{"id":4619,"date":"2016-04-29T15:21:03","date_gmt":"2016-04-29T09:51:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=4619"},"modified":"2016-04-29T15:21:03","modified_gmt":"2016-04-29T09:51:03","slug":"masoom-motherhood-nuance-deserves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=4619","title":{"rendered":"How Shabana Azmi\u2019s Masoom Mimes the Conflict between Motherhood & Womanhood"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I<\/span>t is that Sunday again when our social media timelines become a playground for that competitive sport called \u201cKiski ma kitni mahan hai?<\/p>\u201d<\/span><\/i> To be honest, the idea of praising mothers doesn\u2019t bother me. God knows they deserve all the praise in the world even if it ends up coming their way only once a year \u2013 that also on a social networking site they probably don\u2019t use. What bothers me instead, is how every single way we want to celebrate mothers seems to focus on marvelling at their beyond human capabilities. The biggest culprit, of course, is <\/span>Bollywood<\/span><\/a> with its white-washed \u201cMa toh devi hai\u201d <\/span>trope, an inane, problematic idea that not only glosses over the very human struggles of our mothers, but also reduces them to characters with no complexity.<\/span>\n\nIn a cinematic universe full of Nirupa Roys (and Lalita Pawar, should the storyline choose to go the evil stepmother way), Shekhar Kapur\u2019s <\/span>Masoom<\/span><\/i> was, and continues to be a breath of fresh air. I suppose it stemmed from the kind of euphoric novelty where a mother (and a step-mother no less) also happened to be a woman with her own story, struggles, and dilemmas that went beyond her \u201cdivine <\/span>motherhood<\/span><\/a>\u201d, while inadvertently crossing paths with it.\u00a0<\/span>\n\nThe first time I watched <\/span>Masoom<\/span><\/i>, I was barely 10 \u2013 too young to entirely comprehend its adult themes, but just at the right age to deeply empathise with Jugal Hansraj\u2019s Rahul. I related to his longing for his mother, his search for his father, his desire to be liked and loved by his adopted <\/span>family<\/span><\/a>, and his subtle but profound sense of abandonment in ways few adults could. \u00a0<\/span>\n\nBut my mind was able to conjure up a full picture only years later, when I watched <\/span>Masoom<\/span><\/i> again with the awareness of an adult. At that time, I was momentarily thrown off by how much more the story encompassed beyond just the anguish of a child and the struggle of a mother. Written by Gulzar, the classic was pathbreaking in its approach toward socio-personal issues like <\/span>infidelity<\/span><\/a>, our understanding of the \u201cother woman\u201d, and the aftermath of a mistake that seems unforgivable. <\/span>\n\nAdapted from Erich Segal\u2019s <\/span>Man Woman and Child<\/span><\/i>, Gulzar\u2019s screenplay is remarkably tender; it is in no hurry to dispense black and white solutions. No character in the film is perfect or without a flaw. At the centre of the story is DK (a restrained Naseeruddin Shah), a fundamentally good man, a doting father, and a loving husband who is haunted by a stray, professedly <\/span>loveless affair<\/span><\/a>. Supriya Pathak\u2019s Bhavana, the other woman is hardly a house-ruining vamp, unwilling to let even the man bear the burden of their combined mistakes. And Shabana Azmi\u2019s Indu is a strong, modern woman whose life choices are infinitely complicated, not because she is a wife (the movie goes out of its way to establish that leaving your husband and living a life as an \u201cazaad aurat\u201d is not only okay, it\u2019s also great), but because she is also a mother. <\/span>\n

Masoom insists that before we write sonnets praising our mothers, we see her as the distressed, flawed, torn human being she is.<\/blockquote>\nIn treating a stray affair as just that, the movie shakes up the middle-class morality that tends to bracket sex and love together, and asks important but difficult questions about how we define mistakes in a relationship, and if <\/span>forgiveness<\/span><\/a> is really an option. But its beautifully nuanced treatment of marriage (a signature of Gulzar who also wrote the film\u2019s dialogues, and lyrics) is not what sets this movie apart. It is the fact that this story makes an unlikely choice to look at its tangled, grown-up world through the eyes of a child who is too young to understand the nuances, but processes them with a gravitas that can put adults to shame. <\/span>\n\nAlthough, the story\u2019s primary plot revolves around a man\u2019s actions, <\/span>Masoom<\/span><\/i> is essentially a story of a woman in conflict with her nature. A woman who doesn’t want to condone a past mistake of an otherwise perfect husband. But is simultaneously <\/span>trapped<\/span><\/a> in a world where that mistake has taken the shape of an innocent child who has done nothing wrong, and who is constantly seeking her affection, oblivious to her distress. You see, what makes <\/span>Masoom<\/span><\/i> stand out, is that the real conflict<\/span> is never between a man and his wife, or a woman and her wifely concerns. Instead, the conflict between a woman and her motherly instincts \u2013 a depiction that is unusual for mainstream Hindi cinema.<\/span>\n\nShabana Azmi delivers an astounding performance that embodies every bit of the dilemma of a woman torn between the anguish and anger of a wronged wife and the compassion of a mother. Indu\u2019s reluctant affection towards a child who also reminds her of her husband’s betrayal is the kind of poetic torment great stories are made of. It is also a resounding rejection of every stereotype ever associated with a woman in her situation \u2013 whether as a wife or as a <\/span>(step)mother<\/span><\/a>. Ultimately <\/span>Masoom<\/span><\/i> is an ode to motherhood that does not rely on lazy tropes and bland generalisation. It is a story that elevates the idea of motherhood beyond biological compulsions. But it also recognises the cost of this greatness, humanity, the struggle, and the pain, inherent in it. <\/span>\n\nMasoom<\/span><\/i> insists that before we write sonnets praising our mothers, we see her as the distressed, flawed, torn human being she is. It insists we feel her pain and live with her struggles as a woman forced to undertake <\/span>emotional <\/span><\/a>labours that are as unfair as they are cruel. It wants us to see the woman behind a mother, and not push her behind an impenetrable halo that shields us from facing the truth. <\/span>Masoom <\/span><\/i>reminds us that the greatest gift we can give our mothers is to allow them their humanity. Something we should keep in mind every day.<\/span>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Masoom is an ode to motherhood that does not rely on lazy tropes and bland generalisation. It is a story that elevates the idea of motherhood beyond biological compulsions. It reminds us that the greatest gift we can give our mothers is to allow them their humanity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":212,"featured_media":4620,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3114],"tags":[4560,8192,8193,5176,4116,8194,4856,8195,1772,1394,1773,1918,1234,4197,2323],"class_list":["post-4619","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bollywood","tag-emotions","tag-empathise","tag-greatness","tag-gulzar","tag-humanity","tag-jugal-hansraj","tag-maa","tag-masoom","tag-mother","tag-motherhood","tag-mothers-day","tag-naseeruddin-shah","tag-shabana-azmi","tag-supriya-pathak","tag-woman"],"yoast_head":"\nHow Shabana Azmi\u2019s Masoom Mimes the Conflict between Motherhood & Womanhood<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Masoom is an ode to motherhood that does not rely on lazy tropes and bland generalisation. 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