This was fun, I didn’t have to write anything this week!  We wrote it all together on Monday in bits and pieces, I just had to pull it together and make sense of it for this.

The Game of Mr. No (the sexy Shahrukh/Vidya one)

Courtesy of Procrastinatrix!  Who suggested Vidya and Shahrukh in a sexy movie.

She is a powerful sexy actress (herself, essentially). He is the secretary/manager she has just hired. At first she doesn’t notice him because he seems so quiet and efficient, but then she starts to see his dry wit and how perfectly he is arranging/controlling her life and gets intrigued. She wants to crack open his privacy and is increasingly frustrated by how carefully he maintains the “ma’am” kind of distance with her. She starts obsessing over him, ignores her sexy available young co-stars to run after him, gets increasingly blatant in her advances, he is never insulting or ungentlemanly but also never really responds to her.

 

(This kind of very buttoned up, unemotional, mature sort of look)

Until one day he is driving her back from a location shoot, the car breaks down in the middle of a rain storm, they at stuck together in a remote hut, he submissively suggests she take her clothes off (because he doesn’t want her to catch cold), and it kind of goes from there. The next day, he is already dressed and proper and has the car fixed by the time she wakes up, refuses to talk about anything that happened, just drives her to the shoot, and she comes back to her make-up room to find a farewell note from him explaining that he was an assistant at her manager’s office and was in love with her, but noticed she always got bored of men who gave her whatever she wanted.  So he came up with a plan, became her assistant but kept himself always just out of reach until she went crazy over it.  Only, while spending time with her, he realized he wasn’t even really in love before, it’s only now that he has seen the real Vidya that he has really truly fallen in love, and he feels guilty for playing games with her and he will go off with the memory of one wonderful night together and she should be with someone more “worthy”, because now that he really knows her after all this time together and he realizes what a wonderful person she is. So after pretending humility and saying “no” all this time, now he is actually sincerely humiliated and humble and truly doesn’t want her to be with him. And then Vidya can have the same realization that it wasn’t just his game, she actually grew to like him.

(Vidya is sexy like this)

She tracks him down and pretends to be furious with him, and he is conciliatory and sad and agrees with everything she says and admits he would do anything she asks, including sleep with her again, because he is that in love and can’t say “no” any more. At which point she reveals that she is in love with him, and is still in love with him after he said “yes” over and over again, so clearly it is more than just his game and her feelings are real. And then they agree that they will only play games in the bedroom from now on.

 

Deepika and Prabhas, Arranged Marriage Unlikely Couple

Courtesy of Anonymous

Dips was supposed to marry a great catch NRI type guy, she is an educated upperclass doctor type herself and a classical dancer and all sorts of valuable things on the marriage market. Prabhas is the “loser” of the family, barely graduated college after multiple tries and unemployed now and drinks with his friends in the evening. But then Deepika’s groom runs out on her, and Prabhas has to step up and marry her last minute to save the family honor (he is either the groom’s younger brother, or Deepika’s cousin, haven’t decided). Deepika is grateful, but Prabhas knows he isn’t worthy of her, they awkwardly start to get to know each other after they move to Dubai where Deepika has a good job, Prabhas explores the city while she works and makes her dinner at night and does the laundry and then takes her out for fun adventures that he has carefully planned whenever she needs a break from work.

(Not like this bit, but the part right after, when he is all supportive and proud of her and stays at her apartment and does her laundry and cooks her dinner)

And of course at some point there is a fight scene and Prabhas bravely defends her and then Dips patches him up once they are home. They start to fall in love, but Dips gets worried and thinks he is growing away from her when he turns down her subtle advances, and starts getting mysterious phone calls and stuff. She is about to leave him, he follows her to the airport and declares his love, and also explains that he felt he wasn’t worthy of her until he had something of his own, that’s why he avoided her advances, and that’s the mysterious phone calls, he was investing in a restaurant in Dubai which has finally opened and taken off. And now he wants to propose, again, and ask her to share his life by choice, not by desperation.

 

Alia and Prabhas, Silsila Remix

Courtesy of Asmita, and Meenakshy (this one got very confused, so I am re-writing it all in one piece)

Prabhas and Southern Siddharth (Not Sid M!) are friends, but Sid has always been the “good” one who never dated or did anything wrong and feels so much cleaner and younger, while Prabhas is the wild “bad” one.  Prabhas has a casual longterm dating relationship with Deepika, who was his college girlfriend and now is a successful marketing exec while Prabhas happily lives in his tiny apartment and half-heartedly runs the supermarket he inherited from his family.

Sid falls in love with Alia at first sight, she is a young fresh-faced NRI visiting India with her family.  Prabhas helps arrange for Sid and Alia to meet, is there on their dates driving the car and stuff and generally being supportive of their perfect love.  But then Sid, a fighter pilot, has to go away at the end of his leave.  And two weeks later, Prabhas has to bring word to Alia that Sid is dead.  Alia is devastated and grief stricken, and blurts out to her parents and Prabhas that she is also pregnant.

(This Siddharth)

Her parents are upset, want to whisk her back to America.  But Alia refuses, because she and Sid talked about it and she promised to raise his child in India.  So in the middle of this big family argument, Alia declares that she will do whatever it takes to stay in India, and turns to Prabhas and demands he marry her so she can stay as a citizen, he owes it to Sid’s memory.

Prabhas agrees, but pulls Alia aside to make sure she really wants this, doesn’t she want to marry for love?  But Alia is sure she will never love again, she just wants to live with someone who can help keep Sid’s memory alive for her and for their child.

Prabhas isn’t just older, he is also lower class and just plain different than a person that Alia would be expected to fall in love with. Prabhas and Dips have a lingering thing, which Alia kind of knows about but understands since Prabhas just married her out of obligation. Then Dips decides she wants an arranged marriage, tells Prabhas that she can’t keep living this half life, and then sends him a letter 2 years later saying how happy she is with her husband and she hopes he can find the same kind of happiness in his marriage, it is possible to forget your first love.

(And of course by now Prabhas has stopped being the drinking lazy drifting young man, and buckled down and worked hard to keep his business going now that he knows he can’t lose it since he has a family to support, and cooks for Alia at night, and wears nicer clothes, and so on)

And then after years of tiny moments, Prabhas holding her hand and giving her strength while she gives birth, the two of them trading off baby duties in the middle of the night, Alia helping out at Prabhas’ supermarket, Prabhas encouraging her to go back to school, Alia helping him come up with a marketing plan to expand his store, them finding a new better apartment together and Alia decorating it, having family jokes and putting the baby to bed together every night and so on and so on, they finally fall in love.  They each have tiny moments of suddenly feeling love for the other one, but then crush it down.  Until finally it all comes up after Prabhas gets Dips’ letter, and Alia rereads an old letter from Sid where he says he hopes she can find love again if anything happens to him, and that night after putting their daughter to bed, Alia finally goes to Prabhas and tells him she does want a “love” marriage after all, but not with some nice young man, with him, her husband all along.

 

Amitabh and Meryl Streep on a Sheep farm

Courtesy of Asmita!

Amitabh and Meryl as two crotchety solitary animal types. Amitabh got a degree from Oxford in animal husbandry or something, and then returned to India to live alone and remote with his sheep, he never married or even thought about it and hates people. Meryl is a similar type, inherited a farm in Vermont or something where she raises sheep and makes her own yarn and writes books on it. They both only agreed to this because it is a really unique breed of sheep on this farm, the uncle who died somehow managed to breed and domestic a kind that is usually wild or something like that. So they hate working together, but they are both determined to stay because they want the knowledge.

Obviously finding love over a sick little lamb that they both stay up all night taking care of, fall asleep leaning on each other, and wake up in the morning to discover their experimental treatment worked and the lamb is fine, and then embrace each other in happiness and somehow end up kissing.

(This is apparently someone named “lamb”, but I think Amitabh looks like he would much rather be hanging out with an actual lamb, rather than this idiot.  I think I might prefer that too)

 

Amitabh and Meryl Street Falling in Love in Cooking Classes

Courtesy of Decaf

They are both New York widowers who meet in a cooking class because their spouse used to do all the cooking and they are tired of take out. They are both terrible at the class, so the teacher puts them together and they decide to try to learn to cook on their own and start trading off Saturdays at each other’s houses experimenting with recipes. They both impress their kids/grandkids with a Thanksgiving dinner, which was the goal, and then Meryl invites Amitabh to come as her date/support to an event where she is getting an award (she is a college professor who is beloved by her students) because she doesn’t want to go alone. Amitabh notices how everyone is pitying her and talking about how sad it is to see her without her husband, and starts playing up being her boyfriend.

(Maybe he does a song kind of like this)

They both enjoy this game, and at the end of the evening end up kissing. Both of them are conflicted and guilty afterwards, knowing how much the other one loved their spouse and feeling like they crossed a line and may have lost the friendship. But then Meryl’s spunky young research assistant and Amitabh’s snarky older desi housekeeper both encourage them to take a chance and just talk to each other, and they rush to see each other at the one place they know they will be, the fresh foods market on Saturday morning and declare their love for each other. Flasforward to next Thanksgiving, where there is a glorious combined family celebration, all the grandkids playing together and the kids teasing and joking together, and the meal a combination of Indian and traditional American.

 

Amitabh and Meryl Streep and Helen Mirren Love Triangle

Courtesy of my friend in real life suggesting it!

If you are like me, you heard this and immediately the plot appeared full-blown in your head.  I’m thinking, retirement community (which we all know are hotbeds of sex and romantic drama.  Not even joking, they really are).  Helen Mirren is the “sexy” one, the slutty one that everyone whispers about behind her back.  She was just dumped publicly by her last boyfriend, Patrick Stewart, who romanced her and then ended up proposing to the sweet good-girl widow Judi Dench instead of her.  She is smarting from this, and ready to give up her wild ways and actually fall in love.

Meanwhile, Meryl Streep is a new arrival.  Her husband died a year ago after having alzheimers for years, she is lonely and has lost her social skills after being a caregiver for so long.  She keeps making a fool of herself in the dining room, sitting at the wrong table, not knowing how to make friends, feeling lonely and embarrassed all the time.

(Look, they are friends in real life!  I love it!)

And then Amitabh arrives!!!!!  He is brought in as a guest speaker, gives a gorgeous poetry recital, is all sexy and rock star like, and then while everyone is fangirling over him and having little heart palpitations, the event coordinator announces that in fact he is moving in, their newest tenant.  And then she asks for questions.  Helen raises her hand right away, and gives a very flirty question, which Amitabh smoothly responds to.  And then he takes it upon himself to call on Meryl because he noticed how she was listening, and Meryl shyly asks a brilliant question that digs into the content of his poetry, and Amitabh is obviously intrigued.

For the rest of the film, Amitabh is clearly interested in and chasing after Meryl, but she is so insecure she doesn’t realize what he is doing.  Meanwhile, Helen is chasing Amitabh HARD and he is smoothly ignoring her.  Meryl finally decides to take a risk and ask Amitabh out, only to see Helen leaving his apartment after having clearly spent the night.  Helen, meanwhile, hit rock bottom, tried to seduce Amitabh and he gently turned her down.  She returns home humiliated, which makes her finally see and appreciate the nice funny dorky guy next door who watches Wheel of Fortune with her every night, Dustin Hoffman.  He may not be as sexy and exotic as Amitabh, but she is happy with him.

Helen, finally feeling happy and secure in her new wonderful relationship, reaches out to Meryl and helps her.  Explains what happened with Amitabh, that he refused her advanced but let her stay the night because she threw her back out, and Meryl should just make a move on him already.  Finally, Meryl ends up confessing her love in the middle of the dinner hour with every watching, and Amitabh romantically responds with poetry and then a big dramatic kiss while everyone applauds.

 

Shahrukh and Minnie Driver, Single Mom and Divorced Pediatrician

Courtesy of Procrastinatrix!

She’s a single mom, he’s a divorced doctor, neither of them know how to date or handle the idea of “romance” since she married her high school sweetheart who then died, and he had an arranged marriage which ended in divorce. But they keep seeing each other because he is the new family doctor at the clinic she goes to, and her kids’ are accident prone. He needs help and encouragement from his nurse to realize that he and Minnie are really vibing, she tries to borrow dating tips from magazines and ends up just embarrassing herself, they go for a first date and both try to do what they think “dates” are like, and then end up just giving up on the fancy restaurant and going to the video arcade where she teaches him how to play video games and he gets cutely obsessed with winning.

(Somehow I just feel like she and Shahrukh would have great chemistry)

But conflict starts when his older sister comes to town and wants him to marry another “nice” desi girl so he can finally have kids, and Minnie’s mother-in-law visits and she starts to feel guilty about falling in love again. They decide to end it, as better all around, but then Minnie’s mother-in-law notices how miserable she is and finds out from the kids that she had been dating and ended it and realizes what happened and gives Minnie her blessing to live again, and Shahrukh finally speaks up at his “first meeting” with an appropriate woman, tells her she seems perfectly nice, but he is in love with a widow with two kids who is white and he is going to marry her or no one.

 

Vidya Balan/Hrithik Roshan, Hot Husband and Wife Who Feels Unattractive

Courtesy of Meenakshy

They married when he was skinny and shy and she was pretty and curvy. And then 20 years later, he has aged into being dashing and handsome and confident, and she has aged into being mousy and dowdy. We could see time passing, Starting with a happy young romance, doing everything together, building a life. Then him finding more and more satisfaction and confidence at work while she is running around after the kids, but they still have the happiest time of the day when they come back together in the evening, and she is happy and proud of her handsome husband and happy for him. And then her going to work parties with him and starting to feel more and more uncomfortable as she watches his younger glamorous female colleagues fawn over him and she just stands awkwardly in the corner with no one to talk to, until she stops going to the work parties altogether, even if he begs, and he feels sad and lonely like she doesn’t care about his life, and she feels increasingly unattractive and unworthy. Finally, she is mistaken for his mother when they are out together, and that is the last straw.

And then I’m not sure what I want to happen after that. Maybe he starts emailing her online pretending to be someone else who saw her at the market or something and fell passionately in love at first sight, which helps her feel beautiful again. Or maybe he arranges for a friend who is a modeling agent to pretend to want to hire her, only then she actually does end up being amazing at the modeling job and the friend starts to fall for her, and Hrithik goes insane with jealousy as he sees all of India talking about how sexy and beautiful his wife is and begins to understand how she felt.

 

Madhavan and Vidya, Comic Couple Caper

Courtesy of niviblog

I’d love to see them in kind of a comic crime type movie. Like, they both worked for years and did everything they were supposed to do as a responsible middle-class couple and their lives are kind of boring. And then Maddy is fired and learns his company raided the pension fund and everything falls apart. They try to get their money out from a building company they invested in, it’s super shady and the guy refuses to give them their money, they are both frustrated, and Vidya suggests why not just take it? She talks Maddy into going along with it, they run a con and manage to get their money back. And then they just keep going, all the people who bend the rules and take money from the trusting hardworking middle-class types, everyone they had to bribe or overpay over the years, they work together to rip them off. And, needless to say, they also rediscover their sex life and everything exciting and romantic and fun with copious amounts of roleplay. Until finally they come up with the biggest plan of all, to somehow get the pension fund back from Maddy’s corrupt boss. It’s all very stressful and dangerous, but they succeed, and the happy ending is the two of them and their kids (who ended up being part of that final con) moving to Goa to live happily in a beach house, while all of Madhavan’s ex-co-workers get mysterious checks in the mail replacing their pensions.