Thank you for the change you brought to filmi mum roles, RL

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Thank you for the change you brought to filmi mum roles, RL

Celebrating the life of actress Reema Lagoo who single-handedly punctured the 100-year-old wailing violins of the long-suffering, sacrificing mommas of Indian cinema. We'll see you post... intermission

by

Sushmita Bose

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Published: Thu 25 May 2017, 9:29 PM

Last updated: Thu 25 May 2017, 11:38 PM

Last week, when (Indian actress) Reema Lagoo passed away - at the rather young age of 59 - I got a flag from the BBC website. It had carried a report titled, "Bollywood's 'favourite mother' dies". Most other news sites, I was soon to discover, had toed the same line. Reema Lagoo, "mother figure," is no more.
Surprisingly, most of them missed out on the most critical aspect of the Reema Lagoo story (in a way, also the story of a changing India): how she, almost single-handedly, changed the concept of motherhood in popular culture, as showcased in Bollywood.
Mothers have always been important in Hindi cinema. It's not that they had particularly major roles to play (with the exception, perhaps, of Nargis in Mother India), but they were key to help set the patriarchal tone. They would represent the essence of a traditional 'Indian' woman - one who always puts everyone's interests ahead of her own, doesn't raise her voice (in fact, doesn't have much of a voice unless the son is being indulgent), silently endorses men getting away with all decision-making processes and so on. Their short but frequent onscreen presences were usually reserved for 'emotional' reasons - a long-drawn-out and weepy speech on family ties, for instance - that would have everyone scrambling for a box of tissues, a lachrymose break audiences needed before moving on to manly sequences of inane action.
The typical Bollywood mother would be long-suffering, someone who'd made immense "sacrifices" to bring up her progeny (think Nirupa Roy); she'd usually be a widow (to reinforce the notion of 'long-suffering'); and she'd be clad in a white sari (obviously, she didn't have time, inclination or mindset to pay attention to her looks). The only time her worry lines-creased face would break into a smile was when the hero told her, "Ma, mein tere liye bahu leke ayoonga [Mother, I'm going to get you a daughter-in-law - subtext: to help out with the chores and ease your sufferings]."
You had movies like Bobby, where the hero's mother (played by Sonia Sahni) was a socialite and, therefore, not committed to her son full-time; she was perceived as being somewhat odious; veiled judgements were cast: what kind of a mother is she, more intent on looking good rather than feeding her (grown-up) son?
This pretty much was the maternal landscape in Bollywood till Maine Pyar Kiya happened in 1989. Reema Lagoo's act as Salman Khan's mother was a defining moment, at a time when India was gearing up for economic liberalisation, market reforms and globalisation; the country was about to be ushered out of an antiquated age, and, unwittingly, she paved the way for the 'modernisation' of the Indian mom. She was 31 in real life then, so, first off, she looked younger than any other reel mother (of a fully grown leading man). She got in an exuberance that was missing in maternal roles so far. She looked beautiful, had a sense of humour. and, best of all, encouraged her son to follow his heart and fall in love - against her husband's wishes (it was a stand she didn't buckle down from, even when the husband expressed extreme displeasure). After watching Maine Pyar Kiya, I remember someone saying, "The girlfriend seems so old-fashioned [referring to the simpering Bhagyashree], whereas the mother is so cool!"
Aashiqui followed soon after, in 1990. Reema Lagoo played a single mom. She wasn't single because - like other mothers before her in Bollywood - her husband had died. She was a single mother because he had left her, and along the course of the film, she makes her peace with it. Bollywood suddenly had mothers who were human. Nuanced. Even complex.
In Vaastav, Reema Lagoo did something quite unthinkable - stoically: she killed her son because he wanted to be set free of his life as an underworld don. In Hum Saath-Saath Hain, she donned a slightly 'negative' shade, and was instrumental in getting the 'good son' (albeit stepson) and his wife out of the family stead; the reasons were, of course, kitchen politics (this was a Rajshri film, after all), but was a significant departure from 'role model' nonetheless. In Saajan, she and her husband (played by Kader Khan) were so much into each other they told their sons - one biological (Salman Khan), one adopted (Sanjay Dutt) - to give them some time for "romance" instead of getting in their way; it was in jest, of course, but it was great to see a 'mother' having strong romantic attachments.
Once Reema Lagoo had set the ball rolling, the cinematic Bollywood interpretation of the maternal instinct was shaken by a paradigm shift. It was refreshing to see mothers not being typecast by gender imbalances. They wanted to - and felt free to - look good, dress well, stay in shape, laugh out loud. They were shown to have a life beyond fretting over errant offspring. They became decision makers. So, thank you, Reema Lagoo, for taking the suffering out, and humanising mothers. and, in a sense, women.
sushmita@khaleejtimes.com
Sushmita is Editor, Wknd. She has a penchant for analysing human foibles


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