Posted:
Heya!
I am an old member of IF but a new one of the bollywood forum - first visit, first post 😃
I wasn't around in this forum when Tamasha released so I have no idea how many discussions took place, how many people liked/disliked it and what the general view about the film is in here. I am just penning down some of my thoughts and forgive me if I sound repetitive.
I had a lot of free time this week so I decided to watch Tamasha for the 7th or the 8th time since I first saw it in the theater with few of my girl friends and was blown away by how beautifully Imtiaz understands the human mind and behavior for I literally felt like I was looking into a mirror, and I could see my entire life reflected in it. Barring one, all my friends disliked the movie and termed it a waste of time which left me utterly perplexed.
But now when I watch it again I feel, in order to like or understand the film, one needs to be a little like Ved - jolly, full of life, happy of the first half, and erratic, hyper, incomprehensible of the second. One person but two completely different sides.
I am aware that the popular hunch is that Ved was a man suffering from the Bipolar disorder and Imtiaz has also hinted about it by inserting the 'bipolar' word here and there in the film but I see that as a very simplistic explanation of why Ved was the way he was. He wanted to do something, and ended up doing something else. His core personality that came with his passion was suppressed - thats the simplistic explanation. But the beautiful part is how well Imtiaz showed us what impact suppression of feelings has on one's behavior. His father tells him his final decision and Ved completes his engineering and continues to live the life everyone does after the degree, never once looking back or allowing himself to think about the person he truly was and would have continued to be. He doesn't complain, doesn't voice his opinion of his current life which in turn makes sure that no one else does too.
But something unusual happens when he meets Tara for the second time in Delhi. Someone who has seen his other, real side in the few days he had allowed himself to be free, away from home, away from known faces. Tara wasn't supposed to come back for what happens in Corsica, stays in Corsica. But not only does she return, she returns with her heart full of love for the other, very beautiful Ved. When she lets him know "Mujhe nahi lagta tum ordinary ho, tumhare saath hoti hu toh mein special ho jaati hu, toh socho tum kya ho" he flips and all the bottled up frustration, emotions, real feelings come rushing out in those outbursts that we see right before Agar tum saath ho starts playing. He gets mad at her for triggering in him all those emotions he had so successfully suppressed and demands from her what is this effect that she has on him? What is this energy? So negative!
But it isn't her energy that is negative. Its just the negative impact of suppressing all your real emotions and never letting them out in any way for that is what is expected of you. You're expected to run in the rat race even if you're losing every single time; to be nice when you're having a bad day and just want someone to listen to you and understand; to smile and say you're fine when every inch of your insides is hurting due to a broken heart and that's why he catches hold of that man in the party who asks him his of well being only because 'everyone does so'. So when his pent up feelings come out, they come out in the worst way possible.
Personally for me, Tamasha was like a warm hug. It was like for the first time someone understood. Understood how so much suppression of one's real self and forceful conformation to societal standards can alter one's personality so much so that the next time someone from that happy, sunny time of your life sees the other you, he/she refuses to recognize you for how is it now possible for you to be so ordinary, so boring, so monotonous as opposed to the old beautiful, sunny, full of life you? Which one's genuine and which one's an act? Or is it even an act and both are real? One is your core nature and the other is what you have become and is now a part of you. But which one makes you happy is the key question that needs an answer and Tara answers it for Ved ❤️
I'd love to know what others thought of the film. Negative/positive/Mixed?
EDITED : There's this one shot in a deleted scene I can relate to a lot. I dont know how to upload an image on IF so will post the link. In the video exactly at 1:54 we see Ved standing next to his door with newspapers pressed into the window. It shows how he has stopped reading them and hasn't even bothered to bring them inside, showing us how his routine has totally messed up due to everything he is going through. When I was in severe depression I had newspapers pressed into my front window in the same way for I had stopped reading them due to total lack of energy and interest. I thought that shot was so subtle and real.
Here's the link - https://youtu.be/y9CefcaFrH0
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