How to ruin a great movie? Ask an Indian production to remake it. Previously Amir Khan ran Memento aground by making Ghajini and now Lal Singh Chaddha remade Forrest Gump with Indian flair.
While the attempt is good, story line is solid and Amir and the supporting cast doing pretty good job, it's the nationalistic policies, the sycophancy which destroyed it. But more about it later.
First the character Lal Singh doesn't grow up at all. He goes from a young boy to a young adult to more mature man. However, between the young boy and young adult, at least 10 years pass but he and the girl (Rupa - Kareen Kapoor) stay the same age. Emergency was lifted in 1977, India won the WC cricket in 1983, Operation Blue Star and Indira's assassination happened in 1984 and demolition of Babri Masjid happened in 1992. From 1977 to 1992 it is 15 years but both the children and the mother had no change in their looks or growth. Dates are not mentioned specifically but the events included and shown can be useful to determine the time period. That was very lazy writing and sloppy directing.
Now to even bigger problem which plaguing Indian movie industry for sometime now. No matter what the topic or the movie theme is, they somehow find a way to slander non-Hindus. The news reporter who read out Indira's assassination report on the TV. He started by saying "world's largest democracy ruler", which is not incorrect but totally superfluous and then mentioned that she was shot due to revenge sought by Sikhs for the Golden Temple operation. That was way too early to utter those words as the report was made almost immediately after the assassination. That was aimed at Sikh community for whatever reasons best known to director, producer and the writers.
They also showed Ayodhya incident but only in the passing, hardly mentioning anything of worth because that was by Hindu fanatics. Then of course they shifted towards Muslims and stayed with that age-old trope almost until the end of the movie. They stopped short of mentioning Pakistan at length but kept on showing how Muslims could not be trusted and Mohammad Paaji was even shown trying to kill Lal Singh by shooting in his back while being carried away from the battle field. There was a Muslim preacher on the TV stating the common misconception found among Muslims and non-Muslims alike that when they die, there will be 72 virgins waiting for them. Then Mohmmad Paaji joins Lal Singh in the business venture, excels at it, makes a lot of money for everyone while being treated with respect and love by everyone especially Lal Singh. However, when he sees the Mumbai Attack on TV, that is when he realizes that "how wrong he was" and how people are led astray by religious fanatics.
All this is true but it had no place in this solid story. It was pointless to go so much in detail about these events. And the icing on the cake was the last bit. The sycophant gesture. A grand poster of Modi (Indian PM) was splashed across the screen, stopping at it for half a second or so.
Do the movie makers in India think that their movies will not succeed if they don't toe the line of BJP and the chest thumping which comes with the territory?
This movie is produced by Amir Khan productions. Perhaps he has to prove his love for India and the government of India in order to stay relevant.
Whatever the case, this movie was great idea but the makers are guilty of dereliction due to their biased beliefs and not staying true to the subject matter.
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