Rehna Hain Tere Dil Mein was a movie released in 2001.
It was a Hindi remake of Tamil film Minnale which also released in the same year, made by the same director and Madhavan played the same role in that movie as well.
Minnale was the highest grossing film of the year in Tamil but RHTDM flopped at the box office, although the movie got a cult status after it's release.
When I first watched this film as a kid, I instantly preferred and liked Maddy's character over Saif, although Saif was a familiar face to me, in contrast to Maddy whom I was watching for the first time.
It was not just because he was playing the lead character. I liked and preferred him over Saif from the first few scenes itself when both the characters are introduced and are shown clashing with each other.
It's easy to understand why Maddy can be a likable character. He's funny, charming, rebellious. Who doesn't like rebels? Madhavan is also more charismatic than Saif in atleast this movie. In acting performance he again is much better, though Saif didn't have much scope here so it's unfair to make a comparison.
Even if we keep the comparison with Saif aside, Maddy as a character on it's own is very problematic, and me back as a kid never realized it. I adored him and cheered for him when he gets the girl in the end over Saif.
Now when I look back at him, I realize that he's a misogynist. He's shown harassing a group of girls at the start of the movie itself. He isn't interested in dating or having relationships with women at all. That's a personal choice but he doesn't even view them as human beings until he first sees Reena (Diya Mirza).
Some scenes and dialogues in this movie are problematic on a whole new level. Like there's a scene where Reena is making a call from a local PCO and after she leaves, Maddy comes and picks up the receiver to get her scent like a creep.
The movie tries to play this off as a cute and funny scene by playing romantic background music. There's another scene where Maddy is angry on Reena because she's rightfully ignoring him after learning his truth, he says and I quote, "Arre inn ladkiyon se toh baat karna hi bekaar hain. Arre inko toh kone mein kahi le jaakar....".
You guys are smart enough to know what he meant. Other than that, he's a punk, hooligan, bully, who fights with people over petty issues. Although Saif was also shown or implied to be a milder version of him.
After all this, I still find Maddy's character likable and didn't feel anything for Saif. But why? I suppose we as an audience have a tendency to like flawed and asshole characters over goody two shoes. The reason behind this is we relate to flawed characters more easily, because we as human beings are extremely flawed as well.
By we don't want to see the real ugliness of ourselves either. So the filmmakers present a glossed up version of it, by showing these characters in a grand way. They do it by making these characters quirky, funny and larger than life.
I'll give you another example which is from the MCU. Tony Stark is a more popular character than Steve Rogers. Tony was liked for being rude, arrogant womanizer asshole from the first Iron Man movie itself.
While Captain America was a boring and nobody's favorite character in his origin movie and first Avengers because he was goody two shoes character with no interesting superpowers.
Russos reinvented him in Winter Soldier by putting his best skills and qualities at display. It's also not just the character here, as Chris Evans charm also helped in audience accepting and liking the character.
It took Cap three movies to grow as a character, while Tony was liked instantly by the audience. It's not just Bollywood or Indian audience, but in general people like rude, arrogant, rebellious characters in fiction because it gives a power trip to them.
A hero who gives zero fucks and does whatever he wants and also gets away with it. People love this power fantasy.
Lastly I wanna say this topic was not just about RHTDM or Tony or Steve but about audience liking a certain type of characters.
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