Aishwarya Rai: Old Movie...;) :)))

Watched this one:

Now just gonna post some pictures and will write about it later...

*****

Just had an idea maybe we should open here a topic just with her pics? These are awesome by the way! So how was the movie?

PS Owlet, welcome back!

Mag wrote:

Just had an idea maybe we should open here a topic just with her pics?

Why not???
Here is a beautiful picture from Mumtaz...

Mag wrote:

So how was the movie?

Well...
That's what one of reviews says:
I do not know what to say.
I am curious to konw what was the original intent of the novel Ravindranath Tagore? I am sure this talented writer wrote it with some purpose.
Can anybody explain something about this novel.(Forget the movie!)

I feel the same....

And here is another one:

This is supposed to be the most daring stories written by Tagore. His heroine, Binodini was a highly educated woman, deeply passionate, arrogant, manipulative, and seductive. She is a widow who seduces her bestfriend's husband and breaks her marriage and lives openly with him.
The character is supposed to be very passionate and sexy. She is supposed to have this hot sexual affair with her best friend's husband but there was no chemistry whatsoever between her and Prasanjeet. An actress who actually knows how to act and knows how to speak Bengali would have made this movie a much better one. Binodini was a firecracker and a ballbreaker and Ashwairya is not talented enough to carry this role...don't know, maybe they are right...but it was nice watching her in the movie...

Bad thing about this movie was that there were a lot of loose ends. A lot of things happen which don't make any sense or are not explained clearly.

Anyway, I've got the movie and gonna watch it again...

Mag wrote:

PS Owlet, welcome back!

Thanks Mag...
Happy to be back......looking forward for reading what was written while I was absent and write more...

I take it so you still liked the movie in spite of not very good opinions. Oh but eventhough I haven't seen this one, as a fan I completely agree - even if she makes it bad, a movie with Aishwarya is worth watching just because of her!
But yet this all "deeply passionate, arrogant, manipulative, and seductive" definitely doesn't suit her, just what were they thinking?!

Owlet, our nest is more fun with you here, but we were trying to keep it alive!

Mag wrote:

I take it so you still liked the movie in spite of not very good opinions. Oh but eventhough I haven't seen this one, as a fan I completely agree - even if she makes it bad, a movie with Aishwarya is worth watching just because of her!

You know I wanted to buy a Hindi movie......actually I was looking for Devdas coz I haven't seen it yet and meant to... ...but couldn't find Devdas...
And out of available movies this one caught my attention......wanted to see Bengali life of a previous century...
I was watching the movie with a friend and we both were getting disappointed by it...
But anyway, I want to use it to brush up my Hindi...

Mag wrote:

But yet this all "deeply passionate, arrogant, manipulative, and seductive" definitely doesn't suit her, just what were they thinking?!

Agree...that's why I couldn't get it at the beginning...she was not this kind of person and I didn't want to watch a movie about something like that...

Mag wrote:

Owlet, our nest is more fun with you here, but we were trying to keep it alive!

Well done guys!!!
I love everybody here and was missing u all a LOT!!!

If you cannot find Devdas but want to watch it, then it is here with translation:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKkWM9Z6D4I
But speaking honestly I didn't like it so much. Too dramatic or I don't know...

Owlet wrote:

I love everybody here and was missing u all a LOT!!!

Yes! happy u r back at last!

I've watched it. Well what can I say... Aishwarya's character was somewhat bitchy and strangely that suited her... or strange why her manipulation actually worked.. after all another girl was not less beautiful.
As for the story, lots of questions left and I feel the same about the novel as written in that review. Perhaps reading it would make some things clear.
So some of the questions are:
Who actually is Bali? First Ashalata named Binodini Choker Bali and then Binodini was addressing her as Bali. (?)
Why did Binodini live in that house? Just because her best friend let her stay there?
What relation had Behari to that family? Did he have an affair with Ashalata? There're some letters from him to her? Or to whom?
Actually Mahendra could marry Binodini too (?) but why he didn't?
Why did she stay with nuns at the beginning or what was it?
What was the deal with English?
Why is it a sin to drink tea?? Was it just some prejudice?
And so on....
Oh and she had same kind of binoculars as in Devdas.

I'm very happy u've seen it Mag...
Now I have somebody to talk to about it...
Though I need to watch it again to answer some of your Qs...
And I haven't read Tagor's novel, so was looking on the net for what they say about that... ...and that's what they say :

Feminism has breed in Tagore's novel be it TEEN KANYA, CHARULATA or GHARE BAIRE.
Rabindranath Tagore's novel Choker Bali appeared for the first time in Bangadarshan in 1902. The novel created a stir in the Bengali society as the three women characters ushered a change of sexual desire in society. It also voiced concern on certain issues that were biting the society then. So the novel has a reference of widow remarriage and sati Pratha. The novel also peeps at the insatiable hunger of widow lady whose clamour of sex is worth.

The story is about the relationships between four young people, two men and two women. Mahendra is a spoilt young dandy, the pride and despair of his widowed mother Rajlakshmi. Behari, his closest friend is almost like another son to Rajlakshmi. Both young men are studying medicine. Like all doting mothers, Rajlakshmi wants to see her son happily married and she would like to see Behari settled as well. She has a girl in mind for Mahendra in the form of Binodini, the daughter of a friend of hers who comes from the same village as Rajlakshmi. Binodini is beautiful and accomplished, but the whimsical Mahendra chooses to refuse her as a wife, having seen only her photograph.
Binodini is from a poor family who doesn't have enough money to give dowry for her marriage. Her parents propose her marriage to two medical students Mahendra and Bihari. Neither of them agrees to the proposal. Those days as it was a disgrace to keep an unmarried girl over 12 at home, she is married off to a poor sickly man who dies soon after.

Binodini is the main protagonist of the novel happens to marry an old man and thus is deprived of any sexual intimacy. Binodini now comes to stay as a maid to Rajalakshmi and soon comes across Mahendra and Behari. Now Binodini knows that both of them refused to marry her when she was a kid.

Mahendra finally settles down with Ashalata, a girl who was originally engaged to Behari. It is obvious from the beginning that despite their closeness, there is a spirit of competition between the two men. Mahendra wants what Behari has and expects Behari to give in to him. Perversely, Rajlakshmi is not pleased with the marriage, especially since Mahendra insists on spending all his time with his new wife and skipping classes at college. She storms out of the house and takes refuge in her childhood home.

There she meets Binodini and impulsively brings her back to Calcutta with her. The reasons why she does this are unclear - she might have wanted a companion to talk to, a diversion from her sister in law who lives in the same house and who, incidentally, happens to be Ashalata's aunt. Or perhaps because Binodini seduces her with small luxuries like English tea which she has learned to make from the nuns who taught her.

In Calcutta, Binodini meets the two young men who she might have married. She is also keenly aware of the life she has lost and resents the fact that the naïve Ashalata has what she cannot. The death of her husband has condemned Binodini to the deprived life of a widow, forced to shroud herself in white and eat a strict diet of vegetarian food, remarriage being forbidden by the strict Hindu codes of conduct.

She begins to manipulate Ashalata so as to get closer to the young men. She pits her knowledge of English and her sophistication against Ashalata's simplicity. She also uses her sexual experience gained over one year of marriage against Ashalata's relative innocence. Ashalata, on the other hand, is delighted to have someone else to confide in. She gives Binodini a pet name, 'Chokher Bali', literally meaning Sand in the Eye.

Now Binodini tries to seduce Mahendra and Behari on the other hand is completely magnetized by her resplendent beauty. Binodini also forms a strong bonding with Ashalata. What unravels is a revolt from Binodini, who refuses to bow down before her sexual desire. She also portrays her fight against Mahendra.

Binodini uses her intellect to intrigue Mahendra and Behari. She embarks on an affair with Mahendra. However the affair does not stay a secret for long. Ashalata accidentally discovers the love letters written by her husband to Binodini. She decides to bury her grief in the holy city of Benares, a place of refuge for lost souls and takes her aunt with her. Rajlakshmi, wise to Binodini's intrigues insults her and forces her to leave the house.

In despair, Binodini appeals to Behari, asking him to marry her or make her his mistress. Her status in society depends on being the possession of a man. Behari refuses, explaining that he cannot forgive her for her behaviour. Binodini decides to return to her country home. There she contemplates the options open to her - suicide or exile to Benares, and chooses Benares. Mahendra turns up at her doorstep and agrees to escort her to the holy city. He also agrees to a platonic relationship.

Benares is a kind of revelation for Binodini, a melting pot of death, despair and lost hopes set against the canvas of eternity. From Mahendra's boat she spies on this new world through her binoculars. She also catches a glimpse of a visibly pregnant Ashalata. This shocks her into remorse. She decides to renounce Mahendra. At this crucial moment, Behari arrives at Benares bringing the news of Rajlakshmi's death with him. He realises Binodini's plight and asks her to marry him.

Binodini agrees, but when the wedding day arrives, she is nowhere to be found. She leaves a note for Ashalata. In the note Binodini says that freedom is the final reality, the place where one belongs, the only thing that one can call one's own. She advises Ashalata to raise her child differently, open to the world and its influences, unlike her generation caged within four walls.

We'll talk about the rest later...

Thanks Owlet, that was very interesting. So it's about the novel?
I've got something too about the difference between the movie and the novel (I guess so many question marks are there because something's wrong with the code):


1. Rabindranath was requested by the then editor Srish Chandra of the newly revived ?Bangadarshan?, to write a novel on the lines of Bankimchandra Chattopadhyay highly popular novel ?Bishbrikkho? treating it according to the tastes of the modern readers?. It is to be noted that the same magazine had published ?Bishbrikkho? in the past. In the preface to ?Chokher Bali? (1840), Rabindranath said that he had written the novel to show the dark side of a mother?s jealousy.
In Rituparno?s ?Chokher Bali?, Rajlakshmi?s (Mahendra?s mother) jealousy is not


2. Behari?s character in the novel is naïve, honest and noble. He has immense respect for Binodini and that is the primary reason for his marriage proposal to her. In the film, Behari is the worst developed character devoid of his nobility. His wanting to marry Binodini is more out of infatuation and physical attraction than deep-set love or respect.

3. In spite of numerous incidents and situations being present in the book to establish the characters, Rituparno rejects all of them and creates his own incidents and situations. Does he wish to convey that Rabindranath failed to bring out the characters aptly in his novel so that he had to improve on the story?

4. Rabindranath?s Binodini is a unique mixture of coquetry and dignity. She is as sensitive as she is sensuous. But she is a cultured woman with a strong sense of ethics. In the film, Binodini emerges as a manipulating whore. The way she treats the young adopted boy at Behari?s house in order to entice Behari is nauseating and against the essence of her character.

5. Rabindranath used several letters in his novel to bring out the complexity of different characters as well as to create dramatic impact in the plot. Rituparno used several letters in his film too but none of the original letters have been used. He rewrites almost all the letters in the film emulating Rabindranath?s language and style thus passing off his own prose as that of Rabindranath to the innocent viewers.

6. In the novel, Binodini refuses to marry Behari as she feels that the proximity of marriage will erode Behari?s love and respect for her. She worshipped Behari and his righteousness. Thus she leaves him forever and goes to live with her aunt Annapurna (Mahendra?s aunt too) in Benaras. In the film, Binodini gets pregnant with Mahendra?s child and leaves Behari without a word. She comes out more as a loose, strayed woman than the strong, dignified character Rabindranath had etched in his book.

7. In the novel, Binodini takes leave of Asha (Mahendra?s wife) with the words, ?You loved me once. Today, when you are happy once more, can you show me an iota of that love and forget the rest that happened??
In the film, Binodini writes a lengthy letter to Asha regarding the meaning of nationality (why to Asha?) and also advising Asha on how to bring up her child (what audacity!).

I wonder can we actually trust this all information?