{"id":3654,"date":"2016-06-22T13:16:55","date_gmt":"2016-06-22T07:46:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=3654"},"modified":"2016-06-22T13:16:55","modified_gmt":"2016-06-22T07:46:55","slug":"10-years-of-dostana-what-it-meant-for-an-india-where-homosexuality-was-still-a-crime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=3654","title":{"rendered":"What Dostana Meant For an India Where Homosexuality Was Still a Crime"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\n\nI<\/span>\n\n<\/div>\nt\u2019s been a whole decade since the rainbow-hued glory of Tarun Mansukhani\u2019s <\/span>Dostana<\/span><\/i> graced our screens \u2013 and for once, it doesn\u2019t feel like Bollywood\u2019s biggest almost-gay blockbuster released just yesterday. <\/span>\n\nOn one hand, it\u2019s difficult to deny <\/span>Dostana\u2019<\/span><\/i>s status as an era-defining classic. Like any noughties\u2019 film worth its salt, it featured bright, beachy locations, all the better to show off a trio of bronzed, six-packed leads (okay, two bronzed, six-packed leads and <\/span>Abhishek Bachchan<\/span><\/a>). It has the candy-coloured bubbliness of a tropical cocktail, and the requisite appearance of Kirron Kher as Jr Bachchan\u2019s long-suffering Punjabi mom who is unable to get with the times. <\/span>\n\nBut ten years later, in our (hopefully more) enlightened <\/span>post-Section 377<\/span><\/a> age, it\u2019s finally okay to be gay, and <\/span>Dostana<\/span><\/i> can feel hopelessly outdated, for the film goes out of its way to avoid any suggestion of an authentic LGBT story.<\/span>\n\nAfter all, the film\u2019s main conceit is that two guys in Miami, Kunal (John Abraham) and Sam (Abhishek Bachchan) are so desperate to rent a flat owned by the gorgeous Neha (Priyanka Chopra), that they pretend to be gay. Of course, Kunal and Sam promptly fall in love with Neha, complicating their charade further. Besides lying to Neha, they sabotage her job and her relationships with other men in their misguided pursuit of her \u2013 another toxic Bollywood trope that has aged poorly in this era of <\/span>#MeToo<\/span><\/a>. She, in turn, tries to get them to flirt with her gay boss (Boman Irani), whose character forgoes any nuance in favour of tired stereotypes. Following roughly two cinematic hours of this shitty behaviour, Kunal and Sam are only able to win back Neha\u2019s friendship by a ritual public humiliation, doing the worst thing any heterosexual man can think of: kissing another man. <\/span>\n\nLooking back, <\/span>Dostana<\/span><\/i>\u2019s attitude towards the <\/span>LGBT community<\/span><\/a> seems hardly better than that one uncle who insists on referring to them as \u201cthe gays\u201d. The male leads \u2013 Kunal in particular \u2013 are perpetually in a state of hetero anxiety, terrified that they might be perceived as actual gays. They casually equate \u201cacting gay\u201d with \u201cacting like girls,\u201d and balk at the prospect of simple interactions with homosexual men.<\/span>\n\nAnd yet, was <\/span>Dostana<\/span><\/i>\u2019s regressive depiction so far off from the reality of male insecurity in India? Despite its glaring imperfections, the film\u2019s release mere months before the landmark Delhi High Court judgment that read down <\/span>Section 377<\/span><\/a> (a victory that would later be overturned by the Supreme Court in 2013) played a role in drawing the attention of a nation oblivious to the queer community and its struggles.<\/span>\n

Despite the obvious flaws of the overarching narrative, both Abraham and Bachchan, as actors, display none of the film\u2019s anxiety over sexuality.<\/blockquote>\nWith <\/span>Dostana,<\/span><\/i> producer <\/span>Karan Johar<\/span><\/a>, costume designers Manish Malhotra and Aki Narula, went on to define both the fashion sensibilities of the decade, and the mantra of the LGBT community: sexy, fabulous, and deeply individual. <\/span>\n\nDespite being very much an item song, \u201cDesi Girl\u201d, with its instantly clockable silver sari, was not designed solely for straight male moviegoers. Instead, it was a joyful celebration of Indian <\/span>womanhood<\/span><\/a>. And then there was the equal-opportunity thirst trap: an impossibly buff John Abraham, emerging godlike from the sea in minuscule yellow trunks. Similarly, Abhishek Bachchan\u2019s floral shirt-and-scarf combo felt true to his character, serving as a symbol of self-expression that went beyond Bollywood\u2019s usual machismo.<\/span>\n\nDespite the obvious flaws of the overarching narrative, both Abraham and Bachchan, as actors, display none of the film\u2019s anxiety over sexuality. Instead, they slip comfortably into homoerotic scenes. Even Kirron Kher\u2019s character, the most obvious representative of society\u2019s homophobia, exists only to be talked into acceptance by Neha. <\/span>\n\nIn a country where, only a decade prior, Deepa Mehta\u2019s <\/span>Fire<\/span><\/i>, about a lesbian romance within a middle-class joint family, was rioted out of <\/span>theatres<\/span><\/a>, perhaps <\/span>Dostana<\/span><\/i> was the baby step we needed. With its theme of LGBT acceptance and its nods to gay culture that only those in the know would appreciate, even 12 years on, <\/span>Dostana<\/span><\/i> is one of the few Bollywood films that\u2019s not just for \u201cthe straights\u201d. Yes, it hasn\u2019t aged well \u2013 but have you tried watching <\/span>Student of the Year<\/span><\/i>? \u00a0<\/span>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Despite its glaring flaws, Dostana played a role in drawing the attention of a nation oblivious to the queer community and its struggles. The film went on to define the mantra of the LGBT community: sexy, fabulous, and deeply individual.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":208,"featured_media":3655,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3114],"tags":[1898,141,1099,1102,6857,340,821],"class_list":["post-3654","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bollywood","tag-abhishek-bachchan","tag-bollywood","tag-dostana","tag-homosexuality","tag-john-abraham","tag-priyanka-chopra","tag-section-377"],"yoast_head":"\nWhat Dostana Meant For an India Where Homosexuality Was Still a Crime<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Despite its glaring flaws, Dostana played a role in drawing the attention of a nation oblivious to the queer community and its struggles. 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