Hindi Films behind the Veil

Hi everyone,

Been a long time since my last post! A combination of work (lots – both at office and at home!), Windows crashing (Thank You, Mr. G.) and a temporary writer’s block (miniscule) led to this.

However, things seem to be back to normal (lots of work is now normal – and I’m loving it :-)), so here’s my latest – on Hindi Films Behind the Veil.

Sometime in 2004, I was travelling between Riyadh and Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Upon entering the flight, I saw an elderly, distinguished looking Saudi gentleman in my place, animatedly talking to the gentleman next to him. Realising that he could have made a mistake, I said, “Excuse me Sir, I think you’re sitting on my seat.” He gave me a beatific smile and responded, “Young man, I know I’m sitting on your seat!”

My consternation must have been immediately visible. Seeing me flummoxed like that, he explained that the gentleman on his left was an old friend from his youth. They had lost touch, and had bumped into each other after nearly 25-30 years, and were catching up on all the lost time!

Then he asked me, “Where are you from?” I still remember his words when I said I was from India. “Aah! The land of Amitabh Bachchan.”

Huh!!! I mean, I know that a lot of people across the globe love Hindi Films, and a lot of people would recognize Mr.B. Egyptians, for instance, are crazy about him. But this was Saudi Arabia.

Conservative, puritan Saudi Arabia.

Where films are not made, there are no cinema theatres and expats watch movies from their country on their DVDs at home.

And virtually no Saudi understands Hindi.

I must have showed my amazement on my face, to which the gentleman explained that there were cinema theatres in Saudi Arabia earlier. He had grown up watching Hindi films on his 16 mm projector in the Old City of Jeddah, and was a big fan of Amitabh Bachchan, having watched all his films from Zanjeer onwards.

I thought that possibly the older generation of Saudis - who had seen some Hindi films – must have some knowledge about our cinema. But for the younger ones, who have grown up on American culture and swayed to Lebanese pop music, our films must be as alien as possibly someone from Alpha Centauri.

That notion changed about a year later, when my wife and I were out shopping in Azizia, Jeddah – an area populated by people of the countries of our sub-continent.

Those who know Jeddah would know that the Pakistani populated area of Azizia is one of the best places to get pirated CDs. One can get decent quality CDs within a day of the movie releasing in India, and sometimes even the day before – from hawkers, who are discreet when they have some ‘information’ and pretty blatant otherwise, spreading their wares on sheets on the footpath.

Well, coming to the point, my wife and I were shopping for some fresh vegetables, next to this hawker of CDs, when a group of 5-6 very excited Saudi girls chatting animatedly came up and asked the hawker for the latest “John Ibraheem film”.

???

After they’d done their purchase and moved on, the hawker shared that after his shirtless debut in Jism, our Abraham was the latest heartthrob of Saudi girls, and he actually had to stock better quality, extra CDs of John’s films.

Well, well, well! I wouldn’t even have dreamt of that!