Hindi Movies - A perspective

This past week and through the weekend, I had the opportunity to watch two new Hindi movies, Race & Shaurya. Yeah, not one but two movies in one week which is unusual for me because I generally go months without watching one, in this case the last movie I watched was two months ago.

Anyway, coming back to the movies. After watching both movies, I found myself thinking how different they were and how I felt after watching each of them.

Race was packed with all the hot stars of Bollywood including Saif Ali Khan (Mr. Hot), Akshaye Khanna, Anil Kapoor, and two beautiful women B. Basu & K. Kaif. The movie was action packed with a plot so complicated that at each turn you wondered who else would join the killing game. The movie showed rich playboys and seemingly simple girls, all of whom had no morals, plotting against each other for $100 M.

And then I watched Shaurya. No major stars per say, the main heroes included Rahul Bose (who is quite cute) and Javed Jaffrey (who looked great). The movie revolves around a soldier who is accused of killing his boss and is being courtmartialed. A happy-go-lucky lawyer gets assigned to the soldier to basically enter a plea of "guilty" and close the case. Thrown in were some scenes that closely resembled scenes from the Tom Cruise movie "A few Good Men" (after all what Bollywood movie is complete without some plagiarism?).

I saw Shauriya and actually felt teary eyed in a couple of scenes. The movie was well made and I couldn't help compare it to the previous one I had viewed. What a difference. Shaurya touted patriotism, loyalty, bravery, and of course "gallantry" (the meaning of "Shaurya"). And what Race touted was that morals be da****, do what you can, including killing, lying, tricking, etc. to win, the biggest reward being money.

I for one couldn't stop thinking about the impact these movies may have on our impressionable youth. More and more movies are sending messages that I for one don't want my kids to hear, lie, steal, money is the ultimate goal, etc. etc.

Are movies watched by folks merely as entertainment or do they get emulated and result in a change in the social and moral behavior of a society? I know that many youths want what they see their favorite stars emulating on stage, and impressionable minds have a tough time differentiating reality from fiction.

Movie makers and Bollywood (and Hollywood for that matter) have a responsibility towards creating a morally responsible society. They should be spending more time sending positive messages to the movie-viewing public and those impressionable youths who want to be just like the stars.

And before someone argues that these are "movies" and not to be taken seriously, let me say that there is no such thing. People take movies seriously whereby their clothing, their lifestyles, and their social events are all in some way, shape or form influenced by what was seen in a particular movie or show.

And call me old school, sentimental, whatever. I'll take watching Shaurya with a not-so--hot-bollywood cast over watching Race any day of the week.