With passing years, the urge of getting validated becomes a natural humane instinct, but most of the times it gets deluded with ‘Entitlement’. There is nothing wrong in seeking validation, but it eventually does take you to this catastrophic ‘nowhere’ of ‘I am the best’ toxicity. And that’s what we could wrap up in our hearts after we finished watching the Netflix’s autobiographical documentary ‘The Romantics’.
The four episode documentary brings YRF’s legacy on board, which we don’t deny; because every YRF movie has successfully GERMINATED the ‘delusionary’ love language (love towards anything); hideous, nonsensical song sequences in any screenplay, if you recall the movie Koi… Mil Gaya, Indian kids grew up watching ‘Jaadu’ as an alien; what worse could get than this? Men wearing warm long trench coats in zero degrees, and women romping around in their micro minis; and like that, the ‘legacy’ continued.
Yes, Nostalgia, definitely! No sarcasm on that. We were heavily grounded with it. The songs, the movie clips straight back from the eras when we were children, almost made us relive our childhood again, as we reminisced. There is no going away from the fact that Yash Raj Films holds almost of a quarter of our minds and emotions. The fascinations were for real. And to be honest, the documentary got us teary-eyed a bit.
But then…there is reality check!
What we were wondering is what is even the sole purpose of this documentary in the first place? What is with this blowing your own trumpet and scream how you have been responsible for people’s success or even ‘cinema’s success’? What kind of ‘saviour syndrome’ is it? Is it to save ‘Bollywood’ from the trash talk that is happening countrywide lately or is it to make Bollywood ‘inclusive’ in Indian cinema, as the south is now making howls?
In the entirety, we could hear how YRF became a ‘catapult’ to legendary actors like Amitabh Bachchan and others’ success. How it has given ‘India’ long-term entertainment, because truly ‘cinema is the best thing after sex’… but the movies that YRF (just not YRF, most other houses in the country too) has given to Indians are of very little worth to be celebrated as ‘CINEMA’ or ‘FILMS’. Most are about wishy-washy, crappy larger than life, misogynistic characters and mentally pabulum scripts.
The documentary touches upon nepotism; but as precedented, they got in constant denial. Of course, the audience decides who they want to see on the screen, but are you really missing the whole point or just loving this privilege shadow? Nepotism occurs when you almost force a ‘new face’ to the world out of nowhere. And even if the audience isn’t loving that ‘new face’, somehow or the other, you deliberately push the ‘name’ in the frontline because, of course, you have the power.
What appalled us is how beautifully everyone in the documentary denied the term ‘Bollywood’, asserting how they ‘hated’ it because it was prejudiced to be Hollywood’s counterpart. Who are you kidding? What game even is this? It has always been Hollywood’s counterpart, period. All of a sudden this thrive to get included in ‘Indian Cinema’ looks extremely juvenile. And the Indian audience isn’t ‘stupid’ to not pick up on where this ‘thrive’ is coming from! Bollywood has always lived in this rat race of becoming ‘Hollywood’, and never ever owned it up as Indian cinema as well. They all rush to grab the Oscars, the ultimate validation for all. Aamir Khan doesn’t believe in desi award shows, however, will give his arm and leg to gain Oscars limelight. Top of that, the poor failing representation of other tribes and communities in “HINDI” films says it all. Now this sudden withdrawal of the narrative looks preposterous.
Another string that we couldn’t miss out on is how conceited and dictatorial the house has been. How it is stated, ‘Aditya Chopra doesn’t like being told,’ says it all. Celebrating and making a big fuss that Aditya Chopra is coming in front of the ‘camera’ and participating in this stunning ‘scripted’ talk; note all the traits of being ‘pompous’. One of the most pioneering traits of pomp, is that you never own up to your failures. When it’s about your big box office numbers, the trumpet is on; but your ‘failures’ aren’t your responsibility, and then it’s just the audience that did not ‘give in’.
What is laughable, in the entire documentary, no one spoke about the failures from the past year, like Shamshera, Samrat Prithviraj and others. Were they waiting for Pathaan’s release, which is currently darting at the box office, to put this documentary out there for the viewers? For, the content certainly looks from the past and in waiting to be dished out post a hit, which took some time to come, of course. SRK mentioning about ‘yet to work with YRF in an action film’ while Pathaan has done wonders, seems strange in terms of timing and narrative.
Romantics is nostalgic, sugary, a PR led exercise and YRF saying how great YRF is, well, is obnoxiously lame. Apne miya mitthu …anyone?
And Aditya Chopra facing the camera must be big deal between Juhu and Bandra in Mumbai, for the rest, does it really matter?