The Magic of Realism

I am a huge fan of realistic cinema. So committed I am to the magic of realism that I don’t mind paying big bucks to watch a man with a lota and foul intent, getting chased by the news-hungry media. And I sigh with relief and start munching my popcorn noisily when he finally gets to relieve himself, with only the tall grass protecting his modesty.

As I get back home, I shake my head in disbelief. Man, that pooping scene was so intense! I could almost feel my bowels crying with ecstasy.

During my growing up years, my parents made sure that my brother and I were exposed to nothing but the best. While my parents snuck off to watch Sholay, we the helpless were left behind to spend the evening, trying to kill each other in the most painful way. Of course we managed to survive to watch classics by the likes of Satyajit Ray, Hrishikesh Mukherjee and Sai Paranjpye.

With such an intense grooming, wisdom had no choice but to walk ahead of my years. While my lowly friends watched festival circuit movies (read art house cinema) for the sex, I would watch it for the three intense lines that the characters exchanged with each other in Spanish, while rowing for two hours and ten minutes in a picturesque lake.

My brother rebelled and dedicated the rest of his life to watching just action movies and Angelina Jolie.

But me, I was getting hungrier and hungrier for stark reality. No happy endings, no colourful bonanzas, no loud celebrations for me. I wanted my character to seek the meaning of life from the lone sheep in the deserts of Mongolia. Any hanky-panky that the man might have wanted to do with the sheep was snipped off by Edward-Scissorhands, whom we otherwise refer to as Censor Board of India.
 

I was content with the sad, hungry and the angry.

Until I moved to a country where censorship is as alien as a Swiss bank account to an Indian politician.

Now before I proceed, let me clarify that realistic cinema is different from Art house cinema. Art house cinema is like the masterpieces hung at Tate’s Gallery of Modern Art. Nobody understands it but everyone is too scared to trash it. Realistic cinema on the other hand, is reality that our mundane lives often miss out on. It’s not every day you see Gangs of Wasseypur playing out in real life or discover that your soft-spoken neighbour is actually a wannabe terrorist!

Thankfully none of the characters catch a plane to Istanbul, Switzerland or London to profess their love with 20 extras doing dhinchak in the background. I think the politically correct word is backup dancers. Although I still don’t know why they are called that! Are they expected to take the lead actress’s place if she passes out?

Coming back to the point, away from the clutches of censorship, I was finally getting to watch unedited versions of reality and art. Naked hairy asses and no I’m not talking about the four legged variety. Men kissing men, the kind where you can feel the tongue touching your tonsils …and most importantly, close-up shots of men and women of all sizes, barfing like it’s nobody’s business.

It’s not as if I’m averse to barfing, but there’s a right way to do it - quietly in a corner, away from prying eyes. But no Sir, not in these movies! The actors will make a big show of it, to let reality sink in like the Titanic. On the carpet, inside the car, on some hapless man - just like kindergarten kids, for whom puking and peeing is just another act of spontaneity.

Irrespective of whether you are watching French, German or American cinema, the movie is incomplete without the lead character’s puke being splashed all over your screen in all its vividness.

I mean, if I really wanted to watch men and women puke, I’ll just walk around in any of the hospitals in my vicinity. If I wanted to watch someone else’s butt plastered all over my screen, I’ll watch porn, dammit!

And I have observed that most of the characters prefer doing all their talking while sitting on the shit-pot. For heaven’s sake, the least you can do is shut the door while you exchange intense bytes of wisdom!

Sadly, these movies come with no prior warning. Just a – this movie may contain adult themes. I refuse to see what’s so adult about letting out/ exchanging your bodily fluids in the most grotesque manner! Enough to put you off sex for a lifetime. Little wonder that most European nations have such a low growth rate.

Learn something from Indian cinema, you fools! We show how men and women can have babies by simply running around trees and kissing each other behind giant sunflowers.

Little wonder we are a population of 1.22 billion and growing.

Things have come to such a point that I have started craving movies that show picture-perfect characters living out picture-perfect lives! So guess what, this Diwali, I actually went ahead and watched Jab Taak hai Jaan! Such a simple story line…boy meets hottie... hottie falls for the boy who’s always trying to sing like Rabbi Shergil…hottie leaves God for boy….boy goes off to Ladakh, grows a stubble and starts defusing bombs…and it goes on and on and on, till you wake up to discover hottie is singing songs with her lover boy again. And not once did I have to put up with SRK having trouble digesting his dinner! Phew!

Damn you realism, I’ve had enough of you. I’d much rather watch larger than life characters in all their Technicolour glory.

Isn’t it why we watch movies - to evade reality?