Opening Doorz

By Martin D’Souza | Opening Doorz Editorial | February 12, 2018

OMG! What will Swara Bhaskar think?

As I walked out after watching Padman, I was wondering what poor Swara Bhaskar would be thinking, if she did see this film. I’m sure, after Padmaavat, she would stop watching films as she would not want to feel like a Vagina, all over again.

Watching Padman, I’m sure she would feel repelled like the characters on screen did when Lakshmi went about his task of pressurizing his wife, then sisters, then  a little village girl to try out his homemade sanitary pads.

The movie was all about the vagina!

Surprising, there has not been a single word of protest against this film from Swara! Instead, she has lauded this film… My guess is she saw this film three days before its official release… Here’s her very positive tweet:

Swara Bhasker @ReallySwara Feb 6
#padman Uplifting, empowering, hopeful, fun & thought provoking.. R v too quick to judge people illogically because r minds r closed by archaic notions like Shame? Kudos #RBalki sir, @mrsfunnybones @swanandkirkire  thank uuuuu 4 telling this story

Chalo, at least she was not archaic in her thinking whilst watching this particular film.

The Vagina Trust…

For me, the message in Padman was hammered ad nauseam. Much was expected from this film where most of the friends and accomplices of the filmmaker and the actors acting in it, including a father (Anil Kapoor) posed with pads taking the #PadmanChallenge. It was a good PR exercise.

It’s a pity though no one posed with a poster of Deepika Padukone when some fringe outfit threatened to cut off her nose and also laid a price for anyone who did it, during the Padmaavat protests. Deepika stood tall, without any hashtag #ISupportDeepika campaign from Bollywood. I guess everyone in Bollywood likes to play it safe: dangling a brand new pad is far safer than standing up collectively for a threatened colleague!

Coming back to the film, it could have easily touched upon the very important aspect of 12% GST on the sanitary pad, which it did not. Methinks that would have been a powerful statement to make through this film.

For all those who did not watch it after hearing/reading how boring the film was, I request you to call on Swara Bhaskar and ask her to form a trust… The Vagina Trust. The money collected from people who generously donate their ticket fare could help fund pads for villagers throughout the year!

And if the film does cross the Rs 100 Crore mark, the producers could keep aside Rs 20 crores and use it judiciously to empower more rural women taking Arunachalam Muruganantham’s legacy forward. That would make Padman a truly benevolent film! It would also have taken Muruganantham’s dream forward. Then we can proudly repeat the dialogue Amitabh Bachchan said in the film: “If Hollywood has Superman, Batman and Spiderman, we have Padman!”

Swara Bhaskar, Nawazuddin, Vivek…

Since I started with Swara Bhaskar, I will end with her: has Swara done a Nawazuddin Siddiqui? Or has she done a Vivek Oberoi?

Nawazbhai was going great guns with his career peaking up when his PR team decided he should get immortal with his book, An Ordinary Life: A memoir. It was in bad taste and I wonder how Nawaz was influenced into getting this book published. I mean, you don’t sleep and tell! One actor categorically told me, “I’m glad I did not work with him.” Nawazuddin had to apologize and withdraw the book. This ensured he had muck on his face and the people around him had guided him foolishly.

Many a times, celebrities go overboard in over-selling themselves thinking ‘the more I am seen, the more work it will get me’. But sadly, sometimes it works adversely, like it did with Nawazuddin and Vivek Oberoi.

We all know that Vivek acted josh mein and that was the end of his rising career. Bollywood sometimes is united when it comes to issues which suit them fine, unlike the Deepika-Padmavat-Bhansali issue.

By doing the Vagina act after Padmavat, Swara has tried to get her publicity stakes upped (which it did) but she has also shot herself in the foot, like Nawazuddin and Vivek. One has to wait and watch to see where the Swara-Vagina rant leads to in the year(s) to come!

Bollywood, after all, is unforgiving.

Also Read: Bhansali, Padmaavati, Swara, Vagina!