Mamootty picks the BEST story ideas for his age. After Bhaskar the Rascal, here is another one, Pullikkaran Staraa, that is age appropriate and interesting and could so easily be translated into a Hindi film. Especially since the Malayalam original was only moderately successful and of only moderate quality.
The original is a movie called Pullikkaran Staraa. I’ll be putting up a “real” review as well, but this is just a quick post so all of my fellow Hindi fans can join me in going “yes! This is the kind of movie the middle-aged Khans should be making!”
Our hero has always had bad luck with women. He tries to do the right thing, but it gets misunderstood. Back in his village, he got a bad name to begin with when he was born and as a baby grabbed at the nurse’s breast and she called him “naughty”. From then on, when anything went wrong in the village, boys who had stolen a bra from a laundry line dropped it for instance, it was blamed on him. His father died, he got his younger brother married, and here he is, 40-something, still with no luck with women, still being misunderstood.
(Sort of like Shahrukh in Chennai Express, but more sweet and misunderstood instead of just a failed ladies man)
Our hero lives in the city now and is a teaching instructor who goes from school to school doing training courses for teachers. In his new course is a woman he recognizes from his home town, his first love when they were children. But he doesn’t know how to act with her, how to woo her, despite his friends trying to give him advice.
At the same time, when he is riding the train one day, he sees a young woman get on. And then a young man get on and sit with her and have an intense conversation ending with the two of them embracing, clearly in love. And then in the middle of the night, he wakes up and sees the young woman wake up as well to see that the young man is gone and has left a note. She looks sad, and then goes to stand looking out between the two cars. Our hero follows her and grabs her when it looks like she is about to jump. The train engineer misunderstands and (as always) thinks our hero is being a womanizer, but she supports him. He jollies her into cheerfulness and takes her home with him now that she has no other place to go.
(Kind of like Jab We Met, but not really)
And in return, she enthusiastically starts helping him in his own romance, giving him lessons on how to make romantic phone calls and so on. But just as the romance with the childhood sweetheart seems to be progressing, he learns she is married! But separated for a year. His friends are divided on what to do, if he should give up because she is still married or if he should try to make her forget her husband. Our hero is cheerfully ready to give up, because he is happy to have another friend, friends are wonderful. His friends are frustrated with him, because this attitude of making women into friends is why he is over 40 and still not married.
Meanwhile, the young woman is beginning to be more and more caught up with him. She tells her friend that she feels restless, bored, she is only happy when she is listening to his silly stories and he isn’t around enough lately. Her friend suggests she might be falling in love and at first she rejects this idea, but it nags away at her. Just as she is thinking it might be true, our hero reveals that not only has he been talking to his childhood sweetheart’s husband to try to fix her marriage, he also tracked down the boy that broke the heart of the young woman and abandoned her to try to bring him back so she will be happy again. She gets mad and yells at him and he can’t understand why.
Right in the middle of this conversation, he gets an upset phone call from the other woman, there is an issue at her school, and he rushes to help her with a group of angry parents, saving her. The younger woman is now sure he isn’t interested in her, until he suddenly suggests that they go on a trip together, just the two of them, it will be fun, it will give them a distraction. She is excited and considering saying how she feels, and then he says that it will be after the school excursion on which he is going to put everything on the line and ask the other woman a question, now that he has the full story of her marriage. The younger woman is heartbroken and tells the rest of the group of friends how she feels, they try to tell her to just tell the hero and see what he says, but she isn’t sure.
(I also love this group of friends, it’s very Chalte Chalte like, they are all so committed to finally getting our hero married, and so quick to adopt this young woman into their gang of middle-aged men)
On the school trip, our hero asks to speak to the childhood sweetheart alone. And tells her that he talked to her husband and thinks it is a misunderstanding and she should at least speak with him. She resists, saying she saw him cheating with her own eyes, our hero argues that there could still be an explanation, and finally wins from her an agreement to at least meet with him. That was the big question he wanted to ask. On the way home, one of the buses slips and our hero has to climb down a cliff to rescue a child. ACTION SCENE!!!!
Finally he returns home to be surprised by an older couple in his living room. And the young man from the train, the younger woman’s ex boyfriend. Our hero had arranged for him to come, and her parents, so the marriage could be settled but he didn’t expect them that day. The young man comes out of the room and tells our hero that he is still in love but it won’t work out, our hero knows why. Our hero just looks confused. And then her parents and his friends explain to him that they are there to propose a marriage between him and the young woman. Please don’t mess it up this time! He looks at the young woman, she is smiling, so he knows it is okay and then awkwardly sits down and talks to her parents. And then there isn’t an end credits wedding song, but there SHOULD BE.
(Everything should have an end credits wedding song, EVERYTHING!!! I know this isn’t the end credits, but there’s another version there showing the hero and heroine getting married)
So, this is adorable! A love triangle between our older hero and the woman he “should” be with, age appropriate, childhood sweetheart, interests in common (also a teacher). And the woman he “shouldn’t” be with, much much younger, met her when she was in the middle of eloping, nothing in common. But the younger women and he have so much more chemistry, he loves telling her stories and she loves listening to them, she immediately is part of his intimate friend circle and knows all his embarrassing secrets, they even cutely hide together under a sheet when she tries to help him make his first romantic phone call.
I want a Hindi cast for this film! An older hero, a younger actress he has great chemistry with, and an older actress he has great chemistry with but only friend chemistry. And another older hero to do a cameo as her husband.
Options:
Older hero: Shahrukh Khan
Childhood sweetheart turned friend: Juhi Chawla
Younger heroine: Anushka Sharma
Husband cameo: Rahul Bose
(Something closer to how they are in real life, friend and enjoy each other but clearly aware of the age difference between them)
Older Hero: Aamir Khan
Childhood sweetheart turned friend: Madhuri Dixit
Younger heroine: Kareena Kapoor
Husband cameo: Salman Khan
(I know everyone treats them as the same age now, but there is actually a 15 year age gap, it would be nice to have a movie that acknowledges that)
Older hero: Salman Khan
Childhood sweetheart turned friend: Kajol
Younger heroine: Katrina Kaif
Husband cameo: Ajay
(They are always SO GOOD together!!!!)
That’s just the three Khans, I could go on and on!
So, what do you think? And what would be your dream cast?
dontcallitbollywood 
Ayyo!
Mamootty picks the BEST story ideas for his age.
>>> NO NO NO NO NO
LikeLike
😂😂😂
LikeLike
See??? You like it! Why don’t directors make movies that people will like and get excited about?
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 9:08 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
The story-the way you wrote is very charming. Quite age appropriate, funny & romantic for any of the middle aged superstars. The actual Malayalam film & it’s execution is a whole another story!
Btw I would go with the Salman-Kat remake. In fact it feels semi autobiographical. Only I would change the older heroine to Aish & of course Abhishek as the hubby. Wdnt that be something ?
LikeLike
Oh yeah, that is the best possible cast. And it would be a perfect redemption story for Salman, making us all leave the theaters with warm fuzzies about how he just wants Aish to be happy in her marriage and just wants to rescue Kat without ever thinking of her in a romantic way until she forces him to. And of course he isn’t REALLY a womanizer, he is just unmarried because he is so misunderstood.
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 10:12 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
Yep! Im expanding the cast-Ranbir as the guy who dumped Kat &trying to get back to her later. His parents of course Rishi & Neetu. But Kat is now firmly in love with Salman who always wanted the best for her. That’s eerily close rt?
LikeLike
Yep! This is the movie Salman and Kat should make right before they announce their engagement, to soften up their public image and create a narrative that will make us supportive of the match.
Also, so long as we are doing the perfect cast, can we make Sanju and SRK and Aamir play Salman’s group of friends that just want the best for him and are trying to help him finally get married?
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 10:24 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
All three Khans in one movie?? That’s one heck of an ask..😂😂😂maybe I can offer you Sanjay Dutt, Anil Kapoor & Sunil Shetty as friends? Let the focus remain on Salman only.
LikeLike
I figure, in a world where we can get Aish and Abhi and Salman to costar, we can also get all 3 Khans together. Anything could happen!
And speaking only for myself, if Suniel Shetty is onscreen, I am NOT focusing on Salman Khan.
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 10:32 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
Okay, the IDEAS are good, not making any promises about the execution. This movie was pretty confused and not good in how it ended up, but the idea of a guy who kept being misunderstood and so was unmarred at 40, and being torn between his childhood sweetheart and a totally inappropriate young woman, that is so much better than whatever SRK was doing in Dilwale
LikeLiked by 1 person
Pullikkaran staraa !!!!! being a diehard mammootty fan, even me skipped this one due to terrible reports.. u are the first one to say something positive about it 😂
LikeLike
It’s really not a great movie, but I was watching it thinking “this plot could be so easily turned into a great Hindi movie”. It might even work better in Hindi than in Malayalam, there was this effort to shove in a village sequence that didn’t make sense, and some kind of message about children and education which didn’t make sense either. If they took that out and Hindi-ized it, the end result could be a much better film.
LikeLike
Reviewers here were much more harsh hence i skipped it i may watch this one now before your review..
LikeLike
I wouldn’t necessarily, not unless (like me) you needed something pleasant in the background while you unpacked and petted the dog. There are definitely better ways to spend your time. But it is interesting to think about in terms of showing a love triangle between an older and younger woman.
LikeLike
This sounds like such a delightful movie!
I have some nitpicks about the title. It looks like somebody has already green lit this movie to be remade in Hindi. Also shouldn’t the movie name appear in the title? It seems tad disrespectful.
LikeLike
YES — Why make us search around to figure out what you’re writing about?
LikeLike
You are right, I was just trying to throw something up quick before I left for work.
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 9:12 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
`
I gotta go with Aamir and Madhuri.
–
LikeLike
They do have great “friends but not romantic” chemistry.
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 9:13 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
I prefer Rani as the friends person. I think Madhuri puts out so much sex appeal that a younger woman could never compete.
LikeLike
Normally I would agree, but I also think Aamir and Rani have such great chemistry of the romantic kind, it would be hard to give that up for a younger woman romance.
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 8:04 PM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
They do and I’d love to see them in something low key and sweet, like they are widowers who’ve written off love until it slowly dawns on them that they’ve found it together. And then drama ensues because their kids think they’re being undignified.
LikeLike
This is the exact plot of Pyar Main Twist. The execution fails a bit, but the idea is lovely. Oh, and you can appreciate it now! You’ve seen Bobby. Pyar Main Twist is Rishi and Dimple reuniting in their 50s and the sweet spark is still there.
LikeLike
IT’S ON NETFLIX!
LikeLike
Also (SPOILERS) Baby Spice!!!!
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 9:43 PM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
Okay, I’m at the point where everyone is losing their minds over Dimple’s date with Rishi and them being mistaken for a married couple and I’m deeply confused. What is the big deal? Is it just some very specific cultural thing that I don’t understand?
LikeLike
I am going to be corrected by people over this, but I will just plunge in and try to answer anyway. There is a very specific cultural taboo against widows remarrying. One part of it is that children are considered the child of their mother’s father, no matter who their biological father is. So a woman marrying twice brings up all kinds of issues around that. There’s also all the various rituals and religious aspects to the wife-husband relationship that get complicated if she has two husbands. Who is she fasting for, who is she praying for, who is she worshipping? Not to mention reincarnation, the Karwa Chauth fast (which is just a northern thing) is specifically so you will be reincarnated and marry the same person again. So in her next life, is she going to be with Rishi or her first husband? And there’s also the family issue, a married woman is part of her husband’s family. So, if she remarries, is she now part of a new family or what? It’s in this movie just barely, with her closeness with her sister-in-law.
And in “olden days” a widow was supposed to be only half alive after her husband died. No jewelry, no colored clothing, not invented to big events (because she is “bad luck”), kept isolated in a bare room of the house eating gruel, or else sent to a special widows compound. She was supposed to have living death to show that she was more or less dead with her husband. This movie doesn’t get into that, but there’s still sort of the background assumption that a widow will spend her whole life in mourning instead of living again. And all of those various social and religious structures that rely on a woman marrying only once.
If you want more widow movies, there’s Baabul where Amitabh goes out and finds a husband for his widowed daughter-in-law, Prem Rog where a poor young widow struggles with the betwixt and between nature of her place in society (doesn’t belong in her married home any more, but her parents don’t want her back either, and no one will let her get married again), or the totally ridiculous Tum Mere Ho with Aamir as a snake charmer. Movies always have been forward thinking on the widow front, but they also tend towards making the heroine naturally want to be in mourning the rest of her life, and someone else has to convince her otherwise. This movie is fairly unique in Dimple just falling in love all on her own.
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 10:49 PM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
Despite my utter confusion I really enjoyed it! Dimple makes Rishi tolerable for me which is a big accomplishment, let me tell you. They were sweet and charming in this one.
LikeLike
You convinced me to rewatch it too, it was my “palate cleanser before bed” and “thing in the background while I had breakfast” movie and I really enjoyed it too. Dimple and Rishi were as cute and innocent in this as they were in Bobby, just with a little more grey at the temples.
LikeLike
I vote for Sharukh version, and I hope Salman’s version will never be made. But what if we would cast 40, and not 50 years old actor? Who is 40? John Abraham, but he is too handsome for this role. Akshaye Khanna, Randeep Hooda. Who else?
LikeLike
Yes, Shah Rukh & Alia Bhatt would make a very nice pair
LikeLike
You could cast Randeep Hooda opposite Nargis, just to create the movie that Margaret will hate more than anything else in the history of the world.
Bobby Deol? Could be another come back for him. Bobby opposite Jacqueline maybe, with Sonali Bendre as the childhood sweetheart.
Emraan Hashmi is getting up there, and it might be kind of fun and tongue in cheek to have him play someone who has a terrible reputation as a womanizer but is actually sweet. I want him opposite Alia, but they are cousins so that wouldn’t work. Maybe Sonam? Kind of interesting energy there. And Dia Mirza could be his childhood sweetheart.
Akshaye Khanna, perhaps. Kareena could be the old friend, and Alia could be the young woman. Or Sonam, I kind of like Sonam as someone who confidently plows into an older man’s life and teaches him how to flirt.
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 9:40 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
LOL I think Karan Johar hacked this blog, and now he is casting Alia even in our imaginary movies 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
Shah Rukh Khan is surely trying to escape the romantic hero image, I must admit his recent choices echo this in a very discomforting tone. But, this one seems good.
But, I wish to see Shah Rukh play a more darker role now. Like, an aged Michael Corleone who wishes to lead a rather peaceful life but is too clever to get the darkness behind the rosy things he sees in his new beginnings. I know that sounds familiar, but I do wish for it. Or something like, say, a Logan?
LikeLike
That’s what I was hoping for with Raees. If they had started it at the interval point, instead of doing his “rise”, it would have been a much better and more interesting movie I think. Come in when he is already the top bootlegger of the region, make Nawazuddin the first cop to really go after him, have him think about his mortality and helping his community now that he is at the end of his career, and build a movie around that, the cop coming after the aging gangster just as the gangster is beginning to look beyond violence and to something deeper.
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 10:57 AM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
There is something very familiar in your plot, Margaret. I’ve the feeling that I’ve already watched a film like that…bizarre…
As much as I would like a 3-Khan, Aish-Abhishek, Katrina version, I vote for ShahRukh in his late 40ies and instead of Anushka I would choose Alia…
LikeLike
But she’s SO YOUNG!!!! Even with this plot, I don’t know if I would be comfortable with them together. Although it would be really cute for her to walk him through how to flirt on the phone.
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 4:43 PM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
Yes, it has to be someone that young because he himself has remained rather young despite his age…and he does not consider that a woman that young could fall in love with him…but that exists! not only in fictional stories 😉 🙂
LikeLike
And who would you put as his old friend/sweetheart?
On Tue, Jun 12, 2018 at 4:55 PM, dontcallitbollywood wrote:
>
LikeLike
All your suggestions for the “younger woman” are no good, because all of them already are regular heroines to the three Khans. By casting them as the unsuitable but suitable younger woman, you are questioning the existing system so much as to make it come crashing down. So from that point of view you need someone not of their “screen generation”, like Alia. But then you will have legitimized that such a pairing is acceptable, so that we will then have the Khans abandoning all their current heroines (who are 15 -20 years younger than them), and having license to keep on costarring with the current “younger lot”. So, your movie is not a good idea sociologically speaking. 🙂
LikeLike
Ah, but what if I WANT to make the existing system come crashing down? Force us all to question the way films are written and cast and the assumptions we make? My favorite films would still be left standing, Rab Ne Bana di Jodi, Bajrangi Bhaijaan, Talaash, Jab Harry Met Sejal, they all acknowledged and worked with the age gap. I wouldn’t mind losing Sultan and Dhoom 3 and Happy New Year to impracticability. Burn it down! Burn it all down to save the few that have value!
LikeLike
It’s not the crashing down that’s the problem (because your “younger woman” suggestions won’t fly), but the legitimizing of the really younger women, who so are are being seen as “too young” to costar opposite the Khans and their generation, as viable love interests.
Revolutions usually have unplanned (and unforeseen) consequences. 🙂
LikeLike