{"id":1812,"date":"2016-04-13T22:15:28","date_gmt":"2016-04-13T16:45:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=1812"},"modified":"2016-04-13T22:15:28","modified_gmt":"2016-04-13T16:45:28","slug":"hichki-rani-mukherjee-bollywood-tourette-syndrome-jagga-jasoos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=1812","title":{"rendered":"Hichki and Bollywood\u2019s New-Found Sensitivity"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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ichki<\/em> <\/span><\/i>will mark Rani Mukherjee\u2019s return to screen after a gap of four years. As seen from <\/span>Hichki\u2019s<\/span><\/i> trailer, the actress plays Naina Mathur, who is keen to pursue her dreams of becoming a school teacher despite suffering from Tourette\u2019s syndrome. The neurological disorder ensures that Naina\u2019s speech is punctuated by regular involuntary hiccup-like sounds, giving her a speech impediment. Much of the film rests on how she overcomes obstacles and ill-mannered students to realise her dream.<\/span>\n\nHichki <\/span><\/i>just might be what Bollywood needs; a renewed vigour in portraying impediments on screen with sensitivity, instead of exploiting it for punchlines. It\u2019s a trend that began this year with <\/span>Jagga Jasoos<\/span><\/i><\/a>.<\/span>\n\nIn a refreshing departure for mainstream Hindi cinema, Jagga\u2019s (<\/span>Ranbir Kapoor<\/span><\/a>) debilitating speech defect in <\/span>Jagga Jasoos<\/span><\/i> wasn\u2019t an object of pity. Over the course of the 160-minute film, Jagga graduated from a <\/span>stuttering teenager<\/span><\/a> detective \u2013 with several shades of Tintin and Harry Potter \u2013 whose words \u201cso so ke nikalte hai\u201d, to the film\u2019s stuttering hero in search of his missing father. That by itself was the film\u2019s greatest achievement. It not only managed to make its audience realise the unbearable arduousness of living with an impairment, but also took its hero seriously. The stutter wasn\u2019t merely a plot device, an ailment that gets cured once Jagga displayed traditional hero behaviour. <\/span>\n\nBut, Bollywood hasn\u2019t always been this lenient in its portrayal of impairment. The binary treatment of a disability in Bollywood has almost always verged between humiliation and pity. Scraping the bottom of the barrel here is Rohit Shetty\u2019s <\/span>Golmaal<\/span><\/i> <\/a>series. In the third installment of the unnecessary franchise, Shreyas Talpade\u2019s stutter is a device that\u2019s <\/span>only <\/span><\/i>exploited for comic relief in the film. \u201cAbey jaldi bol, kal subah Panvel nikalna hai,\u201d a character tells him. For a country that has approximately 1.25 crore Indians who stammer, the film\u2019s demeaning usage of a disability to garner cheap laughs forced the Indian Stammering Association to <\/span>file<\/span><\/a> a petition against its makers.<\/span>\n\n

Jagga Jasoos<\/em> not only managed to make its audience realise the unbearable arduousness of living with an impairment, but also took its hero seriously<\/p><\/blockquote> \n\nGolmaal 3 <\/span><\/i>was only following in the footsteps of <\/span>Awaara Pagaal Deewana<\/span><\/i> and <\/span>Phir Hera Pheri<\/span><\/i>, where two stuttering mobsters are constantly stuck in supposedly hilarious situations. On the opposing side are films like <\/span>Chalbaaz<\/span><\/i>, where Anju\u2019s stutter and nervousness render her a weak character. I also remember Pooja Bhatt as the meek, under-confident student in <\/span>Sir<\/span><\/i>, who is given therapeutic advice by Naseeruddin Shah\u2019s character who tells her to \u201cnot be nervous\u201d and just talk.<\/span>\n\n