Bedtime stories

In Elegy, Ben Kingsley plays a 60-plus professor. Two things surprised me about Elegy, the new Kingsley concoction.
This explicit treatise on the age-induced unmaking of love-making has been done by a female director. In our country even male filmmakers shy away from love-making scenes. Ram Gopal Varma who loves the female form in the briefest of clothes permissible, has no idea of celluloid sex.In his films you���ll see the ladies cavorting in sexual splendour, but never quite making it into bed.
When Ramu did his own Elegy two years ago, he called it Nishabd. There was no sex between the 60-plus hero and his daughter���s friend who comes to stay over for a vacation. There couldn���t be. The protagonist, you see, was played by Mr Bachchan who is compelled to think about his iconic image each time he craves to be different. When he did Kaizad Gustad���s Boom they said, how dare he be so raunchy? When he dared to fall in love with his daughter���s friend in Nishabd they said, ���Kuch to apne image ka khayal karo���.
Forget about being libidinous like Kingsley in Elegy, Mr Bachchan can���t smoke or hold a gun on screen without being reminded of his social responsibilities. In 2000, when he made his comeback, he was pulled up for allowing Shah Rukh Khan to give his character a dressing down in Mohabbatein! Aapko shobha nahin deta, the moralists shook their collective heads.
Can you imagine what Mr Bachchan would have to face if he did something as explicit as Ben Kingsley in Elegy! He would be accused of everything from corrupting the youth to bringing Uttar Pradeshi ribaldry into Maharashtra. Khai ke ���panned��� Banaraswala....
My reaction on seeing the lead in Elegy was, ���Oh my God!���. I thought of how prudish Hindi cinema remains in matters of the bed. Sex is sinful in Hindi films. That���s a fact. How many actresses would do what Penelope Cruz does in Elegy? Let the co-star���s gaze fall with vocal appreciation on their vital statistics? Forget that.
Would any actress bare her upper torso no matter what the role���s requirement? In all these years that I���ve been watching films, I can think of only one actress who has bared her bust for a role. Simi Garwal in Conrad Rooks���s Siddharth. And, that was 40 years ago! Simi, in case you forget, was considered ahead of her times. If she had done the bare scene now she���d still be ahead of her times.
Nowadays, the concept of aesthetic decency baffles me. Uncontainable quotients of cleavage are fine. But, unapologetic nudity? Na baba na! What will mom, kids, politicians and pundits say? Say what you will. I find even the most contemporised New Age films to be prudish about sex.
Farhan Akhtar���s Rock On!! and Abbas Tyrewala���s Jaane Tu...Ya Jaane Na were the two most urbane films in recent times. There was no sex among the characters. All they did was talk, fight and play music.
Zoya Akhtar���s recently-released flick is sanitised to the point of appearing sterile. Farhan and Konkona Sen Sharma play two very urbane characters coupled in their struggle to chase their dreams. We see them hugging, but never kissing or, God forbid, making love... Konkona, you see, is in a steady relationship and Farhan is married. What would their partners say?!
Log kya kahenge? If you look at the films that have come in the past five years, not one dares to show the lead sharing full-intimacy in bed except maybe Abhishek and Rani Mukerji in Bunty Aur Babli and Kabhi Alvida Naa Kehna. Though of course, there was no nudity.
I am reminded of a conversation I had with this upcoming actress who was being considered opposite Hrithik Roshan in Kites. ���How could I do that role? It required a lot of love-making and nudity? I had my dad���s reputation to consider.���
Oh, drop it, babes. Or else we can be happy with Suriji and Taniji from Rab Ne Bana De Jodi as the typical hero and heroine of our films sharing not just separate beds and rooms, but also different floors in the same house. Protection to this husband means shielding his wife���s head from the rain.
Kingsley and Cruz can go fly kites.