Thursday, July 20, 2006

Isn't every Bollywood movie a superhero movie?

Okay, a confession. Maybe more of stating the obvious than a confession. Or maybe both. In any case, I haven’t seen Krrish (seriously, why is the spelling so…rrrrrr?), nor do I really intend to. The reviews were engaging enough, so why be indulgent? But, much like like-minded people, I was a bit perplexed as to what made Kr-rr-rish that different from the rest of the stud-men brigade to deserve the category of Bollywood’s First Superhero (BoFS for short):

Yes he flies…but isn’t that a perception issue? If you watch things in slow motion, stud-men seem to be flying across the screen anyway.
But he flies like a bird…ahhhh, that’s a taste-issue. Kr-rr-rish chose a bird, some choose aeroplanes, and some others, maybe flies and bugs. Who knows? The point is that the choice for the analogy is subjective.
He runs like the wind…this seems to be an eyewash. What does wind run like? Does he run as fast as the wind? But wind can be really gentle as well (halu-halu-waara). Come to think of it, I run like the wind – gently.
Like an eagle, he soars….don’t get me started on that, but so does John Ashcroft. Soars straight into a cringing headache.
Grave as a lion, he does something on the rocks ...h-uh??? (I apologise, but there seems to be a bit much of the Nature Channel here).
And then some be-you-tea-fool lady enters his life (and takes him to Singapore…why?)…okay, I agree that would make any guy feel like a superhero, but you would have to fly longer, soar higher and be grave-er than those damned animals to be a superhero on that account.

post script: a case can be made of there being a basic mis_ in Bollywood's understanding of Hollywood's superhero genre. But as it has never understood it, it hasn't been misled by it.

2 comments:

Api said...

Ha ha... this is funny. Now I know why Jeff Goldblum was my superhero in "The Fly". And why Singapore? Well, what does a superhero do but fly around flashy skyscrapers?

Anonymous said...

singapore is as squeaky clean as the superhero's spandex (lycra) underwear. (and affordable too... LOL, no pun intended)