Serendipity is what led me to the movie last evening (because I usually don't go looking for almost-a-year-old Bollywood movies on weekdays).
And I can honestly say that Kapoor and Sons is, by far, one of the most sensible movies I have ever seen. It has even reinstated a little of my belief in family – they survive pretty much everything that could possibly go wrong, including death (which is the ultimate test, I believe), and came out as a whole, didn’t they? Such an honest portrayal of characters.
I believed that no relationship can survive cheating spouses: they may not have worked it out, BUT Harsh and Sunita STILL loved each other, that much is apparent. The inner workings of infidelity will forever be loopy and shrouded in the smog of people not wanting to talk about their motivations, but people can love each other through anything, the movie says.
That kind of love is not spoken about enough, I feel. We all see and feel the deep pull of young love, crashing over our lives like mini tsunamis, and taking over all the senses and our social media accounts. But we don’t hear much about middle-aged love, when you have had children, and they have left the nest to become people you may or may not particularly like (but always love), when you have paid a million bills, and had a million ugly fights, and nothing about the other really excites you anymore. But you still love. Love that person like you love a limb, you know them like you know yourself, you can read them like you can quote paragraphs off your favorite book, you love them inspite of yourself, you love them in a way that cannot be separated or torn away by any disaster (including infidelity). We don’t hear much about their warm woodsy smell on t-shirts they insist on wearing twice, the straggly toothbrush they favor over all the new ones, the runny eggs they love and you hate, how they fart and immediately look guilty, and how they are your human heating pad in the winters.
I may be romanticizing this way more than necessary. But it gives me hope about relationships and their longevity. And God knows, I need some.
Moving on.
Sunita saying ‘I don’t know what I did wrong’ (about her “perfect” son) quite nearly broke my heart; if you love a parent, you’ll know that’s probably one of the worst things you can hear them say about you. But then, mothers, the amazing ones (most of them are), are capable of ultimate acts of forgiveness. But I AM curious to know how they’d have portrayed Harsh’s reaction to his son’s sexual orientation.
Siddharth is easy on the eyes, isn’t he? Real easy. (I just looked it up, he is 32, so I don’t have to feel guilty about lusting after a child #terrorsofbeingonthewrongsideof20s)
One gripe I have is that Alia, the actor, was not used effectively. Her storyline seemed like an appendage, a circumstance created forcibly to facilitate a misunderstanding. She deserves more than that as an actor.
Happy ending as it was, they didn’t pull off any of those usual BS movie moves that make you want to throw up in your mouth. And if you felt anything at all during the movie, you’ll know that the ending wasn’t really happy, per say, just the characters’ acceptance of life and how it has this peculiar quality to keeping going, despite everything.
