I was watching Bora in the late 00 and early periods Dock rom-com grown up s. They were the first kind of movies I remember seeing, in the dark, cavernous theaters of the sprawling multiplex in South Calcutta, where I was born. Then, at the age of seven, my mum and I moved to London, and somehow these joyful, bombastic, colorful musicals took on more importance: as slow as the Bengali food we made and Indian classical music playing in our living room. On Sunday morning, they formed a bridge to their distant home.
Not only that, but like all good romantic comedies, they are infinitely comforting no matter what country they come from. During our first winter in the UK, my mum and I would go to the local cinema and watch three-hour epics like Aditya Chopra’s Shah Rukh Khan and Amitabh Bachchan*). When I got chickenpox at my new school, I spent a week curled up in a blanket watching the VCD of World of Dance Dil To Pagal Hai on repeat. I still associate its high-octane opening numbers with the foul smell of calamine lotion.
Re-watching them now, I’m struck by how formulaic they are compared to contemporary Indian food, stuffed full of predictable marriage plots, stern elders and a line from Mumbai The same cast of stars. But the music is powerful, the costumes are lavish, and the performances deftly balance broad comedy with overwhelming emotion. It’s also hard to overstate the influence they had on me as a kid, making me see actors who, albeit pale and airbrushed, looked more like me than actors in early British rom-coms s, and play a starring role in their own lives.
Below, browse the seven “1995” and “
