Only Shah Rukh Khan could have done it without seeming totally ridiculous. And only he could have sustained it over almost 20 years, making it his trademark. Yeah, it’s the spread-legs-spread-arms-flash-dimple-and-yodel moment that made its mark in Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge , the one that SRK should have — and maybe has — legally patented, considering he has it down so pat.
“Come … fall in love,” he seems to invite, embodying the tag line of the film itself. And almost everyone did. So much so that the movie is still running today at the Maratha Mandir theatre, 1,000 weeks after it was first released in 1995. Produced by the inimitable Yash Chopra and directed by debutant Aditya Chopra — the Invisible Man who not so long ago married the very widely visible Rani Mukherji — DDLJ , as it is fondly referred to, is the love story that every young woman and her doting papa dream of.
Raj (SRK), son of a rather liberal and even more demented father (Anupam Kher at the start of his long and illustrious career as a ham), falls in love with Simran, daughter of the ‘ mera Bharat mahaan ’ advocate Baldev Singh (Amrish Puri). They do a little Europe yatra together — purely by accident, nothing (honest!) happened… almost — and sing a song or two, finally returning to London, where they part to go back to their own lives. But love has already blossomed and they need to work a little harder before they can settle down and smell the flowers. The story goes on and the ending, needless to say, is about happily ever after, with all the ideals, traditions and morality systems firmly in place, cocking a dated but delightful snook at the execrable concept of honour killings and khap diktats.
While many of the current generation look at Varun Dhawan, Siddharth Malhotra and Aditya Roy Kapoor as the ultimate in eye candy-slash-stuff of heroes, it was only a few years ago that the boyishly gangly SRK, clad in those thank-God-they’re-done high-waisted jeans ran around trees — yes, that is the archetypal Hindi movie romantic moment for doing which this author was almost arrested many years ago — with a fearsomely beetle-browed Kajol, and established himself as the romantic star. And today, with so many movies to his resume, he is still dimpling and spreading those arms, keeping honour and Indian values on a pedestal, still seen as the only actor who could possibly be Raj (and occasionally Rahul).
SRK and Kajol together are more often than not voted the best onscreen pair ever, be it then, when DDLJ first made its impact, or now, when so many other couples have done the filmi boogie with varying degrees of success. And many have even been called Raj and Simran, including on television soaps!
But cynicism apart, moments of Dilwale do reign eternal. The scene where Kajol runs to catch a train, her beau reaching out to grab her hand and swing her in was reprised in Chennai Express , which had the now rather older lover boy Shah Rukh stretching it for his next-gen heroine, Deepika Padukone. And we all smiled. Then there is the unforgettable line to Kajol, “ Bade bade shehron mein chhoti chhoti baatein hoti rehte hain ”, which R.R. Patil tried to make his own soon after the terrorist attack on Mumbai in 2008, with disastrous consequences. There is the everlasting and as-dimpled-as-SRK Farida Jalal as the supportive and loving parent — or aunt, or hostel warden or housekeeper in later films, take your pick — the wannabe bridegroom who loses out on the bride, the little sister who makes friends with the beau, the flowering mustard fields, the flowing drapery (sari, dupatta , you choose) et al, all enduring symbols of the wave that DDLJ set off. Today, take the same story with minor updates, change the designers who label the wardrobe choices, add some electronic music, a little more modern technology and a great many zeroes to the production budget and it will work, provided the hero can do the SRK stretch, the heroine can be sanskari and yet yearn for the love of her life and the baddies do no more than glower.
And since all this worked so well then, enough to have a special 1,000-week milestone screening that is no less than a high-glam multi-star red carpet event at the same theatre (now refurbished, of course) that has been showing the film unfailingly at a matinee every day since October 20, 1995, it must be the perfect formula for a super hit film, hai na ? Maratha Mandir is house full for the special show, its managing director Manoj Desai has said. And as the brave-hearted takes away the bride for the umpteenth time — with her father’s permission, of course — everyone watching will sniff happily and fall in love, all over again!
