Director: Indra Kumar; Writer: Gyandev Agnihotri, K. Bhagyaraj, Kamlesh Pandey; Producer: Indra Kumar, Vinod Doshi, Ashok Thakeria; Cinematographer: Baba Azmi; Editor: Hussain A. Burmawala; Cast: Anil Kapoor, Madhuri Dixit, Aruna Irani, Laxmikant Berde, Akash Khurana, Adi Irani, Anupam Kher, Rita Bhaduri, Satyendra Kapoor, Bharati Achrekar, Kunika, Priya Arun, Brij Gopal, Master Bunty, Yunus Parvez, Vikas Anand, Gurbachchan Singh, Harjeet Walia, Arun Mathur, Jamnadas, Rajeev Mehta, Vipul Shah, Ghanshyam Nayak, Bhola, Snehal, Raugh Sheikh, Johnny Hayward, Naginder Malawade, Miss Mimmy, Rajesh Mehta, Thakur, Yasmin, Harbans Darshan M. Arora, Jack Gaud, Ajitesh
Duration: 02:36:58; Aspect Ratio: 1.778:1; Hue: 28.366; Saturation: 0.120; Lightness: 0.385; Volume: 0.216; Cuts per Minute: 17.366; Words per Minute: 67.937
Summary: A rich widower (Khurana) marries Laxmi
(Irani) to provide a mother for his infant son
Raju. However, she is an evil woman who
schemes to appropriate her husband’s property
by having him locked away, making her
stepson emotionally dependent on her and
moving in with her equally villainous brother
(Kher). Raju (Kapoor) grows up an illiterate
peasant, but when he marries Saraswati (Dixit),
the new daughter-in-law sets things right. The
major dramatic pivot constitutes the assembling
of a new patriarchy around Raju and around
the contradiction of ‘bad’ characters being
positioned in positive roles: e.g. the daughterin-
law must persecute the evil Laxmi without
tarnishing Laxmi’s authority as her mother-inlaw,
and Raju himself has to accede to new
notions of morality - including economic
independence from the joint family - while the
narrative must sustain his symbolic regard for
his stepmother. After his second success (Dil,
in 1990, was his first) Indra Kumar went on to
make it three-in-a-row with Raja (1995), all
starring Madhuri Dixit. The film is notorious
mainly for its erotic picturisation of the Dhak
dhak number (Anand Patwardhan later refers
to the song in Father Son and Holy War, 1994,
as epitomising male fantasy).
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