DOR

DOR

She is a still a child at heart closing her eyes in horror during a violent scene in a film and absorbs every word in a film that she can repeat the words when she sees it again. She loves dancing to the tunes of film songs imagining herself to be Aishwarya Rai or kareena kapoor. A child forced to be a woman through marriage and early widowhood. She accepts it passively when society tells her that her life and happiness are over when her husband dies.Her happiness depended on being someone's wife and when that someone disappears he takes all her happiness with her.She would live her life serving the parents of her husband and obeying them and staying away from every happy occasion.It is her bad luck that her husband died. She has to make amends by leading an austere life.It is ok for her because she is scared of the outside world and the uncertainties. She prefers the security of her familiar surroundings, so every decision is made for her and she does not have to make decisions or be responsible for the consequences. Even if it means staying in a dark room clothed in drab clothes and going out just once a day to go to the temple.

And then she meets another woman who tells her that she has a right to be happy. She is not a sinner if she felt happy and danced just two months after her husband's death. She has to take her life in her hands and accept responsibility for her decisions.This friend tells the young widow that her life is not over with her husband and she has a right to live her life and a right to happiness. This is a woman who has no time to wallow when she is confronted with troubles as she has to to solve it in the best possible manner. She will try till the end and if her world still comes crashing down she knows how to pick up the pieces and start all over again and fulfil her responsibility to herself.

It is incidental that the latter is from a religion that we like to believe oppresses women by imposition of the veil. And the former follows a religion that accords Godhood to women.It is also incidental that the latter actually comes seeking the help of the former and ends up becoming her friend and showing her the way to happiness.All that matters is that both are women and both fulfil their roles with strength.

It is about how a liberated woman , a stronger woman can hold the hand of a weaker one and empower her.It is a duty that those who have crosed the traditional lines have towards those that are still confined by the lines.

Wonderful film - DOR.Please watch.Touching performance by Ayesha takia, Gul Panag and a very entertaining role played by Shreyas Talpade. Nagesh has delivered again!
For a more professional review , as always, I direct you to my favorite film critic Baradwaj Rangan here.

And if you are as concerned as I am about socially regressive effect of all the martyrhood being conferred on sufferring women in Tamil serials please vist this site and express your solidarity.