I have been on a bit of a Sunny Deol kick lately, not sure exactly why.  Possibly it is just my brain playing tricks, because it is overcast and disgusting where I live and I just want it to be “Sunny” in my apartment somehow!

Speaking of homonyms, a friend’s little sister pointed out that “Sunny Deol” sounds exactly the same as “Sunnydale” where Buffy lived.  Which is true!  And just strange!  Is it possible Josh Whedon is secretly a 80s Indian action superfan?

Anyway, I have just watched 3 Sunny movies, none of which are worth a full recap, but each of which is worth a quick summary hitting the high points.

(second half of this film covered here)

I went in reverse chronological order when watching, for some reason, so I will be starting with The Hero: Love Story of a Spy.  Now, the first thing that strikes you about The Hero: Love Story of a Spy is that it has one of those titles you cannot possible abbreviate.  You will notice through out this posts, I will continue to refer to it as The Hero: Love Story of a Spy every single time, because just saying the first bit sounds wrong!  The closest I can come is “The Hero” (lovestoryofaspy).  See also, Gadar: Ek Prem Katha (speaking of Sunny) and Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol (speaking of spy movies), but not Lagaan (Once Upon a Time in India) for some reason.  And then there are the movies that you can’t say the title without singing it, like “Aap Mujhe Aache Lagna Lagi” or “(dekho dekho dekho) An Evening in Paris“.  Anyway, forcing myself to move on from this fascinating little side road, let’s plunge right into “The Hero: Love Story of a Spy“!

(wait!  Don’t move on yet!  First watch this!  Dekho dekho dekho!)

We open in Canada!  The most Canadian Canada ever!  There is a red faced mountie in full uniform giving a speech.  You have the feeling that it was a close thing not to have him give it from horseback.  The Canadian Government is giving an award for heroism to Sunny Deol, an Indian army officer.  Sure, this seems perfectly normal.  Also, part of the speech is in Hindi (given by a Sikh mountie in uniform but with a white turban instead of a hat).  Again, okay, I will accept this version of Canada.  I’ve never gotten a Canadian medal, for all I know all their governmental awards ceremonies feature the Indian flag more prominently than the Canadian and are given in Hindi!

Sunny says “Thank you” in English, and then promptly answers questions from reporters in Hindi.  The language of Canadian TV journalism!  They ask him what he wants, and he says something sappy about just wanting love.  And then gets in a car and drives off with random exposition extractor person, who asks him what he will do now.  Sunny gets a faint look in his eyes and begins one of those incredibly long stories that people are always telling each other in movies.  I always wonder, how detailed are we supposed to believe the dialogue version of the flashback is?  Like, is the character supposedly describing in detail “And then I embraced her and it felt like we were in the Swiss Alps and she was in a green sari and then it changed to a red miniskirt and then we embraced but didn’t kiss and then it was all a dream and actually no time had passed, but from that moment on we knew we were destined to be together!”  Because that would be a very boring and very long story.  In fact, it would just be my blog posts!

So, right, Sunny starts his super long story.  First, he was back in Canada!  Years ago!  In an odd and terribly disguise, cleverly capturing Amrish Puri, who was also in an odd and terrible disguise and a terrorist!  I did not bother wasting brain space on exactly how this happened, but I know the final confrontation was in a glass elevator (oo, Canada is so fancy!).

(his disguise is kind of like this)

Following which, Sunny is sent home and given an “easy” assignment within India itself.  He gets to build a spy network in Kashmir!  Pretending to be an army officer!  Which he actually is, except that he usually is a spy Army Officer, not a commanding men Officer.  But I guess he still went through that Lakshya training course, because he seems perfectly capable!

(Polo!  Table Manners!  Everything you need to serve on the border!)

So then we have the traditional driving to Kashmir songfest.  I showed just this part to a friend, and they couldn’t believe it, so then I had to show her all the other movies that have included the exact same scene.  Apparently, singing happy melodic songs while driving into enemy territory is just what the Indian army does.  This particular melodic song as just worlds worst lyrics.  Which, thanks to the stupid simplicity, are dangerously easy to memorize and have going through your head for days and days and days.

(LOC Kargil!  It’s just the same as this one, but catchier and stupider)

 

Song over, they have arrived in Kashmir!  Where their route is blocked by Preity Zinta!  With sheep!  Including one who is attached to her back!  Spoiler: It stays on her back for the entire first half of the movie.  Except when she is carrying it in front like a wittle baby.  She is sweet and innocent (in case you didn’t catch that).

Anyway, Preity wants to do that thing I learned about from Roja when Madhoo did it to Arvind Swamy where you drive all the sheep onto the road and keep them there until the drivers of the cars give you baksheesh.  Her friend is scared, but Priety is perky and does it anyway.  Of course, our saintly Sunny Deol army officer is charmed by this and gives her some cash to drive them away.  That’s because he is secretly a spy.  If he were a real Indian army officer stationed in Kashmir, he would of course have had them all arrested, sheep included.

Sunny in voice over explains that he needs to win over the locals and find people who are willing to “work with” the army.  Which I mentally translate to “inform on their friends and neighbors.”  There is a lot of voice over in this movie, by the way, It kind of feels like Sunny had nothing else going on and just hung out in the recording studio for months and months while every else went about their lives and didn’t even bother recording basic dialogue.

Right, so, Sunny wins over the local fire and brimstone Kashmir for Kashmiris type preacher by giving him sweets to “sweeten his tongue.”  Which I would find horribly patronizing, but apparently the community likes it.  And then he goes to the local shrine and enters it and prays!  Even though he is Hindu!  Oh the humility and open-mindedness!  Oh, and he stops on the way out to wink at Preity who gathered with everyone else to see the One Decent Man in a Bad Place.

I guess Preity’s parents noticed the wink?  Anyway, her Dad approaches him at the army camp and asks for money to help send Preity to school.  Like, $5 American basically.  Sunny makes a big deal about giving it (oh come on Sunny!  That’s like an hour’s pay!).  And then a local who is working nearby starts to come up to Sunny to ask for help for his daughter’s wedding and gets chased away by the humorous aid who is all like “You think the Major will just pay for everything you ask for now?  Get out of here!”  But, why shouldn’t he pay?  He has so much money!  Comparatively!  Why not give it to the struggling Kashmiris and buy a little goodwill?  I get it, its supposed to be that even his Aid has already recognized that he has a special interest in cute little Preity, but I get distracted by the geopolitical forces.

So Preity is going to school, dum-de-dum, and Sunny explains in voice over that she started giving him little gifts whenever she saw him, like fresh sweets and stuff, and one day she gave him something that had a note hidden inside about terrorists she had heard plotting when she visited the Shrine.  Okay, that never happens to me when I go to church!  I just hear people “plotting” about the bake sale and the Sunday school lessons.  I must not be going to the right church.

So, Sunny explains he realized that Preity can come and go over the border, since she is still hanging with the sheep when she is done with classes.  And I think this is when he goes to her father to ask permission for her to spy?  Or something?  Anyway, for some reason he is at her parents’ place which allows them to grab hold with both hands and yank the conversation over until they clarify that, although she was raised by Kashmiri Muslims, Preity herself is in fact a lowland Hindu!  Because her father was the teacher of the village who died, and this couple took her in.  Okay, such blatant anti-interreligious romance statement!  And, pro-Hinduism as a genetic condition!  But on the other hand, Shakuntala?

If you still haven’t read it (even though I told you to back in Bajirao!), Shakuntala is the love story of a Prince and a forest girl.  The Prince falls in love with her, but there is a moment of doubt, because she is raised with the daughters of a Brahmin living the simple life in the forest, and of course a prince can’t marry a Brahmin.  But then it is explained that she is actually Kshastriya and adopted into their family, so it is okay.  It’s a nice little work around caste, so she can still have the cool forest hermit upbringing without being all Brahmin and above the world and not able to rule.  There’s going to be some more Shakuntala parallels in a little bit, by the way.

Back to the movie!  Her parents agree, and then Sunny goes off and does heroic action things based on her information.  Which somehow ends up with him buried under an avalanche?  It is like Bahubaali, but about 90% less exciting. And somehow Preity is the first one to find him?  We don’t see it, it is covered in voice over.  What we see instead is Preity and he in a shed outpost thing with a fire going and Preity rubbing him to warm him up.  Both of them fully clothed, don’t think sexy, think sweet.  And this is when Sunny realizes that Priety loves him.  Not because she is so worried and determined to get him warm again, but because she is willing to risk dishonoring her father by staying with him all night.

Possibly related to this, possibly not, I kind of zone out during the spy parts (I’m more into the “Love Story” part of the title than the “of a Spy” part), a Muhajir (term for someone from what are now Indian territories who resettled in Pakistan after Partition) comes to Sunny and offers his services as a spy, while also giving the audience a nice little summary of how people like him are still treated as second class citizens in Pakistan, while the refugees from what is now Pakistan to India have been fully assimilated.  Okay, I don’t know if I entirely believe that, but I can believe that it is a different experience for refugees between the two countries.  Because they are two different countries.

This helpful Muhajir also offers that if they can get a nice girl for him (not like that!), he can sneak her into the local terrorist household as a maid.  Okay, similar to my reaction to Preity just hearing terrorists plot at the shrine, I feel like I may not know the right neighbors.  If I had to help Sunny Deol spy on my local terrorists, I wouldn’t even know where to start, let alone know them well enough to insert a maid into their household!

So, Preity is the obvious choice.  Sunny takes a moment, in voice over, to explain that he hesitated, because he had grown to care about her, but that his country came first.  He talks to her Dad again (of course!  Do you think the choice to be a spy can be left up to a woman to decide on her own?  With her head all filled with baby lambs and cute army majors?).  Dad gives his permission (maybe this is when he drops the “she’s actually Hindu and mainland Indian!” bombshell?) but expresses concern that she may be attacked or molested.  Oh, you think his concern is because that would be a terrible experience for her?  Silly!  Of course not!  If she is molested, it would of course make it harder to marry her off.  You think he is concerned that she would never feel fully happy and fulfilled unless she is a wife, as Indian society dictates?  Naaaah!  If she never marries, it would lower her father’s honor in the community.  Well, now that is a real concern!  Sunny acknowledges what a disaster this would be, and offers that if there is any doubt when she returns, he’ll just marry her himself.  Preity (and her lamb) of course overhear this and look thoughtful.  But her Dad gives permission, so Preity is in bootcamp!

Worlds most adorable and romantic bootcamp!  Which apparently she just sneaks off to after class or something and changes into fatigues?  And she gets to bring her lamb with her?  Also, what is the party they are at in the middle?  Not the simply Kashmiri folk dance party, the one with the fancy ladies and all?  I get that it is supposed to be his fancy upperclass officers’ party and he invites her into his world, but where did all the fancy upperclass officers’ party attendees suddenly spring form?  Isn’t this supposed to be middle of nowhere Kashmir?  Oh well, maybe they bused them all in for that day.

Love song over with, Priety leaves to sneak across the border one last time, saying good-bye with a kiss.  Oh, she doesn’t kiss Sunny!  No, that would be gross.  She kisses the lamb.

And, we’re in Pakistan!  Where everything is basically the same as India.  Preity has a little hidden transmitter in the dish washing hut, and spends a lot of time massaging the old lady of the house.  When who should arrive, but Amrish Puri!  Remember, from back at the beginning?  The very first part of the flashback, when Sunny puts him in jail?  Well, apparently, he’s out!  Preity takes a picture of him with her enormous spy camera, and shockingly, the huge camera and weird constant rushing to do dishes, is actually noticed!  One of the newer guys who came along with Amrish follows her to the dish area so that she has to cut off the transmitter before the message can be fully sent.  And then he TAKES OFF HER SCARF!!!  Can you imagine?  Well, you probably can, because evil louts are always pulling off girl’s scarves in movies.  And then the hero has to rush around and beat people up until they return it.

(I love Singham)

This time though, no hero!  Preity is brought to the center court of the house and made to stand there, duppatta-less, while they talk about their suspicions.  And the thing is, they’re right!  She has a camera on her right then!  But we are still supposed to be all “booo!”  because they are considering laying indecorous hands on a female.  But she really is a spy!  I feel so bad for the “bad” guy here.  Bad guy, you’re right!  Just like you think you are!

He starts to pat her down and Preity looks all icked out (it is icky, he isn’t so much patting as lingeringly rubbing), but then she realizes, who has the real power here!  Who can be her hero, who can defeat all her foes!  Yes, that’s right, the old lady she massaged!  She calls out for her, and the old lady comes running over and slaps everybody!!!  And then tells them she is ashamed to call them her sons and they should go inside and think about what they did and Preity will stay with her from now own.  And even Amrish Puri looks all scared and guilty.  Old ladies are terrifying!

But, Preity can’t go do dishes and send messages any more, so she has to go over to the bar?  Trading house?  Large living room?  Whatever, it’s where the Muhajir is hanging out and give him the camera.  He is all excited about taking the camera across to India for her, but then Amrish Puri!  And a bunch of other guys!  They show up, shoot everything, blow up stuff, and kill the Muhajir’s wife, which makes him really angry, so he sends Priety out through a secret passage and pulls out his own gun and shoots back.  They kill him, of course, but he did manage to delay them.  Including, towards the end, hanging on to some guy’s ankle and making him drag his dying body along for a few more feet.

So Preity is running running running!  Forest forest forest!  Bad day for night lighting bad day for night lighting bad day for night lighting!  She climbs a vine and hides in the trees, and then falls on the ground and hides in a hole under the jeeps.  But eventually, they catch her!  But just as she is surrounded by like twenty guys, Sunny Deol!  In all black, leaping down, holding a gun in each hand.  And he keeps leaping for like five minutes while he shoots all twenty guys!  And then he scoops her up in his arms, shoots two more guys, while another guy comes up from behind and tries to snatch her, and he just straight up backhands that guy across the forest.  And then he calls out “IS THERE ANYONE ELSE OUT THERE?  I AM READY FOR YOU!!!!”  And, presumably, all the other terrorists decide to just quietly back away and let Sunny do what Sunny’s gonna do.

And, party!  Fireworks and stuff.  It’s New Years (how religiously neutral!) and they are having a big party in Preity’s honor, with her parents there, and Sunny proposes!  But Preity is all self-sacrificing and says he doesn’t have to marry her just because he feels bad.  To which Sunny responds by singing!  It’s sweeter than it sounds.  He starts a sort of jolly folk song version of a love song, saying he loves her, and if he is lying, let a scorpion eat him.  Preity is all shy and sweet about it, let’s herself get made over by the fancy ladies at the party (not like a big make over, just a nicer version of the same salwar kameez and head scarf she has been wearing all movie), and finally accepts both his ring, and his bangles (presumably his mother’s bangles, as that is the traditional gift for a new bride) and they are all in love and EXPLOSION!!!!  Amrish Puri is back!  With a vengeance!  Oh!  Die Hard: With a Vengeance!  There’s another one of those movie titles where you just have to say the whole thing!

So, remember how I said Shakuntala was going to come back again?  So, in Shakuntala, there is this whole thing about how they are in love and married “before the trees” and everything is awesome.  Only, then the groom loses his ring and thanks to a curse, forgets his wife.  So he goes back to his princely duties, and she travels far far away from her home to meet him, but he doesn’t recognize her, so she goes away.  Until years later, he finally remembers her and finds her again and they are happy.  And now you know the whole second half of this movie!

Not really, I am going to go into more detail, but I’ve gone so far already I think I am actually going to split this thing into two posts!  Check back tomorrow (or later today) for the rest!