3.18.2005

Main Hoon Na, Part 7

Ram asks Lucky if it’s ok that he stay at their house. Lucky tells Ram that his Mom always wanted a clean-cut son like Ram. Well, except for that time when she didn’t want Ram as a son. Lucky talks about his mother’s cooking, and then Ram asks about his dad. Ram, he’s your dad, too, silly! Remember – Army guy, grey hair, bloody gunshot wound to the chest? Lucky gets all serious and tells Ram that Ram is a friend, and all of Lucky’s friends know not to talk about his dad. Ever. Like, seriously. Dude. Lucky shows Ram the house, which currently has no electricity, and he realizes that he forgot about the broken fuse. He tells Ram to go ahead into the house while he fixes the fuse. Ram walks in and sees Kirron Kher offering puja. (Or something. I don’t know, I’m Buddhist.) Kirron Kher thinks that it’s Lucky because she has her eyes closed, and she offers Ram a blessing. The lights come on and she’s all, “Who’s this random dude accepting blessings and pretending to be Lucky?” Then Lucky walks in and introduces everyone, Ram kneels and touches Lucky’s mom’s feet, and they all stand around looking sappy.

Ram’s new room. He unpacks his things, including the urn containing his father’s ashes, which he quickly hides when Kirron Kher walks in. She shoves a paratha in his mouth because only a mother’s love can create magic parathas and moms and parathas are nice. Ram talks about what a nice guy his father was, and Kirron Kher says that fathers are important, that “Sometimes I feel that if Lucky’s father was with us…” trailing off before completing the thought, “then maybe Lucky wouldn’t have grown up to be such a big stoner doofus.” When Ram asks what happened to Lucky’s dad, Kirron Kher tells him that they had a fight and she left him. Ram asks if Lucky’s dad ever came to bring her back, and… flashback!

Gen. Sharma comes to visit, seven years after their fight. Way to be on top of things, there, Gen. Sharma. He asks Kirron Kher to come back, but she doesn’t want to live in the same house as “that boy,” and tells Gen. Sharma that he has to choose between her and Lucky on the one hand, and Ram on the other. Nine-year-old Lucky pokes his head out so he can eavesdrop at the moment of maximal emotional scarring. Gen. Sharma chooses Ram. Lucky chooses to stop showering and start hitting the bong.

Back to the present. Lucky calls, looking for his shoes. His mom complains about his skanky hair, skanky jeans, and the dog leash that he is apparently using as a belt that is unfortunately not visible. When she notices that his Union Jack t-shirt has been shredded into ribbons, she offers to stitch it back together, but Lucky explains that he just spent the morning shredding it, perhaps as a means of constructing a new paradigm of postcolonial identity. They bicker some more, until Ram offers to take Lucky’s mom to temple.

Physics class with the spit professor. Lucky doesn’t have his homework, so Ram slips him his, but then gets caught without his assignment. Good plan, Ram. His punishment is to kneel in the hallway with his hands on his ears. Ms. Chandni walks by and starts twirling around as doves fly above her and the wind blows her hair back. Then she goes back to being a normal person and asks Ram why he’s kneeling in the hallway. He tells her that Mr. Rasai (so that’s his name!) has punished him, and she laughs at him. As she walks away, some old song starts playing about a boy who is as nutty as a pie. Ms. Chandni turns around to gaze at him, and violinists appear, but then they disappear, and she suddenly looks irritated for some reason.

Sanju looks for Lucky, and finds out that he’s at the library. Lucky goes up to the library entrance. The library turns into a temple, and onlookers welcome him with music and blessings. Then it goes back to being the library again, and everyone stares at Lucky. A nerdy guy asks Lucky if he’s Sanju’s boyfriend, and he says “double battery, single power.” What the hell does that mean? Then Lucky talks some smack about how Sanju isn’t hot enough for him, just as Sanju is entering the library, wearing one of her Seattle grunge-by-way-of-the-J.C. Penney-junior’s-section outfits. She looks sad and runs to a concert hall to brood. Ram walks in, and Sanju confesses to him that her dad isn’t dead, but that he didn’t love her because she wasn’t a boy. She says that she tried to be like a son, and that now no one remembers that she’s a girl. Wait, Sanju’s a girl? I totally forgot for a second. Ram tells her that she’s fine the way she is, but says that they need to remind everyone how beautiful she is.

Ram stops by Ms. Chandni’s house, and asks her to make him look just like her. Then he realizes that he wasn’t supposed to say that out loud, and pretends that he’s talking about Sanju. Then Sanju appears, because apparently she was hiding behind Ram the whole time. Sanju goes with Ms. Chandni, who tells Ram she’ll see him later. Ram drools some more.
Part 6 Part 8

1 Comments:

At 12/31/2005 8:17 PM, Blogger Beth Loves Bollywood said...

If only this - "perhaps as a means of constructing a new paradigm of postcolonial identity" - could explain the other clothing nightmares we love to find!

I am rereading your whole recap. Superwow as always.

 

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