RAB NE BANA DI JODI (A match made by God)

Runtime: 164min 4secs
Tagline: There is an extraordinary love story in every ordinary Jodi.
Language: Hindi
Written & Directed by: Aditya Chopra
Dialogues by: Jaideep Sahni

Hindi cinema has been a major point of reference for popular Indian culture. It has been an effective instrument for shaping and expressing popular Indian sentiment. Movies by Yash Raj studios, especially, have been the most widely distributed and well-received. Concepts of love, marriage, family, and a shallow look into a more meaningful existence, are those most frequently addressed by these films. Kitsch like this arises out of a failed attempt at art or simply because art has had to take a backseat to the more foreseeable advantages of a commercial undertaking like the movie to be analysed, ‘Rab ne bana di Jodi’.

Synopsis
Surinder Sahni (Shah Rukh Khan) works for Punjab Power and leads a simple life, until his simple life is turned around when he meets & instantly ends up in love with young & bubbly fun-loving Taani (Anushka Sharma) on the eve of her wedding. Tragedy strikes, however (predictably), and the unknown fiancé is killed en route in an accident. With the imminent death of her own father, as a result of the shock on hearing this devastating news, leaves Taani virtually numb to what’s going on around her because of which, when her father asks her to marry Suri, she doesn’t give it a second thought simply consenting to that promise, made by Suri to his dying teacher.
What follows is an unfortunate, but unavoidable, series of events that shows the two newlyweds working out the chinks in this marriage of obligation. At the outset, the audience is made aware of the fact that Suri has fallen instantly in love with Taani, but that our heroine is completely unaware of these feelings she has stirred into life in her seemingly docile, insipid husband. In order to help her overcome her grief, Suri allows her to join a dance class, something that has finally brought a spark of life back to her eyes again, and decides to join her. Enter Raj, our comic relief (or so they were hoping) who is full of life and can say things to her that mild-mannered Suri would never dream of. In the end, owing to the lack of any real opposition (a villain, an integral part of any Bollywood movie), Suri becomes his own worst enemy. His alter ego Raj seems to be doing a whole lot better with his wife; getting her to feel things that the traditionalist Suri never could. He wants his wife to love him for who he is, without having to change just to make her happy. Because, in the end, he’s the man and therefore feels it’s his right to demand his wife’s full loyalty, even if staying married to him as Suri and not Raj makes her miserable. Predictably, all ends well, and I’ll leave it at that.

The common man’s hero is the recurring theme in almost all the movies of the last 5 years. The need for a relatable character, after a decade of romantic heroes that magically have everything work out for them, what with their superhuman strength and financial and social successes, was never felt more than at present. With movies like Dasvidanya and Khosla ka Ghonsla on offer, a Rab ne seems to be the most logical choice for Chopra after his eight-year-long hiatus in that the subject was not wholly original, and the way in which it was handled, on the whole, was just a little too simple. Also prevalent in the movie, is the triumph of the ordinary over the super. That is, just as Clark Kent takes of his glasses and is transformed from an average Joe into the world’s most powerful man, so our Suri (Sharukh) transforms into a fun-loving, philosophizing jock, from the more conventional engineer, a reference to most Indian men of this decade. Every person dreams of being more than they could ever be and here is where wish fulfilment comes in ' a means of fulfilling that dream through a character in a film who is just like you or me. Except, in this movie, this idea that has proved to be a success in the past, is turned on its head. Not only is the lead an ordinary working-class man, he’s a pitiable one. But that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have the right to a happy life because that’s how the righteous are rewarded.

No amount of invasion by foreign ideologies and sensibilities is going to deny this man his share of happiness because he has stayed true to himself and his culture. He doesn’t engage in flirting and fun (albeit with his own wife) when he’s Suri, and not the deplorable roadside Romeo, Raj. Everything that represents a western way of life, like short or tight clothes, raunchy dances, or a blurring in the rules of male-female relationships, is to be looked down upon because, in the end, the old ways always win out over the new. Shah Rukh Khan’s place as every ordinary man’s hero is reinforced through sequences like in the song ‘Phir milenge, Chalte chalte’, where apart from the homage to Indian film and those associated with them, like Raj Kapoor, Dev Anand, Shammi Kapoor, Rajesh Khanna & Rishi Kapoor respectively, there is a more subtle reinforcement of Khan’s status as everyman’s idol through the pairing with actresses, performing with him in different parts of the song, all of whom have worked with him at some point of time, churning out box office hits like Dilwale Dulhaniya, or Kaal ho na ho.

This film reaffirms the notion that a woman can only be happy when she is under the protection of a man, maybe her husband or someone she has a strictly chaste relationship with. We are able to perceive this in her utter misery after she realizes she is somewhat taken by Suri’s alter ego, Raj. The fact that she has not been able to be truly happy in her marriage stems from the fact that she believes her husband married her out of some sense of obligation to her father, rather than any real feeling towards herself. Her realization towards the end of the film, that her husband is the only man she could ever truly come to love, not only proffers a certain divinity to the husband, or man rather, himself, but also to their relationship as a married couple. Essentially, the women in the audience are very subtly told that it’s all well and good to find yourself an acceptable distraction, which in this case is dance, so long as you always find your way back to your own family, your husband and your rightful place in his bed. Taani, when confronted by Raj’s love for her, as well as her own reciprocation of those feelings, uses her marital status as a means of protecting herself, and thereby her “purity” as an Indian woman, who cannot be expected to throw away her vows of marriage just for the sake of her own happiness. Also, by not clearly stating the intensity of her feelings for this unacceptable vagabond, by claiming that she “cannot see God in him” i.e. does not feel that this union will ever be blessed by God, she reiterates the fact that an Indian woman’s happiness lies with her husband and no other man.

There are clear references to the influx of foreign goods into our markets, and the resultant change in our lifestyles through sequences like the one with the Japanese sumo wrestler, and Suri’s purchase of a Hyundai car, in exchange for his old two-wheeler Bajaj, just because he now considers himself to be a family man.
Also, the fact that almost all of the movie was shot in India, especially in Amritsar, shows a certain degree of regionalism and an adherence to the idea that not all things western are better than anything your own country has to offer. Suri’s match with the sumo wrestler is a scene which conveys this newly-arisen nationalistic sentiment in people all over India, on account of all the foreign attacks on our soil, and also this feeling of trying to protect our sovereignty from international giants like Japan that are in our markets via their imports, especially cars. His ultimate victory over the inflamed Japanese giant, and crowd’s eventual support and recognition of him as the ultimate victor further reiterates this patriotic sentimentality.

As a by-product of mass culture, it is not only effective in expressing certain existing opinions but also in conveying a few of its own. Although its reception by the jaded urban audience was less than satisfactory, its reception in quarters that matter, that it could have the most influence over, is just as the makers of this film desired. And it will be a long time yet before we see such blatantly commercial output being replaced by films that perpetuate the means to a more meaningful, far-from-materialistic existence.