Can simplicity and innocence of love help us survive the real world?
A question I returned to after watching Laapataa Ladies
Once in a while, cinema helps us escape this world and feel alive in the softness and innocence of human condition. Kiran Rao’s Laapataa Ladies (Missing Ladies) does exactly that, making one feel giddy in young love, believe in simple dreams and also anguished by the sudden laapataaness of it.
Phool, a young woman, gets accidentally separated from her husband, Deepak as he ends up taking the wrong bride, Pushpa, home. Chaos ensues but amid it remains the sincerity in love, the simplicity in ambition and just the right kind of comedy to weave it all.
The young married couple is bursting with joy at having found a soul-mate in each other, and simply cannot resist blushing as Deepak says “I love you” to Phool. The tender comfort within the two-day old marriage and the longing brought a stream of happy tears. The pain of their separation is further heightened then, as the song ‘O Sajni re’ in Arijit Singh’s voice plays along.
The softness in Phool’s (meaning flower) conviction to reunite with the love of her life who lives in ‘Soorajmukhi’ (meaning sunflower) village - could the writers make it any more moving?
When my partner suggested we go watch this film, he said, “Should we ask some friends to join us?” I’m glad to have declined, simply because watching that film together, took me back to the early days of our relationship. The flutter of joy in holding hands for the first time, going to the cinemas and sharing a bag of popcorn, and leaning on each other whenever an emotional scene took over. During the entirety of the film, the partner could be found resting his head on my shoulder.
The sincerity in Deepak and many other supporting characters, time and again, brings respite. The movie unflinchingly wants to convince you of the goodness in people, the tenderness of loss, and the strength in collective hope. What keeps the movie going amid a very worrying situation, is comedy. It is so refreshing to sit with the heaviness of the film’s subjects, and have comic relief underline the themes so well. Lisa McGhee’s television drama Derry Girls, brilliantly did that with teenagers and their life situations unfolding in the backdrop of the 90s Northern Irish conflict. In the movie, Ravi Kishan as the corrupt yet smart cop carries the comic element with such ease and his scene in the trailer remains the show-stopper.
Laapataa Ladies took me back to a kind of lightness rarely seen in adrenaline-pumping, action-packed and garish mainstream Hindi movies. The last time a film carried this much tenor of innocence was perhaps Aamir Khan’s Taare Zameen Par. (It’s an annual rerun, especially when I need a release of emotions).
Time and again the director returns our attention to the main lead of the film - “ghoonghat” (the veil), and the way it forces women to look down and not ahead, literally and metaphorically. And yet this ghoonghat helps the movie punch above its weight tackling patriarchy, dowry system, domestic abuse and the evils of our society, which those on the societal periphery fight to stay free and alive. At no point though, the movie is misguided by a saviour syndrome. Rao grounds the characters in their roles and focuses exclusively on the ladies in search of the love of their lives.
The women speak for or against the imposition of this ghoonghat, another significant marker of how the veil is perceived by those who wear it, and not those who impose it. The scene with the veiled Muslim woman disappoints, because we don’t know if the veil is her choice or not — but the scene leaves the audience with an affirmative that it is not. I remember the audience laughing at that scene, convinced what the film-makers were trying to say, reaffirming the trope around Muslim women and their relationship with the veil.
Pushpa’s story evokes simplicity through determination, which if not done correctly, could have ended up stereotyping her character. Maybe it’s the ordinariness of her dreams or the enormity of them given the circumstances, which push her story convincingly. Of course she deserves what she wants and of course she found a simple way through it. But was it easy? Only Pushpa’s story can reveal that.
‘Dheeme Dheeme’ written by Swanand Kirkire and sung in the melodious voice of Shreya Ghoshal not just speaks about a mind with dreams, but a heart with boundless hope:
‘Nayaa safar hai ek naya haunsala (A new journey, a new courage)
Baandha chidiyoein ne naya ghonsla (The birds have created a new nest)
Nayee aasha ka deepak jala (A lamp lit by new hope)
Chala sapnoein ka naya qaafila’ (A new caravan of dreams begins)
In one scene, Phool says to an older woman, Manju Maai “Aap bharosa rakhiye na Dadi,” reminding the audience that despite a lifetime of experiences that Manju has had, young Phool has something to offer — a dollop of sunshine — that a lot of us lose at some point adulting in our lives.
Laapataa Ladies makes you want to root for all those who find a piece of beauty in themselves and pursue it. And in doing so you end up rooting for yourself, in the possibility of finding solace and safety even when the world around you might feel otherwise.
Go alone, with friends or family and lose yourself, if only briefly, in this beautiful story.
Mariyam Haider is an independent writer-researcher, spoken word artist and producer & host of Main Bhi Muslim podcast. Her writing has appeared in Scroll, Kontinentalist, Asian Review of Books, Centre for Feminist Foreign Policy, AWARE, Livemint, Mekong Review, among others.