Racism is a vice we have been facing and battling within and outside our country. To raise the issue in a film is important, to manipulate it, bollywood-ize is just trivializing the issue. Let me explain with an example. In Chak de India Sukh Lal ji welcomes (only) the girls from north east like they were guests from some other country. To which girls say we are from India only! Its subtle, intelligent and drives home the point so well than creating unnecessary melodrama. It made me cringe and feel immense guilty of having welcomed my friends from north east in college in DU. I should have been as cool with students from Manipur as I was with students from Mumbai. In Mary Kom when she loses to a Haryanavi girl, she loses cool, hurls a chair at the judges and accuses them of racism. And it wasnt even racism because one of the judges was a boxing federation member who was already upset with Mary for saying not so flattering things about the federation to the press. It was more of a person issue than racism. Its this superficial, simplistic almost naive way of story telling that takes away from the inspiring story that Mary Kom could be! Because sometimes just a simple hello, a welcome is more effective than shouting from rooftops.
Posted on: Fri, 05 Sep 2014 11:51:50 +0000