Friends, as expected, yesterday's episode was also full of jungle antics. To cut a long story short, Jodha had to spend a night with Khyber in a hut whose occupants were gaayab. Jodha had to wear the clothes of the lady of that hut, and cook the food available in that hut for herself and Khyber to eat.
To give Jodha her due, even as she did all this forest tourism with Khyber, she was always aware that her babies needed sustenance - and so she did her best to keep herself in warm clothes and gave herself enough to eat to keep the waarises inside her comfortable and alive. But by sleeping the night out in that hut with the darinda she has not done her morals and virtue any favours, for this one fact is surely going to become even more of a matter of speculation than it already is.
I could kill the Creatives for bringing this unsavoury bit of gossip on Jodha's character into the story by this hut-stay episode. Already the people of the surrounding villages are shown as gossiping about why Jodha "ran off" with the darinda, and what's worse, the lecherous Sharif is indulging his own fertile imagination on this topic. Can you all imagination what a feast Ruq and Maham are going to have with this story?
I liked the scene immensely where Mansingh, in the encampment that Jalal set up for the night, comes to Jalal and says "I want to talk to you, if I may?" Jalal says "Go ahead!" Then Mansingh tells Jalal, "I know that Jodha Buasa has a compassionate heart and must have tried to save the darinda, and I cannot forget or forgive her for that. But how the darinda would then behave with her she would not have guessed. She would not have expected a second kidnapping. I know there is a lot of gossip about Jodha Buasa now, but I want to say she is not the sort to run away from her husband with the darinda!" Bravo, Mansingh, for openly saying that to Jalal!
Jalal then showed that he was not really heeding gossip nor blaming Jodha for "eloping" with the darinda. He knew that she must have bitten off more than she could chew when she let the darinda out of the well. Jalal simply replied "I know her ... and I keep wondering which is her bigger fault ... her ziddi, or her naram dil!" Mansingh, on hearing this, must have been deeply gratified that Jalal at least would not fall prey to all the gossip going around about Jodha's "indecent motives".
Friends, its these little things about Jalal, like his belief expressed to Mansingh that Jodha would not throw her virtue away, that shows that there is a lot of love in the relationship, despite the strange circumstances they are in, given the Khyber and Atifa tracks. (But I wouldn't be surprised if Jalal decides to pretend he is affronted by Jodha's lack of virtue, just to give credibility to his "marriage proposal" with Atifa. He may well blame Jodha's "elopement" as the reason for "wanting to marry Atifa". As and when he does that we have to remind ourselves - for our own sanity - that he doesn't really blame Jodha, he is just being "teda"!)
Later on in the hut, when Jalal finds Jodha's clothes there, it was another poignant moment for me, for he was almost feeling Jodha's presence there. He held onto her dupatta that he recognised, and despite Sharif's openly accusatory looks, he just held the dupatta close to himself and said in dead earnest "They can't be far from here, let's keep on searching!"
I also am growing to love the beautiful uncle-nephew relationship between Mansingh and Jalal. I think Jalal sees his own younger self in Mansingh, in the department of brave fighting skills, and a big fighting heart. But there is an endearing innocence to Mansingh, a simple purity of spirit that must remind Jalal of Jodha. If I could put it this way, Mansingh may remind Jodha of Jalal, and remind Jalal of Jodha. The few words that Mansingh said in the episode in defence of Jodha's virtue did so much good to Jalal, no doubt!
Overall on the direction of the episode, yesterday was a bit better than the previous day's episode. The director had to play with a wider range of locations - a rushing river, an empty hut, a steep hillside ... and the range of emotions that Jodha showed and Khyber showed were also better expressed, I thought.
Remember that shot where Jodha gets so frustrated with Khyber and his traipsing through the forest, that she tears a branch of a tree nearby and whips Khyber hard till his old wounds start bleeding again? Khyber bears it all manfully and that makes Jodha feel worse. She breaks into tears and then she tries so hard to tell Khyber in a tired and anguished voice "I saved you, I know that, but my family must be waiting for me, and I so want to go back to them ... so will you please go your way and let me go on mine?" That dialogue was heart-wrenching, but as usual the words just went over Khyber's head. Again, exasperatingly but touchingly, all he is able to do is to wipe her tears ... but he is simply unable to understand what she really wants! That was beautifully done by both actors.
The end scene with Jodha getting all entangled with the dakus was to be expected for we have been having many spoilers on this. The sad part for me is that Jalal tells Sharif to go after the dakus, while he himself goes after Khyber and Jodha. I just don't want Sharif saving Jodha from the dakus, and then leering at her all the way back to Jalal, trying to imply that she was a "loose woman" who spent the night in a hut alone with a darinda! I have a feeling though, that since Khyber has lost Jodha to the dakus, Jalal will just find a lone Khyber and start fighting with him, while Jodha will somehow break loose from the dakus on her own, with some smart thinking, and will arrive just in time to see the raging Jalal-Khyber fight. Maybe Sharif will end up fighting the dakus, who have lost Jodha?
In the precap we have the famous scene that the actor Ketan (aka Khyber) has been proudly posting on his Facebook page for the last one week! Jodha is slipping precariously down a steep rock face, while Jalal on one side and Khyber on the other side are both hanging onto ledges of the rock face with outstretched hands, and it looks like a toss up for Jodha ... whose hand does she reach for? If the little last bit in the precap is seen carefully, Jodha reaches for Jalal's hand ... but I suspect that is where the slip up occurs and she puts herself in the danger of a steep fall down, when Khyber possibly jumps off the rock in time to break her fall and yet crash to the ground himself to die a hero's death!
Even if we do curse the Creatives for the godawful track and the completely unbelievable storyline, the Director of the show is at least valiantly giving us some great camera work and is not staying away from attempting difficult action scenes in differently challenging landscapes. So for that we have to give the Director a round of applause. Having been on several outdoor shoots myself with our advertising crew, I know how tricky these kinds of ambitious location shots can be, and how much legwork has to be put in by a really large contingent of directorial staff with a whole host of elaborate equipment, to make the shots look natural and yet fraught with danger and exciting to watch.
For yesterday's episode, especially for the river shots of Jodha getting carried away by the river rapids, and for the precap's rockface shots, I would give full credit to the Director and the cinematographer. They got their chance to show how well they can handle difficult terrain - and they are displaying great dedication to the quality of their shots, which we should unstintingly appreciate.
What all happened in today's episode ...
Jodha manages to pull her dupatta from under sleeping Khyber's head and runs up to a river. There is no village in sight so she plans to cross the river to other side. Meanwhile Jalal is searching for her near the river, but there is no sign of Jodha. Khyber also wakes up, and seeing Jodha missing, starts searching for her.
Jodha gets into the river which looks shallow enough ... but then she gets caught in a whirlpool and starts struggling calling "Shahenshah" for help. A hand pulls her out but she again faints. When she wakes, she sees she was saved by Khyber and they are in a hut. The owners are not there but their food and clothes are there.
Jodha scolds Khyber for chasing off the owners. Then he sees the hut occupants' clothes and gives these to Jodha to change. Jodha sends him out of the hut and changes. Then she cooks the food and they eat it - because Khyber was about to eat raw food.
Jalal meanwhile decides to set up camp for the night. At the camp, Mansingh comes to Jalal and explains that, though Jodha tried to save Khyber out of a compassionate heart, she would not run away with him as the gossips are saying. Jalal says he knows her well - and that she has both ziddi and naram dil - but wonders which problem to blame her for? In the hut Jodha tries to teach Khyber how to be a decent man but it's a no-go.
Suddenly, the next morning, the hut owner returns and peeps through the window - and sees them both in his hut and that Jodha is wearing his wife's clothes. He runs to Jalal and tells all ... and Jalal and his troupe rush to the hut. Jalal sees Jodha's wet clothes there but does not heed gossip that Jodha spent night there with Khyber. Mansingh looks worried, and Sharif looks curious.
Jalal says they can't be far from here, so they should continue their search. Meanwhile Khyber is pulling Jodha by the hand. She is upset and hits him with a tree branch till he bleeds from old wounds. She then cries and tries to say "I helped you but now I want to go to my family. Please go and let me go also". He fails to understand and wipes her tears.
Jalal and his group, riding their horses, spot some some hint of Khyber up a hill and hear Jodha saying "nahin". They decide to climb the hill by foot to make less noise. But as they climb Khyber sees them and gets upset. Jalal says "He is too far up the hill, so let's ride around hill and climb from other side." Meanwhile Jodha tells Khyber she is hungry and when he goes to find food she runs away again ... and meets a group of men.
She explains she is the Mughal Shahi Begum kidnapped by a darinda and needs their help to get home. They agree to help her. Halfway through the trek Jodha sees their laughing and discovers they are dakus. Meanwhile Jalal passes through a village where they tell him about the local dakus.
Jalal asks Sharif to go after the dakus with a few men, and he rides on with Mansingh to catch Khyber and Jodha. Jodha has a hard time telling the leering dakus to stay away from her.
In the precap, Jodha is seen slipping down a steep rock cliff as both Jalal and Khyber are hanging onto the cliffs with outstretched hands. Whose hand will Jodha grab?
I think we've come to the episode today when finally the Khyber saga will end and he will die. We've cursed him a lot in these last couple of weeks, but let's graciously say goodbye to the actor Ketan, who we all know is not really a big actor but is favoured for such roles because of his humongous and very sculptured body.
He did carry through his role as best as he could and we did get a good impression of his giving his role his 100% ... he was so enthusiastic about his role that he contributed lavishly to all the daily spoilers about what was happening in the shoot. He even posted videos of so many shots that by now we all know by heart what is likely to happen.
So for sheer commitment, pride in his work, and the lovely intention to share his happiness with us, we should send him out with some standing ovation.
It's tough being a half-man and half-animal and not being able to speak any dialogues and trying to look illiterate throughout his role. It is also difficult to keep on pretending he cannot even pronounce the word "Jodha" without elaborately reshaping his whole mouth!
For all these many little details he manfully agreed to cooperate on, to make his role credible, hats off to you, Ketan. Sorry to see you go, but then we want our love story back, you see, so hope you understand!
Edited by skanda12 - 11 years ago
Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi 2
