The decade is coming to an end. But are ideas that have existed since the 90s coming to an end with it? Not really. Let’s explore two movies to see what we considered normal then, and what we consider normal now. First up is DDLJ or Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jaayenge, a movie that is universally loved. Raj is a “charismatic” young man who has failed college and lives off his father’s money. He is also undeniably a pervert. The first time he meets Simran is on a train journey, where upon instantly finding her attractive, he dangles a bra in front of her and snuggles up to her. She, very rightly finding him to be disgusting asks him to stop. But obviously he doesn’t. He keeps invading her personal space on the pretext of love.
What have we learnt today, women? If a man’s actions border on sexual harassment (later in the movie, he actually runs his hands over her butt) you must understand that movies such as DDLJ have been an inspiration to him.
It's sort of interesting to see that even after this, she falls in love with him after they spend a night together in a barn of sorts. Suddenly, everything he had done to her no longer matters to her. In fact, she fights against her father's choice of a marriage partner, tears her family apart with her indecision, all for a man who couldn't respect her as a woman. Though it could be pointed out that a woman rebelling because she didn't want to marry the man who was chosen for her portrays strength in that she doesn’t bow down to her father, it is a bit anticlimactic that she had to fall into the clutches of patriarchy after fighting against a similar set-up.
The movie had shown only Simran's father as unbelievably conservative, but what that movie depicted as a modern young man was indeed personification of conservatism at its worst.
As the 90s have already gone by, and as I have unwillingly accepted that many were on the same wavelength as the director of this movie, I turn to this decade, to look for better movies. I am glad to say that there are many movies that have indeed made me feel better about Bollywood. However, there are also many that make me doubt whether development has indeed taken place or not. For example, we have Kabir Singh.
Now, I do have a reason for choosing Kabir Singh. While I agree that there have been beautiful movies that have come out this decade such as Queen, that explores a woman become truly independent, I must come back to Kabir Singh. Because it highlights the ideas we are surrounded by. Kabir Singh is the remake of a telugu movie with the exact same plotline. The public loved the movie...twice. It showcases what we deem to be normal, what we identify as romantic and what we find more fulfilling. Queen didn’t get such a response.
If you haven't already watched that sad excuse for a romance, then I implore you to read ahead and NOT watch it after all. It's jarring. And the sort of response this movie got has really made me scared of venturing into the world, wondering what the men of today will learn from the alcoholic, abusive, hot-headed, forceful and remorseless beast that is Kabir Singh.
He is extremely intelligent, a genius almost, when it comes to medicine. But as a human being, he's detestable. And here we need to talk about the weird connection people make between being a genius (which is arguably an anomaly) and having defining quirks that can be called eccentricities. Some people flip the scenario and end up believing that the road to becoming a genius is paved by embodying these qualities. Which therefore gives people more incentive to start acting like the crazy man that Kabir is.
This man spots a girl on campus and decides that she is going to "be his." He doesn't know her name, has never talked to her, she probably hasn't even seen him. He goes into a classroom filled with boys in her year and threatens them, warning them to never make a move on her because "there are so many others in the world." He pulls her out of class, teaches her on a daily basis alone, decides who her friends are going to be, is close to beating up (or in some cases does beat up) anybody who does or says things he doesn't agree with (regarding both himself and Preeti) and even dared to hold a woman at knife-point and asked her to undress. What are we supposed to make of this monstrosity?
When he wants to ask for her hand in marriage later in the movie and her family vehemently refuses, he "gives" her 6 hours to make things right. He shouts abuses at her when she talks back and is never in any mood to listen to anybody who doesn't agree with him. When Preeti, the woman in question, finally gets married to another man (whom she leaves immediately because she was so in love with Kabir and the machismo that oozes off of him), he gets into drugs and alcohol and continues to inflict harm on himself. There's nothing really wrong with cinema portraying a man who spirals out of control due to loss of whatever kind. People do lose control. But to glorify this spiralling, to validate his actions, to elevate him to the level of a hero is simply absurd. It's unacceptable.
The public has exalted Kabir Singh, a man who only loved the idea of a woman who never talked back. Kabir didn’t love Preeti herself, because the minute she had anything to say for herself, he shut her down. He treated her like she had no right to speak against him, like he had the right to control everything that happened to both him and her. As if her say on her own life, on anything actually, didn’t matter at all. It upsets me that people are unable to open their eyes to the misogyny and male supremacy highlighted in this movie. Society has preferred to call this a “raw, innocent romance,” when it is clearly nothing but a story of a dominating, egoistic male who chose a plaything for himself. There are, in short, several things wrong with Kabir Singh, and being a drug addict and an alcoholic while a doctor and performing a crucial surgery with cocaine in his blood isn’t the worst he has done.
There are a few questions that come to mind when I think of all those who have loved this film. Would you like to be treated as a possession? Would you like to be ordered to become friends with somebody else? Would you be okay, if somebody forced you to be “theirs” without your consent? Is it really “realistic and intense” when your partner, the one who claims to love you, controls every move of yours?
The definition of love has gone from becoming obsolete to completely toxic. A movie like Kabir Singh coming out and being a blockbuster seems only natural now, considering how DDLJ is something many have grown up with and immensely enjoyed. When we've normalized something as questionable as the acts committed by Raj in DDLJ, we allowed as a society to let this issue evolve into something much worse. This was bound to happen one day. Something as in-your-face and brutally misogynistic as Kabir Singh has finally come to the forefront, and this should awaken many from their deep slumber.
This is, I hope the reader realizes, not about Kabir Singh. Not at all. This is about the dangers of misidentifying toxic, abusive behaviour as love and manipulation and control as affection. This is about the female box, the man box, toxic masculinity. This is about glorifying the very things that support patriarchy and sexism. And this is wrong. This must make us more aware of the problems surrounding gender, to make us realize that this issue is very real and needs to be dealt with.
These movies you see, are very real examples of what is wrong with our society. The issue of consent, objectification, toxicity and the need for men to be dominating and forceful to be recognized as men. This movie deals with all of those things. It affirms behaviours that are toxic and glorifies oppression and male chauvinism. And that is a problem.
"All too often women believe it is a sign of commitment, an expression of love, to endure unkindness or cruelty, to forgive and forget. In actuality, when we love rightly we know that the healthy, loving response to cruelty and abuse is putting ourselves out of harm's way."
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