Throwback Thursday: Pyaar Impossible Is Full Of Double-Standards, Stereotypes And Casual Sexism
Romantic Comedy is a genre that’s loved by most of us. We love ourselves a little cheesy, a little funny type of romance and it’s pretty evident from the guys we like to date. When it’s Christmas, there’s a surge in romantic content being consumed all over the world, especially since for some of us that’s the only source of anything remotely amorous. The best part is, these movies aren’t that heavy on the plot so in my not-so-expert opinion, they shouldn’t be so hard to make. And yet, for every good rom-com out there there are at least three terrible ones that make you want to reconsider your choices in movies. Pyaar Impossible starring Uday Chopra and Priyanka Chopra and scarring us, is one such film.
The movie seems to have one propaganda and that is to tell people that even the nerds need to be admired. Pyaar Impossible wants to call people out for being shallow in love and going just for the looks. But does it end up really doing that? We’ll see.
Alisha (Priyanka Chopra) is the hottie of her college in California with admirers falling left, right and center looking at her flip her hair, in slow-mo of course. Apparently, she’s a “10 on 10” because good looks, good looks and good looks. Alisha parties and is oozing confidence at every moment, so much so that she accidentally falls into a river while partying with her friends. She almost drowns but Abhay (Uday) her nerdy fan from college saves her life. But before she could return to her senses and thank her life saver, her friends take her away. Alisha’s father thinks because she has been partying so much, the best action to take is pull her out of college. Wow logic.
So Abhay’s crush drops out of college and the rest of his life suddenly has no significance because he is shown as noticeable as black chalk on black board. No, that’s not what I am saying; I am not so shallow. That’s how the film tries to portray him. He is a geek so he has to wear specks, sweater and shirt combo and pants that were horrifyingly short for some reason. If that’s not stereotyping then I don’t know what is.
Of course, Alisha had to be into music and parties if she was into looking good. Because you know, dressing well and being a good student don’t go hand in hand. And I have been judged for being into fashion in college; people thought I must not be ambitious or studious. It is this mentality that we carry into the professional world and women are expected to dress simple if they are to be taken seriously.
Coming back to Abhay, seven years later he has made this really cool software and tries to sell it to an investor Sidharth (Dino Morea) who actually ends up stealing it from him. Now Sidharth is trying to sell it to a company where co-incidentally Alisha is the Marketing Head. Following the trail, Abhay is once again at Alisha’s doorstep, still smitten by her. She mistakes him for a nanny and forces him to take care of her 6-year-old daughter who is quite a hands-on.
The kid hates him and any nanny for some reason but what really is worrisome here is that she threatens to tell the cops he did “bad things” to her. I mean, the child is trivialising sex abuse here and I don’t understand why nobody is talking about how terrible that is? She blackmails him with that and he listens to all her whims and fancies.
At some point, to convince Abhay that people don’t go for looks and looks alone, Alisha decides to dress like a nerd in a social experiment. Of course, nobody gives a fuck about her in her de-glam avatar. I don’t know what they are trying to say but I feel they are implying that women who dress simple and wear glasses are undateable and it sucks. To say the least.
All this while, Abhay is playing the ‘I am ugly and nobody sees me’ card. You want to feel sorry for him but seriously, he is as shallow as the next person. He fell for Alisha, completely on the basis of looks. There may be several simple-looking girls but did he fall for them? Nope. So basically, this film is a propaganda by the not-so-handsome men for pretty girls to not reject them for not having a good personality. Meanwhile, women have to look good and will continue to be liked on the basis of their appearance.
ALSO READ: Throwback Thursday: Vivah Is Doused In Sexism, Beauty Stereotypes And Features Two Horny Individuals Who Are Too Shy To Get It On
At the end, as anyone would have predicted – Abhay gets Alisha and his software back. So Alisha settles for a not-so-handsome guy with a good heart. And Abhay gets the girl he loved only on the basis of her appearance while calling out the shallowness of her other people doing that. Wow. That’s not how Karma works but fine. Logic impossible!
