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Ahsaa
 Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna $40.98 Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna, 2006, directed by Karan Johar is a wonderful film. It blends traditional values with modern issues in a story that deals with the price of fulfilling your own wishes at the expense of your family ideals. Kabhi Khushi Kabhie Gham (2001) is another impressive film directed by Johar that brings up the same dilemma. In this particular movie, set in New York, the main characters are two young, professional Indian couples. The movie begins at a turning point in each couple's lives. Dev (Shahrukh Kahn) and Rhea (Preity Zinta) are one couple. Dev has just earned a 5 million dollar soccer contract and Rhea has just landed an excellent job at a fashion magazine. They live with Dev's mom, played by Kirron Kher and their son, Arjun. The other couple includes Abhishek Bachchan, who plays Rishi, who is about to marry his lifelong friend, Maya (Rani Mukherjee). Amitabh Bachchan (Abhishek's father in real life) plays Sam, Rishi's father. This is an all-star cast and they all deliver wonderfully believable characters. You really feel for each character's misunderstandings, pain, and even happiness. Dev meets Maya on a park bench outside her wedding, where she is in her wedding dress and contemplating not getting married after all. She asks Dev, "What if I meet my true love after getting married?" This is the central question of the whole movie. Both of their lives change irrevocably immediately after this exchange, where Rhea returns to the house and marries Rishi. After they part, Dev is hit by a car. This ends his soccer career, the 5 million dollar contract, and leaves him bitterly dependent on his wife, Rhea. The movie moves forward four years, and we are reintroduced to the couples. Dev is now very cynical and feels cheated by his life and marriage, and Maya has found that she loves Rishi like a brother, not a wife, and cannot have children, furthering her resentment. Dev and Maya meet up again in a very odd way, and realize they have a lot in common with respect to their marriages. They decide to get together to brainstorm ways to reignite the spark with their spouses, with disastrous results. They slowly realize that their friendship is becoming something more and ultimately end up cheating on their spouses with each other. Although the topic of adultery is brought up in so many movies, Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna deals with it very delicately and maturely by reflecting how it causes pain to many people, for a long time. Because Rishi and Rhea move in the same business circles, the two families interact while the romance between Dev and Maya develops. There are some scenes such as when the two families get together for a dinner that is so awkward you also feel a part of the drama and feel shame and defiance along with Dev and Maya. In this particular scene, Dev reveals that he loves Maya to Rishi, Rhea, and both of their parents, and then plays it off like a joke, albeit a tasteless one. In another, Dev is walking to meet Maya and brings her flowers, but realizes both women are waiting at the opposite signal. The pain and horror on Maya's face when she realizes that Rhea is walking right next to her and also meeting Dev is heartbreaking to watch. What I especially like about this film is that they are ultimately caught. The movie does not end when Dev and Maya cheat on their spouses, because selfish love conquers all(!), regardless of the consequences (which seems to be the message in many other films. Often, expendable, in-the-way-of-true-love spouses are killed off to evade the problem of adultery). The movie also does not end when both marriages fail. This movie takes the audience into the next few years and shows how adultery can have far reaching effects. Dev and Maya are caught by their parents Sam and Kamal, sharing a good bye kiss at the train station. Sam has a heart attack and dies shortly after (from the shock, you can deduce), and Kamal asks her daughter-in- law, Rhea, if she can stay with her rather than with her own dishonorable son when they divorce. Dev and Maya both spend the next few years alone with their shame and guilt. The movie ends with Maya finding Dev with the blessing of Rishi and Rhea, but the road they took was very difficult. This is a good first film for those not used to Hindi cinema, the only problem I had was the subtitles did not follow the timing of the actual dialogue. It is also long, but so are most Hindi films. However, it does not have the flashy dance sequences that some object to. |
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