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From being seen as eternally depressed, helpless, bedridden characters, senior EVERY once in a while filmmakers create colourful old characters, confirming that age is just a number and youth a state of mind. Our filmmakers have started seeing senior citizens as individuals, and not merely as victims or idols of worship. Old need not always be grey — with aching limbs, choking cough-fits, eternally depressed disposition and helpless bedridden histrionics. Jagmohan Mundhra’s Naughty@40 is a romantic comedy, which portrays how the protagonist Happi (Govinda), a virgin at 40, struggles to come to terms with his wife Gauri (Yuvika Choudhary), who is half his age. Happi is a businessman settled in London. His father owns an electronics store and is a Casanova, whose absurdities are mocked at by the people, at large. All hell breaks loose after the marriage when Happi discovers that passion is missing from their marriage due to the huge age difference. The film portrays how, in order to fill up the void, Happi struggles to ignite the passion.
In Shoojit Sircar’s Johnny Mastana, Amitabh Bachchan plays his age as a bookstore owner, who has taken his wife of 40 years for granted till she meets with a near-fatal accident. Faced with the terrifying prospect of having to spend the rest of life without her, the old man leaves no stone unturned for her treatment. It is a moving tale about the sanctity of relationship, basic family values and human vulnerability very much in line with the recent family dramas like Baghban and Babul. Kabir Sadanand’s Tum Milo to Sahi was a light take on the difficult issues in which three urban couples from different age groups look at love differently. For the youngest couple, love is about meeting of true minds, for the middle-aged couple, love is about the meeting of hearts and for the eldest couple, a lawyer (Nana Patekar) and his client, Dimple Kapadia, love is about meeting of the souls. The film’s cinematic treatment was subtle. V. K. Prakesh’s Phir Kabhi saw high school lovers — Dimple Kapadia and Mithun Chakraborthy — rekindling their romance at a school re-union decades later. B R Chopra’s Baghban depicted the inter-dependence of an ageing couple — Amitabh Bachchan and Hema Malini — in a 40-year-old relationship. It was a statement not just on the dignity of the aged but on the overt sexuality in marriage — all this while absent on the screen. There is a new-age husband, who expressed love full throatedly, weeps, ties her blouse strings and even maintains a fast with his wife. Priyadarshan’s Mere Baap Pehle Aap was a laugh riot about Janardhan Rane (Paresh Rawal) and his sons Chirag (Manoj Joshi) and Gaurav (Akshay Khanna). Gaurav is particularly attached to his father. He is contented with his father’s goof-ups and always bails him out. He wants his father to get married. When Gaurav meets Shikha Kapoor (Geneila D’Souza), they embark on a journey to arrange a marriage between his father Janardhan Rane and her guardian Anuradha (Shobana). In Sunil Merchant’s Cheeni Kum, Buddhadev (Amitabh Bachchan) was the chef-cum-owner of London’s foremost Indian restaurant. He is 64 years old. He is arrogant, egoist, tart-tongued with a passion for cooking He is a confirmed bachelor and has never been in love. Suddenly, Nina Verma (Tabu) 34-year-old girl walks into his restaurant and his life. She is beautiful, cool, controlled, independent and strong-willed girl. Two personalities — opposite in age and attitude, meet and fall in love and decide to get married. Buddhadev respectfully arrives to meet Nina’s father, a Gandhian, who lives in Delhi for his daughter’s hand. There is one problem — Nina’s father Om Prakash Verma (Paresh Rawal) is 58 years old, only six years younger than Buddhadev Gupta, his aspiring son-in-law. But love triumphs. Bollywood conventions took a back seat in Ram Gopal Varma’s Nishabd. The film broke morals, taboos and social norms as it was a non-conformist film. As the older man, Amitabh Bachchan is drawn towards his daughter’s friend (Jiah Khan). It was a story that dwelt more on the foreplay of emotions and long-drawn-out silence rather than spoken words. It was the film of age-defying love. Mukta Arts’ Joggers Park set the screen ablaze by depicting a liaison between a retired Judge (Victor Bannerjee) and a girl Jenny (Perizad Zorabian). They meet each other during their morning walk at a local Joggers Park. Their acquaintance turns into mutual admiration, trust, loyalty, friendship and love. According to Subhash Ghai, the sad thing about age is that only body ages, not the feelings and, therefore, there is no control over desires. Stalwarts like A. K.
Hungal, Utpal Dutt and Ashok Kumar played lustful oldies, who refuse
to accept their age in Shaukeen. While satisfying their craving
for cigarettes, alcohol surreptitiously, it is their weakness for
women that lands them in soup. In Lekh Tandon’s Professor — Pritam
(Shammi Kapoor) woos Neena Verma (Kalapna) on the Mal Road in Shimla
through romantic songs.
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