complexities..

As humans we all see things differently. Over a period of time as we grow, we all evolve, develop differently depending on various happenings, events, surroundings we go through, lots of events leave lots of imprints on our character, some subtle some rather strong, some imprints are such we dont even realise…

There was a big hooplah recently when Ramadoss banned showing smoking in movies, citing it affected kids when their superstars smoke they feel compelled to… before going any further I would like to make it clear I am not with Ramadoss… for sure… but I dont know where I stand either… sigh… I am sure there must be creative freedom and freedom of expression…

But the reason of this post is to just point a huge influence, I think one movie, one scene has had in my mind… for loooooong !!!! I still dont know if I am fully over it… Infact a lot of characters of Amitabh have influenced me in many ways… I am true bhagat of Amitabh, I connect strongly to his character in the movie Shakti and Trishul.

But nothing compares to the effect I had when as a kid I saw the movie Deewar, the plot of Deewar is about Vijay and Ravi, two brothers, both love their mother a lot, but their father abandons them because of treachery by evil villains… The elder son, Vijay, is slightly more mature than Ravi and is deeply affected by the incidents. All injustice seems to have happened to only him… then one day when his mother takes him to a temple, he decides to not climb the steps of a temple, totally having lost faith that any God ever existed… Coz actually if God existed, his mother would not have ever had to go through the things she had to go through… !!!

I am sure all who have seen the movie, Deewar remember that scene… for me Vijay was a cult character from one of India’s most successful movies. The guy loves his mother to bits, takes the wrong path in life, and unlike Ravi is bitter about life…

I connected with the story, quite a bit, as a kid, never before have I confessed this to anyone but my wife a few days back, when we actually went to a temple (btw that was my 2nd visit to a temple in about 3 years).

I have just realised that somewhere the movie affected me a bit too much. I dont know if you ever have felt or experienced something like this. I used to refuse to go to the temple, I have stayed outside, whilst my Mom visited. I have always said there is no God, that its silly to fast, or follow any religious practice. I think in many ways I took to eating non-veg in the beginning even though I was a Jain, was probably my way of showing God that I am rebelling against him. The fact that I love the flavor et all came in much later, but when I took to it, I was surely acting against God and in some ways my silly mind thought that because Vijay fought against God, I must. Sounds silly ‘innit ?

In some ways it was bravado to do what should not be done… I just dont know why, but then like Vijay goes to the headquarters of the goons while they were trying to find him to kill him… so must I !!! 😐

I have ridiculed all those who fast… ! especially if they are doing it for religious reasons… Somewhere somehow my naive mind thought I was ridiculing God.. ! 😐

I’d like to think I have grown out of that silliness and whilst I am not too religious or will follow any custom for the sake of it. I believe in my God, which resides inside me and I must do things that are just in my eyes. I believe in Karma, what we do, we get.

But now when I again think of what Ramadoss meant…. does it really affect kids ??? like it did affect me ?? huh ??

btw if you didnt know I smoke and promise not to give up… so I really am not one of those who doesnt smoke and so wants a ban on smoking ! Infact I love movie stars smoking and think they look rather cool… but then thats me… sigh… !! I dont know how many brickbats I get for this last para…

sigh… at the end of the post, I dont even know if I make even an iota of sense…

Do you think any movie has ever affected you so much ??