Bollywood and Adultery
Four Bollywood films on adultery have suddenly got everyone noticing and talking about these ‘bold’ themes (three of them viz Hawas, Tum and Murder, released back to back this year, with the fourth one Jism hitting the marquee last January). Has our society abruptly become mature, or is it a sheer coincidence that our filmmakers have discovered the DVD of Unfaithful (the film that has ‘inspired’ the three recent films), is a question worth pondering over.
Even if the case is that of the latter, it is quite assuring to note that the filmmakers have had the guts to film a subject that has remained by and large taboo on-screen. The Bollywood makers have consistently shied away from showing this side of marriage and have safely stuck to ego-clashes (Abhiman, Raja Hindustani) or mundane arguments (Chalte Chalte, Saathiya).
Whenever any one has attempted to show adultery, it has always rounded off to a very tame and unexciting ending. I recall the instance of Silsila here- a very mature and subtle film in which both Amitabh Bachchan and Rekha are stuck in their respective ill-fated marriages. The entire film is a pathos-filled journey of their urge to break the chains loose, defy convention and ultimately breathe freely and happily. Alas, the director chickened out in the last reel. The entire graph that he had so painfully built is grounded abruptly in a contrived air-crash of Rekha’s husband, and the graph peters down faster than the sales figures of a defunct company. If ever there is an award of the Most Disappointing Climaxes, Silsila will take not only the cake, but the entire bakery. In another similar film Arth, the ending is more sensitively handled, but there also the woman is not shown going and living off happily with her lover. And if the woman is shown as doing something of this sort, the film makes it a point to dub her as ‘villain’ or ‘vamp’ (Remember Jism, Bipasha was also nominated under the Best Villain Category?) Why is their obsession with our filmmakers to portray the Indian lady in ‘politically and socially’ correct tones? Why could not Rekha or Shabana Azmi leave their respective love-less marriages and be shown living with their former lovers that they had to sacrifice at the altar of a suffocating societal bindings. Why should a Shilpa Shetty in Dhadkan be considered the epitome of virtue just because she accepts Akshay Kumar and shuns Suniel Shetty, just because the former has tied a mangalsutra and walked around the fire with her? So, from this fire to her pyre, she shall not think, feel or love.
Perhaps this has been a reflection of our society by and large. Even till this day, Indians are attuned to continuing a love-less marriage citing reasons from children to society to pure inertia. A divorce is still seen an aberration for ‘normal’ middle-class couples even in the metros and more upward cities like Delhi, what to say of small towns! For them, divorce, or adultery, is just the afflictions that visit the so-called high society or glamorous filmstars. ‘Healthy, normal’ couple do not divorce; they compromise and continue with life.
In this context I am reminded of a scene in Saawan Kumar’s Mother (otherwise, eminently forgettable but it had a very interesting anecdote). Randhir Kapoor is sitting with his friends and discussing his amorous meeting with an ex-girlfriend (Rekha) (after sending his legal wife to a round of beauty parlor), whom he boasts still pines for him and was still coercing him to get married. When the friends argue that he should do the same, he looks at them shockingly and proclaims with a mock-serious moral indignation “But, friends, I am a happily married man”
This, I believe, is a very standard situation in most marriages. The husband will continue to philander, the wife will carry on with the kitty parties and for them life will be ‘good and normal’.
But should the reverse happen, all hell breaks loose. So what is sauce for the goose is certainly murder for the gander. And the ‘hawas‘ication is left only for the woman, she cannot tum-tom about her sexuality - the man can do wrong and come back with any sob story or excuse (Pati Patni Aur Woh, Pati Patni aur Tawaif, Pati Parmeshwar, or more recently, Masti, where the heroes return to their ‘ghar ki daal’ after a ‘biryani‘ outing with a few sobs in the climax, etc etc)
Thankfully, times are changing, and changing fast! Cantankerous relationships are being snipped and divorce rates are up, at least so in the bigger towns. That is not to say that they are favored or looked upon with normal eyesight. But still, the numbers show that the trend is on the rise. Is this a reflection of a less tolerant society, or a more mature understanding and aware one, take your pick! The rising instances of divorce do not show that our society is less filled with love or tolerance. It merely reflects that we now have an option that was not there earlier. Sadly, statistics still show that adultery is more rampant than divorce, which just proves the strong hold the mangalsutra has on the psyche of Indian couples.
And I come back to the point where I started off- we now have had an overdose of films that speak of the woman’s needs and desires, but unfortunately, though the yoke has been lifted, it has not been completely overthrown. So, if though Meghna Naidu or Manisha Koirala will heave and pant in their lover’s beds, but as soon as the husband walks in, their guilt takes over to such an extent that they are ready to even take the blame of a murder on their heads, but their pati parmeshwar should not be harmed.
Once again, these films have not really achieved what they had started to argue upon and have left a lot of things unsaid. I still await a well directed film where the heroine is shown leaving her luck-less stupid marriage and living with her lover, without being labeled gumrah(there is an old Mala Sinha starrer by the same name too) or bewafa and without the justification of having a husband who is uncouth or callous (Daraar, Agnisakshi).
Once that happens, then only will our Bollywood have matured and given its due to the New Age Woman.
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