Dil HaiTumhaara
Director: Kundan Shah
Music: Nadeem-Shravan; Lyrics: Sameer
Year: 2002
Running Time: 2 hours 55 minutes
This oddly formed film makes you think of
having stumbled across an extremely ugly baby that someone has left by the
roadside and you have every intention of doing the same, but it gurgles at
that moment, looking rather homely but cute and you take it home and have
it for dinner. No, I mean take it home and eventually become quite fond of
its quirks and idiosyncrasies. While watching the film in the theater, both
my friend and I turned to one another at the “dramatic” intermission pause
and each exclaimed, “this is a terrible film, but I’m totally loving it”.
By most measures, Dil Hai Tumhaara is a real clunker but as it gurgles along
I found myself thoroughly enjoying the silly humor – some intended, some
not -, an absurd and not very convincing plot, some dusty story devices that
are as old as film itself (a classic eavesdropping scene), lots of rather
fun overdone performances and loads of music. It makes for a surprisingly
engaging three hours, but you have to watch it with the appropriate goofy
attitude.
It is also an unusual Bollywood film in that it is very female centric with
the male actors around for either comic relief or to simply look good – and
it is the three female characters and their relationships with one another
that drive the story forward. Unfortunately, female oriented films generally
don’t fare well in India where the Hero is king of the box office. The 2001
Lajja that focused on four females to often wonderful effect died a quick
death at the box office, so it is a nice sign to see a film like this being
produced. Of course in a period in which nearly 90% of the films being made
in Bombay have been losing money – producers are more willing to look for
something different – but at the same time it is hard to imagine this lovable
little film will bring in the crowds.
Rekha thinks she is in a perfect marriage – o.k., so hubby doesn’t have time
to go out with their small daughter Nimmi on her birthday – but she happily
takes Nimmi to the local fair for some rides. Soon though the daughter is
screeching “daddy, daddy” and sure enough there is good old dad on another
ride with a woman and another small girl. Oops. It seems dad had been busy
on the side with his true love. Well he soon gets his as on the way home
his car goes off the road and over the side and dives headfirst 20 feet below
where it explodes and turns into a ball of fire. Yet he still manages a traditional
Bollywood death scene! With Rekha at his side, he begs her to take care of
his other daughter, Shalu, who miraculously survived without a scratch. Rekha
ponders and we already get a quick flashback of everything that took place
in the first five minutes of the film for those who arrived late. Dad utters
his last plea and promptly dies on cue and Rekha grudgingly takes in the
girl.
Doing her best Joan Crawford, Rekha showers Nimmi with love while giving
Shalu the cold heartless shoulder over the next number of years – and the
extremely homely child actress who plays Shalu is soon making menacing faces
and ripping up pillows. So much so that you fully expect the bad seed or
at least someone with mild homicidal tendencies – but instead she grows up
into the absolutely adorable Preity Zinta who shows all that inner anger
by sliding down the banister to piss old mom off or breaking the occasional
vase – pretty scary stuff indeed. In all these years Preity has yet to get
a mom’s hug – and she has the pictures to prove it - but older sis
– now the lovely Mahima Chaudhary – has never noticed this disparity of affection
from mom. But these are not the most observant of children as the six year
old Nimmi never noticed that all of a sudden she had a brand new sister or
the younger Shalu didn’t seem to notice that mom and dad were suddenly missing
– so they think they are real sisters and unaware of Shalu’s sordid past.
Not for long of course!
Mind you we are only about fifteen minutes into the film at this point so
I will speed up this review considerably! Now the film starts getting wacky.
Preity applies for a job at Khanna Industries – a totally corrupt company
being managed by two brothers in frightful wigs that are often on backwards
and who seem to be in a perpetual state of sweating – clearly bad guys –
but she hoodwinks them into a job by telling them that the distant owner
of the company – Mr. Khanna (Alok Nath) – is her uncle. Meanwhile the son
of Mr. Khanna, Arjun Rampal, has come back from business school abroad and
along with his Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee right hand men – CEO I and CEO
II (you know this by their badges) – is full of theories on productivity,
non-productivity productivity and productive productivity. He wants to close
the unprofitable plant, but his kindly father asks him to first visit it
and make sure something can’t be done to fix it. Arjun disguises himself
as the chauffeur’s son with slicked back nerdy hair, glasses and a look of
total stupidity and gets a job as a clerk and driver in the company working
for Preity. Even though she sends him on an amusing wild goose chase up a
mountain and across a lake in a boatful of sheep, he soon is of course falling
in love with her dimples. Nimmi though is totally besotted with him and when
they all discover who he really is mom is intent on marrying him off to Nimmi
and not Preity.
Throw into this pot a ventriloquist, Jimmy Shergill, with a giant puppet
who is in love with Preity, but unable to tell her. Not that I am an expert
on courtship, but a few love tips to future ventriloquists out there. Leave
your dummy at home. Don’t have intimate conversations with your dummy in
front of your hoped for love one. Don’t have your dummy appear smarter than
you are. Believe me, you are going to freak out the girl who will likely
think that you are looking for a kinky ménage a trois with the dummy
and her. The fact that you live in a little grass hut in an enchanted forest
probably won’t help either – or the fact that your dummy seems to move on
its own at times. Is it possessed or what? Thankfully he disappears from
the film when some Japanese talent searchers spot him and take him on a tour
of Japan where Hindi ventriloquists must be in high demand.
It all gets very complicated towards the end of course with Preity wanting
the love of her mom and sister, Arjun wanting her, Nimmi wanting him, Alok
wanting some good food, Jimmy wanting Preity, the dummy wanting Jimmy, the
mother wanting a coat hanger and revenge on her dead husband, the bewigged
sweaty guys wanting more screen time and the Japanese wanting their investment
back. The performances are far from nuanced, but highly energetic – especially
Preity who is non-stop movement and charm – and entertaining. The music is
not inspired, but certainly listenable with a few catchy tunes and the picturization
is well done with some clever moments. In an odd way, it’s all quite bad
and quite wonderful at the same time.
My rating for this film: 6.0
