In Tapan Sinhas’s classic comedy “Golpo Holeo Sotti” [A story but a truth] there was a certain shocking dialogue by Rudraprasad, playing the role of an editor sort in an Advertisement agency, where he says “The present world business is run by shock therapy”; and then adds “The more you put shock elements in your products, the more people will bash you in public, but could never restrict them from having a taste of the same”.
I guess this good old shock business had started many years ago, well before “Golpo Holeo Sotti” hit the screen. Being a die heart fan of “Dark shade” movies, by the likes of “Omkara”, “Subha Maharat” or “Basic Instinct”, it was virtually impossible for me to miss Rituparno Ghosh‘s “Chokher Bali” [A sand grain that causes eyes to water] on theaters, a celluloid experiment on Rabindranath Tagore’s original novel, over which the writer once repented, even begged sorry after penning it down. CB was a Pujo release, and I was so desperate to watch it that I bought the ticket on the night of “Nabami” [the 3rd day of Durga Puja], and saw it all alone.
The information literally put my jaws off when I came to know that CB was written in the year of 1930. CB as a novel is a very mature, passionate, at the same time wicked in its progression and more in the league of the western novels in freedom. A widow belonging to a Bengali household, during 1930s, can be anything but thinking her in a desperate polygamic mould was a tough asking. Binodini, the protagonist female character, played by Aishwariya Rai in CB, was a woman exactly of that sort. Now I guess, you have no problem to understand what I meant few whiles ago when I had expressed my thoughts on the tradition of shock elements in business. The shock was so striking for me, that even I shocked some of my friends, when I went for a Ms. Rai starrer, missing the second last night celebration of Durga Puja. Actually Rai is a woman whom I always hated for her pathetic acting skills, and extreme haughtiness on her beauty, and showing it off time again though the world knows it already and acknowledged.
Some one said, only God can understand what’s going through a lady’s mind. Looking at Binodini, I doubt whether God is taking credits with out proofs. Binodini is a lady, who does not take her any less than a man or may be a bit more than the masculine group if i am not wrong. For every question asked by a man, for every Mickey taken out by a man on her, she has an answer, that too a very strong and logical one. This makes Binodini a different cup of tea than other females of that time, forget widows! I guess her attitude and arrogance, makes more impact on a readers or viewers mind, because she is a widow. But whats makes Binodini most special is that she is an out an out polygamic character. Mahendra and Bihari, both the men rejected her as their life partner. Probably that was like niggle to her ego. Binodini came down like a house of fire on them.
Rabindranath Tagore, might be sorry for the way he sketched out Binodini, long ahead of time, but for me Binodini’s vulnerability after getting rejected, and then getting deserted in between the fun of love and lust of married life (or any relationship that provides the two), is a timeless one, was yet to be touched. This is something that is embedded in most of the educated female’s mind, who can understand what game the opposite sex is playing or have played with her.
After a breakup (Here loosing husband) a Man can become a Devdas, or a traitor of a handful, but there hides the most important factor to be a Casanova: How many possibilities, permutations and combinations a man can manage while taking on many girls at the same time, absolutely killing his emotions, fundamental values and ethics. I guess it’s tough for a Man, because neither his thinking is so robust in fixing a problem which is far fetched from sports and study, nor his reflexes are so good to tell lies. For a girl, that’s a cake walk, because for a girl, she has been honing these skills through out her life. Just look at a girl and a boy of a primary school and compare their actions. Though in most cases [I said most cases] the boys are academically good and more skillful in solving a math problem than a girl, but he is the more vulnerable and non-trustable one when it comes to bringing all the materials back to his home that he carried to his school or managing and giving a whole new look to a mistake that he did. Girls are by their gender brilliant at that.
The best three scenes for me in CB are:
1. In between an oral sex and a bit of necking, which comes as shocker on screen, Binodini whispers at the ears of Mahendra that her husband died in Plague. Mahendra backs out and Binodini bursts with laughter. Though Aishwariya’s acting in this particular section is pathetic and an absolute show off as usual, but I want to clap for Rituparna. Binodini keeps on mentioning the word “spleen”, and abuses Mahendra for backing off being a doctor. I guess the first revenge for rejecting her as his wife. Binodini literally plays with emotions of both the men; she knows how to tackle Mahendra like a dog, what are the ways of keeping Ashalata and Bihari away when she is in the company of Mahendra. Even once she said that it wont be any bad to see Mahendra and Bihari figting with each other. She knew how to Tame fire with fire.
2. Ashalata is a simple girl, who didn’t have the privilege of primary education in her life. Her thinking is simple and mostly inspired from the society’s common notions. When Ashalata and Binodini both where hanging their washed clothes on the rope, the former suddenly discovered a red love mark on the upper bosom part of the later. Ashalata is so simple, and puppetish that she can not even think her hubby as a Traitor, though she knows Mahendra is the only male in the house that interacts frequently with her Bosom friend “Chokher Bali”. Though I contradict with Ashalata, but mind you she was yet to get the real pinch of reality.
3. The Last scene is when Binodini comes to Bihari’s house at night for a shelter, wearing a store of Jewelries. Bihari is reluctant to think Binodini as his life partner, as Binodini pleads to him to take her like that way. She is so much desperate to get a male in her life that she does not keep her away from abusing Bihari, “There is no credit being Swami Vivekananda Bihari babu, if that’s the case then live in Dakkhineswar”.
In spite of living such a tumultuous and chaotic life Binodini does not marry in the end. Wonder why Rituparna was reluctant to end it like that way, being so bold through out the story. Probably He went by the original novel, did not have the courage to tamper the novel so much, when Tagore copyright issue still prevailed.
Though CB did not do too well at the BO, but for me I went to see the movie only because of Binodini (not Ms.Rai) and I was given the exact dose as the doctor had ordered. By the way, Aishwariya might have looked like a diva, umpteen times in her career, but none comes before the scene in CB, when Aishwariya matches eyes with her husband Bipin in Benarasi. The jarring of her face, her tension, her wide eyes, still reminds me of another face, once I came across in my life. Well that’s another story.
