in slightly amended version. The story begins at the outset of the Bond career, enabling a new depth of character and the development of relationship from their usual superficiality and avoiding references to the anti Russian and China cold war situations.
This is the second film of the week which also tries to avoid alienating Muslims by the device of painting the terrorists as commercially orientated criminals exploiting the beliefs of extremist and fanatics. There is real violence and real pain in this film which is not suitable for children.
Of course there much unbelievable spectacular action and despite attempts to plant false trails and explanations, the outcome is predicable as Bond learns the hard way that to survive, let alone win out, he has to trust no one especially any woman who appears to fancy him and to remain professionally on guard day and night.
In terms of plot specifics, the principal baddy in this film is a man who acts as the banker for dictators and fundamentalists, and make his money by gambling with this money. His bets 100 million pounds that the shares of a company producing a new airbus will plummet after he arranges the prototype to be blown up in a terrorist attack, but this fails because of the intervention of 007 and he loses the money, temporarily, because as a skilful poker players, he does not cheat, he plans to gain £150 million in a game where the entrance sum is £10million and re-entry is only possible with another £5. Missing from this film is the throw away humour, the latest up to-date devices designed by Q and Miss Moneypenny, with M and her department relying on the latest mobile SatLap E communications. Who needs yer Baby?
During the last seven days I also saw a gambling based British film, called The Big Game. These days it appears everyone has learnt how to play poker and plays via the TV or on line, the new legal way of breaking into people's homes and their bank accounts. The amusing aspect of the Big Game is that it is a childhood board game which looks very much like Monopoly, except that the players bet a hundred pounds on four player games, with a number of games played in long sessions until the early hours. The story centres on a worker in a pie factory and his girl friend who works in a chippy saving up to buy a home of their own. The young man also studies business and the stock market and pretends he is a stock broker to his playing friends who include a professional footballer who scores a hat trick against Newcastle after spending the greater part of the night gambling and a business man whop backs the winning stock market tips. A new player in he group, friend of the friend talks of games in London where the stakes are even higher and where entry is as high as £40000, and the friends of the young man push him into representing their collective financial interests in such a game not knowing that the game will be fixed one way or the other and that their new contact is on a retainer to find suitable victims. There is a nice twist to this film which leaves everyone happy except the crooks.
I listen to a radio programme on the merits of eating porridge for breakfast and returned to my microwaves instant preparation, and kept up the good work with a roasted bream and vegetables for lunch and a small omelette for tea and then undid the good work with a bag, a small bad of chocolate covered peanuts and a large glass of red. Well it is my birthday week.
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