Pyar Jhukta Nahin (1985)

I was watching Hamari Adhuri Kahaani, but that turned out to be pretty insufferable, so I found myself some Mithun to cleanse my palate. Plus, Padmini Kolhapure! The mom from PPNH! I seem to have gotten very lazy about finding subtitled versions of movies, because apparently I couldn’t be bothered to fork over $10 and wait for Amazon Prime shipping, so I watched it on youtube. The plot is straightforward and the story is sweet.

The beginning is pretty hilarious. Preeti (Padmini) drunkenly crashes her car into a lightpost and starts getting hassled by the sort of group of jackasses that always show up when a heroine is doing something improper (as if that excuses it). And like always happens, the hero shows up to leap through the air and kick everybody in the face at the same time. Our hero Ajay (Mithun Chakraborty) tries to help Preeti, who keeps trying to emphasize what a shareef ladki she is. Shareef though she may be, she is also very drunk, so Ajay hauls her home to let her sleep it off.

This is very considerate of him, and in return she accidentally sets his bedroom on fire.

Of course, next morning she doesn’t remember what happened.

"My clothes?!"

"I didn't see anything! I closed my eyes!"

They meet once again, and they’re in love. And sure, that sounds silly when you explain it like that, but I bought it. It’s called acting, and also being a giant sucker for the kind of romance where the couple actually seem, you know, happy. But Preeti is a millionaire’s daughter, and Ajay is only a photographer with a small, now fire damaged, apartment. At her fancy birthday party, he sings a beautiful, melancholy song about how he has nothing to offer her but his heart and he worries that with him, she’ll be unhappy, but she responds that all that matters is their love. (And something about geese, says google translate. I am skeptical.)

And then everybody at the party claps, except her father (Danny Denzongpa), who is a jerk and tells Ajay to go away and never come back.

I always wonder what it would be like to be at one of these parties, where family dramas are played out in emotional song. I mean, what do you do when the birthday girl is getting serenaded by this random guy who goes on and on about how he's not worthy of her love?

Anyway, Preeti’s father objects to the marriage because Ajay isn’t wealthy, and once they are married, he doesn’t stop scheming. He buys Ajay a job as a magazine editor, so he can feel less ashamed of his son-in-law because, hey, it’s not about whether he loves Preeti and makes her happy, it’s about what you can tell your friends about his salary. Ajay’s pride is wounded, so he and Preeti fight. About what, precisely, I did not catch, because my Hindi is much better suited to desperate “mera bachcha kahaan hai?!” sorts of things, but she moves back home and dad sees an opening and takes it. He orchestrates their divorce by telling each party that the other wants one - Ajay up and moves without a forwarding address while Preeti collapses, because, guess what? She’s pregnant.

Evil scheming dad has an evil scheming clock

And he hasn’t ruined her life enough yet, so after Preeti gives birth, he takes the baby and tells her it died. So Preeti goes a little nuts, convinced that a doll is her baby. This is unfortunate for her mental health not only for obvious reasons, but also because whenever it goes flying during arguments it ends up being super traumatic.

Her parents seem to spare no expense to help their daughter, except of course to give her the one thing that would actually help - telling her that her husband still loves her and that her son is alive. Apparently having a crazy daughter is way better than one who’s married to a low-salaried photographer. Ajay gets the baby in exchange for promising never to see Preeti again, and little Vicky grows up wondering about his mother and wishing daddy didn’t drink so much.

When Vicky and Preeti meet by chance, though, they both sense something is up, and when Preeti leaves her doll in the car to chase after Vicky, it just killed me. And Ajay’s face when he sees Preeti again! He’s so happy, and still conflicted, and they can’t just embrace and have it all be perfect, because all this shit went down and they have to sort it out.

They have to go through the “but you divorced me!” and “you married again!” to “I did not!” and finally looking at Preeti’s dad and figuring out who was really the villain here. Of course he then begs forgiveness, saying that his whole life has been about money, but now he knows that’s not what’s really important, he’s totally in the wrong here and was completely willing to ruin his daughter’s life, and her husband’s, and their son’s, because he’s a complete jackass and if that isn’t a reason to cut off your in-laws forever, then I don’t know what is. There might be a little extrapolation there based on incomplete knowledge of Hindi, but I’m going with it.

THEN they (Ajay and Preeti, not dad) embrace and it's all perfect and they and Vicky can finally be a family.

I don't think they make a hallmark card for this moment, but it's touching all the same.