May times when a film is made, the filmakers put the religious connotations in the script to help put their views, ideas and ideologies forward for the consumption of audience. Thus it does not merely establishes a religion. Many times it deconstructs its concept in order to bring a new concept on screen. It may have its own gods and goddesses that may or may not confirm to the existing and prevailing beliefs of population in general. However harsh it may seem, such films tend to bust or reconfirm upon the existing myths depending upon the ideologies of the movie makers. A person need not be an official delegate of religious beliefs on order to project individual religious views, opinions or theories regarding its occurrence and prevalence. Similarly when we talk about religion and films, apart from the regular implications there is a capacity for newer and different parrallels that reflects the aesthetics along with ideologies. These merge yet divide films and religion as seperate entities that need a balanced merger in human life for maintaining their humanitarian balance.

There are days when I seem to be wake-up every now and then only to go back to the blissful vegetative lifestyle. But occasionally there comes a moment where I subconsciously seem to question my mood swings and try to put a stick up by lazy bone to sit up straight and think across my train of thoughts! On one such day as I am sipping my occasional cup of green tea, I all-of-a-sudden realized that things have not been same. The clock hand has shifted. I was another year older, felt more than that (huh)! The weather seems more erratic and chaotic and my husband more cynical (believe me, I do love him)! One thing that has moved on but not really changed is cinema. Well, hold your horses and don’t just roll-up your sleeves to label me as cinematically retarded for putting the above statement forward! All I am saying is cinema to me has remained the same despite the surrounding changes. It loyally continues to excite, entice, frustrate, depress and above all entertain and educate me.

This weekend, I literally threatened my husband with a promise to go on indefinite kitchen-curfew, if we didn’t leave our lovely cocoon and his form and comforting office to watch a movie! Fortunately, the tactic worked, and we were under our trusted blanket this Saturday night after pushing my 8-year-old toward his journey into dreams. As nostalgia hit me despite all his disapproval of my choice, I chose an old Bollywood success “Oh! My God”. The moment it started I knew it was a right decision. All earlier threats thrown at me by him were worth his mood swing. The movie without bias was a stunner! Time just flew and I could still feel the adrenalin rushing during the interval. Kudos to actor Paresh Rawal for carrying the whole movie on his sole shoulders throughout. Akshay Kumar as usual showed his spark in his character, but this was a Paresh Rawal baby from head to toe! Be it the theme, the concept, the dialogues, the whole ambiance, the ideology – it was a wholesome spiced-educator! Believe me, it is a marathon to be able to succeed in creating a formula that can express a thought without dragging itself into a preaching mode. Furthermore, it is almost an impossible task to carry a movie in today’s time without a staple ingredient of female cast. Even the item number seemed go with the flow since it created another important moment in the movie, thus becoming a means to the end! It is not often such movies are made that are total commercial in nature but still elaborating on a particular ideology or theory. I am critiquing the movie but am trying to poke at the parts that we as balanced audience can appreciate, whether we belong to any religion corner or perhaps a believer in none as well. We badly need to forgo the constraints of social, religious shackles in order to come above all for time is flying by us and before we will even be able to realise we might just move back to all those darker times from where we tried so hard to come out.

I may sound overboard with my appreciations; however, this is intentional as I don’t want audience to lose track of such intelligent movies. I would not wish them to just forget it as a passer-by. It is a genuine effort to make us reflect upon our faults in understanding our respective beliefs and we must appreciate it. It jolts us upright to see that we are afraid of what we believe is our religious identity. We almost forget that religion is to be loved and not to feared.  The film is an eye opener for all those who will close their vision once the movie is over. We badly need to study, think, and discuss upon our thoughts; for each belief for sure teaches us first to live in harmony with each other so that we can live in harmony with our ourselves!