Ranjhanaa Essay

Death of a Lover: Theorizing the Concepts of Identification and Desire in the film Raanjhanaa

Kuntal Bag

Abstract: Ranjhanaa, a 2013 Bollywood feature film was a ‘box-office hit’ with its release. The films narration starts from Delhi, the capital of India; takes a journey through Banaras, where the journey of the protagonist begins actually from child hood and ends in Delhi, with the refusal of the lover-hero to live further which leads to the death of a self, a desire. In spite of having a tendency of a circular narration, the film appears to be a simple love story with a tragic end, where the protagonist, the lover-hero Kundan dies refusing to pursue his desire. But the story more than just documenting Kundan’s journey of love (ultimately

Now, if only Kundan had taken the hint and stopped harassing Zoya right at the start, so many lives would have been spared” -this observation on the 2013 Bollywood film Raanjhanaa is made by Shobhaa De, a film reviewer, columnist and popular blog-writer in her column ‘Mumbai Mirror’ in The Times of India. She goes on to reaffirm her disdain for the film in spite of the fact that it grossed a total income of two hundred crores in Indian currency. She identifies Raanjhanaa as a ‘pretty nasty’ film, since, according to her, it attempts to portray ‘a selfish ’, ‘immature, ‘violent and unstable man’ (Kundan, the hero) as a martyr. She gives a clean cheat to the character of the heroine by putting the blame entirely on the hero. She describes the heroine as an ‘innocent victim’ whose ‘peace of mind’ is devastated by a preying lover whom she does not love at al. De also criticizes the three attempts of suicide by the slitting wrists- twice by Kundan, the hero and once by Zoya, the heroine. She considered the whole experience of the film as a ‘wretched’ experience and in a pungently satirical tone announces “Well, at the end of this wretched experience, I sure as hell was ready to slash

Director Aanand Rai defended his creation promptly. By declaring Shobhaa De’s claim as ‘absurd and myopic’ Rai asks about her familiarity with Varanasi (or Banras), (where most of the incidents take place in the film) - “Has she seen Varanasi, felt its pulse? Does she know what the city is all about? Does she understand the feelings of the young in the small cities where two people still cannot go out on a date?” (DNA-India Website) Rai attributes Shobhaa De’s ignorance to her growing-up in metro. According to his claims there are subtle nuance at a small town, which in itself is a different cultural breeding, and which cannot be understood by a metro-city dweller. He emphasizes the fact that as a film maker he is at liberty to treat a theme in a film in his own way: “How I treat the theme of love is entirely up to me. I don’t discuss how she (Shobhaa De) treats love in her books and column. For some people smooching even in public is normal. For my characters even saying, ‘I love you’ is an uphill task.” By mking this contrast he himself reveals his strategy of putting two contrasting desires at work. He consolidates his claim by addressing the reviewer: “You handle your relationships your way. I’ll treat mine the way I want to.” (DNA-India