The kid that I once was...

Disclaimer : ( I often seem to start with these disclaimers huh) : I am an aamir khan fan and look forward to each and every one of his film because I have come to expect increasing standards from a person who manages to put across his points powerfully and successfully. But this in no way influences my opinion about his films and the idea he tries to convey through his films. Suffice to say I will never be a fan who can enjoy and approve whatever absurdity his hero performs onscreen. Moreover, this is not a film review.

I had a lot of unfinished work in the lab. I was quite behind in my work and the prospect of producing any kind of results that remotely resembled the ones that I get in my dreams and experiment planning sessions was quite bleak. So it was with quite a significant bit of apprehension that I decided to go ahead and watch ‘Taare zameen par’. I am not going to tell you what the film was about or how much I like it. I think it will enough for you to know that I saw a lot of people removing their spectacles at the end.

The whole Singapore based Indian crowd that had managed to get tickets was on their feet as soon as the movie was over. It was not to exit the hall but to give the movie a standing ovation. Nobody moved till the last of the credits were scrolling off the screen and since it was the first time I was seeing such a phenomenon, I am moved to the point of saying that I was really impressed. People close to me might know what I frequently say: It’s really tough to impress a Scorpio and therefore it takes something significantly better to produce a drop of tear from his seemingly cold and emotionless eyes. And this just did!

I was watching myself on the screen. I was reminded of a lot of things that I did during my school days and even more of things that I really enjoyed doing when I was a bratty and impossible terror at school. The two bunny teeth sticking out every time I tried to smile or the time when I tried whatever way possible to bunk school (You don’t have to scratch your head. Don’t you remember the number of times you feigned headache or fever or ear pain or stomach pain to stay away from school?) or the number of times I tried to convince my father that nothing was wrong about the 30/50 that I frequently used to secure in the unfriendly and wastefully taxing mathematics test. One incident that I remember quite vividly was when my maths teacher was thinking out loud about the fact that she knew a lot of guys that were pretending to pay attention when they were actually miles away. You could have heard my heart beat even if you were in the North Pole. I think it’s fair to say I was a NORMAL school kid who didn’t enjoy going to school except on days that were rainy or that had a games period in it. I was just plain decent at studies and if there is one thing that I am really grateful to my parents , it’s their never ending effort not to try and impress upon me to produce first ranks ( On hindsight, I never could have produced the first ranks anyway).

I disagree with aamir when he says this particular film is meant for young parents or people who will become parents soon. I think it’s meant for every single adult that understands Hindi or is able to read the subtitles. The parents of a grumbling graduate student will be reminded of the kid with his bunny teeth sticking out every time he tries to suppress his smile ( believe me, when you were a kid, it would have been really funny to see your dad being angry at you) . The grad student will be reminded of what he had become to win the rat race and how his world has been narrowed down to a small cubicle and the bench top that he proudly owns and protects in his lab. The IT professional will be reminded of how listless and routine his life has become and how he misses the colour and joy of the world outside his computer monitor. Above all, and I say this from the bottom of my heart, I hope it reminds everybody that there are things much more important than pushing their kids to secure that 48/50 in his/her unit test.

We are in a world that keeps expecting kids to perform better every single time and it would be quite ludicrous to suggest that we should let children on their own and let them explore their talents without any inhibitions. If we do that we will soon have a bunch of over imaginative and impractical individuals that strive as much to work for mankind’s progress as the present US administration does to adopt the Kyoto. On the other hand, if we over indulge in trying to bring about discipline, we will soon have in our hands a group of no good psychopaths that are bent upon taking revenge for their deplorable fate (remember what happened as an aftermath of the Versailles treaty that was signed to end ‘ the war to end all wars’? ). So what do we do? Of course, follow the golden mean! Give the kid the kind of freedom that you expected from your parents but make sure he knows he is responsible and accountable for his actions. Kids however young they might be (‘Immature’ in the language of the adults) like to be treated as equals and you really become close to a kid if you try and play along rather than boss him over. You may feel as his respect for you is getting diffused over time but what happens in reality is that the veil of distrust between an adult and a child is being shred to pieces. His respect for you as a person who will stand up for him against all odds, remains rock solid. I am really glad I could enjoy this kind of freedom when I was a kid. Whatever I am today, I owe it to this freedom given to me by my parents. Danke!

SO I hope you will know what to do when your kid (Might be a long time from now but still… you never know ;) complains of stomach pain on a Monday morning.

Oh yeah, my objective rating of the film: 9/10. That’s because the end of the movie was a bit predictable for me. Moreover, nothing in this world is perfect and if you accept perfection in something, there will be no scope for improvement. By far, I would rate this film as equal to 2 of the greatest movies that I have had the privilege to watch, ‘Shawshank redemption’ and the Malayalam film ‘Tanmatra’.