Chandra Nandini 76-85: Parts 1 & 2 - Page 4

Originally posted by: sashashyam

Thank you so much, my dear Mansi. My health is like the weather, it changes from day to day, but so far t his week has been good, and I am making the most of it.[/Quote] [/Quote]

Ur welcmzz aunty 😊gd to know ur good at least for now and yes updates can wait u should not put soo much stress on ur hands take care...👍🏼

Originally posted by: rajatshweta

Did anyone miss Chanakya in yesterday's Episode ?

We all heard Daadi saying that the contest is held for conducting Pooja ... and the intention is to bring Chandni together. BUT ...

Mukhya Maharani, who will be sharing equal Rajya responsibilities of Magadh with the King in future ... and the Prime Minister (who made Chandra a samrat), is missing in action ??

Originally posted by: ---Khushi---

Precis writing was always my forte, right from childhood, Aunty 😉😆

Originally posted by: Sabdabhala

WHAT AN AMAZING POST, AUNTY

THIS IS, SO FAR, MY FAV POST OF YOURS IN CN

AND AUNTY, PLEASE DONT APOLOGIZE ABOUT BEING LATE. WE ALL LOOK FORWARD TO YOUR POSTS AND ARW WILLING TO READ AND ENJOY THEM WHENEVER YOU CAN DISH THEM OUT. LOOKING AT THE SIZE OF THIS, I CAN ONLY IMAGINE THE HAVOC THAT YOU MAY HAVE UNLEASHED ON YOUR FINGERS. PLEASE TAKE CARE

I LOVED YOUR TITLE AND THE APT ANALOGY. SEEING THE EPISODES WAS REALLY AKIN TO A JOURNEY ON A WINDING ROAD. EXCEPT, I FELT MORE LIKE TRAVELLING ON A STATE ROADWAYS BUS IN THE HILLS 😆, WITH AN INEBRIATED DRIVER STEERING IT

THE SCRIPT WAS ALL OVER THE PLACE, AS WERE EMOTIONS OF THE CHARACTERS. THE THREAD OF LOGIC WAS CONSPICUOUSLY MISSING, BUT AS YOU HAVE RIGHTLY SAID, SOME CHANDRA NANDINI SCENES MADE IT WORTHWHILE TO WATCH

WHAT CAN I ADD TO SUCH A BEAUTIFUL RENDITION, AUNTY!!! IT IS JUST PERFECT. YOU HAVE DESCRIBED EACH SCENE IN TOTALITY

IN THESE EPISODES I NOTICED, AGAIN AND AGAIN, HOW WELL RAJAT USES HIS EYES AND HIS VOICE TO IMPROVE HIS PERFORMANCE. AND SOMES SCENES LIKE THE DIYA SCENE ON THE TERRACE, AND THE PACKING SCENE WERE HANDLED SO BEAUTIFULLY THAT MOST OF THE OTHER CRAPPY SCENES ALMOST SEEMED SURREAL

I ALSO AGREE WHEN YOU SAY THAT SHWETA'S NANDINI IS A GREAT EFFORT, WHILE HER ROOPA SEEMS A BIT OTT. THE TWIN SISTERS THAT SHE PLAYED IN MAKDEE WERE FAR MORE SUBTLY DIFFERENTIATED

AND I HAVE NEVER HEARD OF THE THAI SOWING FESTIVAL, SO THAT WAS A REVELATION. SOMEHOW I WASNT TOO PERTURBED BY DAADI REMOVING DURDHARA FROM THE CHIEF QUEEN MIX. EKTA LOGIC 😆

I TOO LOOK FORWARD TO THE ROYAL COUPLE IN THE VILLAGE SCENE

THANKS SO MUCH, AUNTY AND PLEASE TAKE CARE

A short journey with Shyamala on the switchback road..

Saraswathi Akka.

Part 1: On a switchback road

Folks,

At the outset - and this seems to be becoming the rule more than the exception - my apologies for being a week late with this one. My RA seems to be flaring up with disconcert ing frequency, which makes me doubtful about how long I can continue to inflict these analyses on you all. But that is for the future.

For now, we have 10 episodes to cover, with a seesaw script that often drives the viewers crazy, but withal embellished with such marvellous scenes between our lead pair - touching, affectionate, magical, despairing, angry, and above all desperate in their unvoiced need for each other - that one ends up forgiving the CVs all their trespasses. So let us begin.

Do you remember the last time you drove on a switchback road in the mountains? On a road that turns right and then fifty yards later, turns left . The next bend comes even quicker, in barely 20 yards. Then there is a 100 yard stretch, and when you just start breathing easy and relax, boom! The next sharp bend is so sudden that you almost go off the road and down the mountainside. At times, it is a corkscrew bend, which makes you come almost full circle. Soon, apart from clinging for dear life to the steering wheel, you begin to despair of ever getting where you want to.

I did this sort of thing often over 40 years ago, on my first diplomatic posting to Geneva. One of the worst was when I was on my way to Como, in northern Italy. After negotiating the Swiss mountain road, which was two lane and crowded with aggressive trucks, I had to do the very same kind of driving, tackling sharp bends every 20 yards or less on a two lane road, all along the shore of Lake Como. I was a good driver, but when I finally got out in front of a hotel to get a room, my eyes were still focussed on looking 20 yards ahead. So I walked straight into the plate glass entrance door that had been cleaned spotlessly.

I was stunned, literally, and and I split the skin over my left eyebrow. I did not realise this at all, and walked over to the reception. Surface cuts sometimes bleed very badly, and I am afraid that besides scaring the poor folks there stiff, I did not do the reception area carpet much good! I was pretty tough in those days, so after they patched me up, I drove on to Milan the next day for my date with The Last Supper. However, for that evening and night, things were bad.

I did not have the experience of driving on such roads, but I have travelled as a passenger. The end result was that I vomited all the way before I reached my destination..

Switchback scripting: This is exactly what I feel like of late about Chandra Nandini. The stunned feeling, that is, not the blood. Not yet, that is.

Let us just check out this switchback script very briefly.

No sooner had we finished exulting in the soaring histrionics and the emotional heft of Episode 75 than we landed in the first of Chandra's encounters with Roopa and her nails. This was fine, and we laughed at poor Chandra's confusion about the pseudo-Nandini. Would the real one have recovered from the trauma of the night before, we wondered.

The road now bent suddenly to the right, and we ended up with two semi-comic, semi-emotional scenes : that of Lep Scene No. 1 (these are going to be numerous, whence the advance numbering!) and of The Choice of Mura's Birthday Present. It was enough to flummox anyone who attached some importance to consistency of tone, but the scenes were so charming ki sab kuch maaf!

Especially when - after a disorienting interlude between Roopa and Chandra in the garden, we got another pleasant scene in the court, with our Odd Couple discreetly sharing their first, secret insider joke about the vaanar.

This was when , within minutes after I started my journey, I enjoyed the scenic beauties along the way..

Of two snankakshes: Lest we should get spoilt, a sharp left turn came up, with Roopa inviting Malayketu to the snankaksh. Which led in turn to two bathing scenes with totally contrasting moods, as a touchingly hopeful Chandra, abruptly disillusioned, lashed himself into a fury of bitter disappointment, and sought to humiliate Nandini the only way he seems to know, by canoodling with Helena in front of her.

Immediately, we went right again, as Nandini cuts her hand, and runs away, with Chandra haring after her to their room. Follows the portrait scene - I owe you that one, Sri! - then Lep Scene No.2. By now, the road seems uncertain about which way to turn.

There was a small, but beautiful ancient sculpture on the way. The driver/guide explained its historical importance . I had to pass it swiftly and made a note to stop and see it on my way back..

Leftish, finally, as Nandini weakly denies all the allegations, and is later told by the vaidya' that she is suffering from the vipareet vyaktitva vyadhi (clearly that old crone is a fan of alliteration!😆) .

It was a steep hairpin bend and I started to have a nauseating feeling for the first time..

Involuntary romance: Right again, with a mehendi snippet out of the blue, and our leads making coy eyes at each other as if the snankaksh fiasco, and the letter to Malay, were all only a bad dream!

The raat mein keeda sequence was another disconnected comic interlude pasted on at this point, bending the script even further to the right.

Next came Roopa's serendipitous switch of the gift thalis, for which she got quite unwarranted kudos from none less than Aapama, while I forbore from asking the one pertinent question: How on earth did Roopa know about the existence of those two switchable (sic) gifts anyway?

OK, then comes the actual gift giving ceremony, with Nandini being praised, predictably, by daadi for the choice of Chandra's gift. The sun is shining and all is well with the world. But not for long!

It was a small park with flowering shrubs , and tourists are seen around the the place..

The gift fiasco: So we have the next crisis, with Nandini being confronted by a weepy Mura, who has taken the trouble to tog herself out in that red joda, instead of doing what any sensible female would do, ie carry it with her.😕

Nandini, following the boilerplate conventions of our TV/films, instead of yelling out in 20 seconds flat that this was her gift for Kanika Ma that had somehow been exchanged with the one for Mura Ma, bleats ineffectively Suniye to, maa! Meri baat to suniye!!

Follows the unexpected straight stretch in the road, as Chandra - though not, to my regret, using his own grey cells😉 - sorts out the problem and exculpates Nandini in style.

The driver/guide was a witty person.. He kept us entertained with jokes and witty anecdotes on the way to ease the strain of our journey..

Of diyas and kumkum: Not just that, but we get a special treat in the diya scene, which is not just visually lovely , but also shows our Odd Couple indulging in a rare bit of gentle and mutually revealing conversation.

This mood is reinforced, though in a standard issue chhed chhad fashion, by the double kumkum smearing bit.

We stopped for a coffee break at the beautiful park .. A beautiful sojourn..

Unbelievably distasteful: Time for the next savage bend to the left. To wit, the decidedly unaesthetic drunken dance by Roopa. Any man, not to speak of a samrat, with an ounce of brains would have dragged Nandini off stage at the first signs of her inebriation, but apna Chandra sits there as if he was at a performance and waiting for the curtain to come down. Even when he finally gets up, he moves so glacially that I was tempted to kick his backside to make him get a move on!😡

The follow through to this exhibitionism was both predictable and unpredictable.

Oh God! the public "convenieces" on the way! Horrible!! I started to feel sick..

The Chandra-Nandini madirawali scene was undoubtedly powerful, and it would head the list of my choice scenes over these 2 weeks. But in the end, it was nothing but a masochistic parade of lacerated feelings by two individuals, the kind of parade which has, I am forced to say, become predictable, and fatiguing. Chandra's question - Who are you really, Nandini? - remained unanswered, and Nandini's fine sounding lines about her hriday made no real sense at all. We are here talking only of the scripting, not the acting, be it noted.

Incomprehensible leniency ?: As for the unpredictable, it was beyond belief that Mura, who cut up so rough with Nandini over that lal joda, had nothing, but nothing to say to her after that disgraceful public exhibition by the pseudo-Nandini. Instead of hauling Nandini over the coals the next morning, Mura is busy trying to bring her son and this disgraceful bahu closer together!!!😡 Predictably, Mura received a very bad press on this count.

A kundali angle?: The only possible explanation for this is something that has, strangely enough, not been trotted out as yet, though it is a Balaji staple. This is the Akhandasowbhagyavati yog in the bahu's kundali, which serves as a cast iron protection for her husband's life. If Nandini's kundali has this rare yog, naturally uske to sau khoon maaf, aur ek madhoshi mein kiya gaya nritya kya hai? Ya shatru ki putri hona kya hai?

I am waiting with bated breath to see if this special feature in Nandini's horoscope is actually announced soon. 😉😉

The Chandra-Malay duel was not a patch on similar scenes between the two actors that we have seen before, perhaps because Rajat is still not quite fit.

The driver/guide was talking about a recently released movie, which had all the ingredients of the movies of the early fifties.. I felt sleepy...

Now we arrive at a corkscrew turn.

A quadrangular confrontation:There is first Roopa's rather oomphy turn as a would be seductress with Malay - she looked quite something, stretched out languidly on his bed 😉- followed by Chhaya's erupting on the scene , her complaining to Chandra, and finally the four cornered encounter between Chandra, Chhaya, Malay and Nandini.

Which ends with both Nandini and Chandra at a point 360 degrees away from where they had started, ie at the same place.

I suddenly got up with a jerk to find me at a place where I was when I started my journey!

Nandini, instead of informing the rest about her vipareet vyaktitva vyadhi , once more whimpers that she had not done nothing. One can only conclude that the girl has lost it.😡 As for Chandra, he threatens Nandini for the umpteenth time with expulsion from the palace as soon as daadi has taken herself off to Piplivan (some hope!) . His is dharti se hi nirvaasit kar doonga threat of the day before has gone with the wind.😉

The ugly, deliberately provoking Chandra-Roopa encounter, clearly intended to drive him off the Nandputri for good, was followed by a precap that was 180 degrees away from it in mood.

My poor head felt, at this point, as if I had walked into that hotel door once more.

I couldn't control my nauseating feeling and had to get down from the car...

Champagne sparkle: But to my great surprise, the next day, in Episode 84, the CVs foxed me, and you too, I am sure. Though we had a solid dose of daadi's sachcharine goings on with our lead pair, the dance performance by Nandini was tolerable, and what followed was superb.

Not just the confused emotionalism of the exchange of farewell gifts between Chandra and Nandini, and the packing session, but far and away the best in a long time, the bubbly champagne gaiety of the scene where Chandra announces that Nandini was not to leave at once after all. The giggly chase around the room, ending in outright, full throated hilarity all round, was a real treat to behold, so very fresh and so very appealing.👏

A little rest and freshened myself...The journey continues.with me sitting on the back seat with eyes closed...