What Really Touches Your Heart In Jigra

When
mainstream
Hindi
cinema
is
preoccupied
with
romance,
comedy,
horror
and
action,
stories
about
sisters
and
brothers
are
very
rare.
Vasan
Bala
has
made
a
first-of-its-kind
film
where
the
leads
play
siblings,
notes
Aseem
Chhabra.

It
was
53
years
ago
when
I
saw
Dev
Anand’s

Hare
Rama
Hare
Krishna
in
which
an
older
brother
traveled
all
the
way
from
Canada
to
Nepal
to
‘rescue’
his
sister
who
had
joined
a
group
of
drugged
out,

Dum
Maro
Dum
singing
hippies.

The
two
were
separated
as
kids
when
their
parents’
marriage
ended
in
divorce.

But
their
emotional
bond
remained
strong
as
we
heard
in
the
oft
repeated
Anand
Bakshi/R
D
Burman
song
in
Kishore
Kumar’s
voice

Phoolon
Ka
Taaron
Ka.

Even
though
Dev
Anand
had
a
love
interest
in
the
film,
the
charming
Mumtaz,

HRHK
was
primarily
a
brother-sister
story,
a
theme
rarely
explored
in
Hindi
cinema.

Ten
years
earlier,
Dev
Anand
appeared
in
Raj
Khosla’s

Bombai
Ka
Babu
where
he
played
a
criminal
who
pretended
to
be
Suchitra
Sen’s
character’s
long-lost
brother
and
the
heir
to
the
family
inheritance.

When
his
secret
was
revealed,
the
two
fell
in
love.

But
in
end,
Dev
Anand’s
character
got
his
‘sister’
married
off,
with
Mukesh
singing
in
the
background
the
heartbreaking
song

Chal
Ri
Sajni
Ab
Kya
Soche.

In
recent
years,
one
of
the
most
convincing
brother-sister
subplots,
with
a
case
of
rather
unique
casting
was
in
Zoya
Akhtar’s

Dil
Dadakne
Do.

Ranveer
Singh
and
Priyanka
Chopra
played
siblings
and
they
even
had
an
unusual
track
in
a
film
that
was
otherwise
over-populated
with
supporting
characters.

In
the
current
times,
when
mainstream
Hindi
cinema
is
preoccupied
with
romance,
comedy,
horror
and
action,
stories
about
sisters
and
brothers
are
very
rare.
So
with

Jigra,
Vasan
Bala
has
made
a
first-of-its-kind
film
where
the
leads
play
siblings.

In
casting
Alia
Bhatt
as
the
sister
and
the
one-film
old,
charming
newcomer
Vedang
Raina
as
her
brother,

Jigra
has
a
believable
plot
line.

In
fact,
before
I
went
to
watch
the
film,
the
publicity
images
and
clips
I
had
seen
had
actually
led
me
to
imagine
the
two
actors
were
related
and
even
resembled
each
other.

Satya
(Bhatt)
and
Ankur
(Raina)
are
orphans.

Their
mother
dies
early
on
and
we
see
their
father
jumping
off
from
the
apartment’s
balcony.

Satya
being
older
takes
the
charge
to
raise
and
protect
her
brother.

There
is
a
playfulness
among
the
siblings,
when
they
take
a
break
from
a
family
wedding
to
play
basketball.

There
are
also
tensions
sometimes
since
Satya
can
be
overprotective.

But
then
during
a
business
trip
to
a
fictional
South-East
Asian
country
close
to
Malaysia,
Ankur
is
framed
on
a
drug
possession
charge
and
given
a
death
sentence.
The
first
person
he
reaches
out
to
is
his
sister.

Bala,
one
of
the
nicest
film-makers
in
the
industry,
struggled
after
his
first
feature

Peddlers
was
not
released.

Since
then,
he
has
made
a
couple
of
films
—
the
quirky,
fun
martial
arts
film

Mard
Ko
Dard
Nahi
Hota,
which
won
the
People’s
Choice
Award
in
the
Midnight
Madness
section
at
the
Toronto
International
Film
Festival,
an
episode
in
the
Netflix
series

Ray
and
a
thriller

Monica,
O
My
Darling,
also
for
the
same
streamer.

He
has
co-written
screenplays
for
a
few
important
films,
from

Psycho
Raman
to

’83.

Jigra
is
Bala’s
biggest
film,
with
a
top
banner
and
Bollywood’s
leading
female
star.

Bala
takes
on
the
prison
break
genre,
common
in
Hollywood
films
and
television
shows,
but
never
approached
in
Hindi
cinema
with
such
a
definite
sprit.

The
film
has
all
the
masala
elements
common
to
the
genre,
with
some
implausible
situations,
but
it
holds
your
attention,
especially
during
the
explosive
finale.

Bala’s
screenplay
and
direction
play
with
the
genre
and
ultimately,
he
delivers
a
very
solid
entertainer.

The
action
sequences,
the
way
they
are
shot
and
edited
work
pretty
much
because
of
Bhatt’s
commanding
performance.

In
her
new
avatar,
the
Bollywood
star
is
now
an
action
queen,
a
one-woman
army.

Only
a
fearless
director
like
Bala
with
the
backing
of
his
producer
Karan
Johar
could
imagine
and
convincingly
portray
this
gender
twist
in
a
Hindi
action
film.

But
Bala
has
created
a
woman
action
star
in
the
past
as
well.

In

Mard
Ko
Dard
Nahin
Hota,
both
his
leads,
played
by
Radhika
Madan
and
Abhimanyu
Dasani,
practiced
martial
arts.

Satya
is
not
alone
in
her
quest.

She
is
aided
by
a
group
of
well-meaning
supporting
characters,
played
by
Manoj
Pahwa
and
Rahul
Ravindran.

But
she
has
an
unstoppable
conviction
that
no
matter
what
she
will
free
her
brother
from
the
prison.
And
you
want
her
to
succeed
because
it
is
truly
sad
to
see
Raina’s
Ankur
in
a
helplessly
difficult
situation.

The
songs
in
the
film,
written
by
Varun
Grover,
have
been
playing
in
my
head
since
I
left
the
theatre,
especially

Tenu
Sang
Rakhna.

Towards
the
middle
of
the
film,
we
hear
the

HRHK
song

Phoolon
Ka
Taaron
Ka,
this
time
sung
by
Raina.

The
context
is
similar.

The
bond
between
two
siblings
and
as
one
tries
to
rescue
the
other.

But
it
is
the
emotional
thread
the
song
builds
to
Dev
Anand’s
53-year-old
classic
from
my
teenage
years
that
touched
my
heart.