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[Y]Watch: Review of ‘Pyaar Ka Punchnama 2’ – It Deserves A Punch, Not An Audience
Last Friday (16th October) saw the release of ‘Pyaar Ka Punchnama 2’ (PKP-2), sequel to the 2011 film ‘Pyaar Ka Punchnama’ (PKP). PKP-2. Much like its predecessor, it is premised on the singular theme of women-bashing. It is scary how the film tries to sell misogyny and going by its successful box-office collections, it can be inferred that it has successfully done so.
The trailer begins by equating a relationship to chutiyapa (bullshit), even while showing dream sequences of three couples on holiday on a yacht. In the yacht, everyone seems to be having a good time. Yet, later, as the trailer suggests, the men feel trapped in relationships as they have to put up with too much chutiyapa.
The movie hasn’t failed to include stereotypes as far as women are concerned. Be it associating the colour pink with women, or reinforcing the belief that women can’t drive, they have done it all. One of the girls is shown to be thrusting her nail paint into her boyfriend’s face while he is driving. She is also shown to demand his password from him, which he discloses grudgingly. Another girl believes that engineers look like ‘mausa ji‘. The third girl wants her family to know her boyfriend and thus, asks him to help around her house. He does it all, from grocery shopping to decorating the house, but not without cribbing about it in front of his friends.
What I find problematic about the movie is not that it shows all its leading ladies in a negative light, but the fact it has shown them as uni-layered, shallow characters with nought intelligence. Ironically, these ‘cunning and manipulative’ women are also shown to be unbelievably dumb – they can’t drive, can’t think beyond clothes and make-up and definitely cannot be engineers! The men, on the other hand, are shown as golden-hearted, naïve people, who despite being ‘smart’, are driven to do ‘stupid’ things for the sake of the women they ‘love’.
It is indeed amusing that in an extremely patriarchal country like India, where the sex ratio is skewed and violence against women is on the rise each day, the so-called modern educated masses don’t hesitate to laugh at sexism. The mobility of women is severely restricted in India and it is for this reason that they have been historically denied opportunities to be out on their own, without the presence of a male guardian. In spite of this, a few women dare to break boundaries and learn to drive, only to be labelled as ‘bad drivers’ or ‘reasons behind road accidents’. Many families do not allow women to own mobile phones, lest they ‘go bad’. Many men coerce their girlfriends and wives to disclose their passwords with the sole aim of keeping a tab on their movements. The film happily ignores these realities.
Women are discouraged from taking up engineering as a career, not only by their families who pressurise them to get married, but also by the industry, as female mechanical or civil engineering students are compelled to take up software jobs because certain companies don’t consider them ‘fit’ for jobs which involve construction of bridges, roads and machines. Living in such a society should automatically make any reasonable human being sensitive to the daily struggles of women. But clearly, the makers of PKP-2 believe otherwise.
One of the male protagonists is shown doing household chores at his girlfriend’’s house and finds it frustrating. Thousands of women in India are made to exactly the same things and sometimes, even much worse, as they move out of their parents’ homes to live with their husbands’ families post marriage. Neither Bollywood nor its audience finds bahus living and slogging away in sasurals offensive or demeaning. Yet, a man helping around at his girlfriend’s place is downright unacceptable.
In an era when a few Bollywood movies, like ‘Queen’ or ‘Highway’ have tried to show women as individuals in their own capacity without typecasting them as mothers, daughters and wives, it is extremely unfortunate that PKP-2 takes a leap backwards. Making fun of romantic relationships would have been in much better taste had the characters been realistic and the perspective free from gender bias.
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Avinesh Saini
This review is even more predictable than the movie itself.
Avinesh Saini
Wow. Never imagined such a simple comment will elicit so much hatred.
krishna
TOh movies kya ab moral science ki book ban jaaye ? Kya bakwaas hai….. the moment i say men…it means ALL MEN IN THIS UNIVERSE…..the moment i say WOMEN…. it means ALL WOMEN in this universe…..SHUT up critics at youth ki awaaz and go get a life….the movie talks about relationship problems…. and the director doesnt need you to tell him what to do in his life and how to make movies. You dont like it… Dont watch it….
Abhijeet
absolutely correct…
Ratnadeep
Brilliant point you raised. When male bashing films like Queen comes, these feminists will be enjoying to the core but when women bashing films like PKP series comes, they can’t digest. They say men and women deserve equal status. So when men are portrayed as negative, why can’t the women be portrayed as negative? The staunch feminists can’t answer this question.
Sandhya
Hi Preeti. This was much needed..thanks for succinctly putting it forth. Worst casualties of such movies are the women who internalise the misogynistic perspective of such movies.
Avinesh Saini
What do you have to say about the actresses who agreed to do the movie knowing fully well about the content?
Prateek Shukla
Okay as expected a feminist loses her mind. The problem with you all that you can’t enjoy things. The video ‘it’s a men’ s world ‘ was very offensive but we enjoyed it and never complained. That’s what makes us better. We are cool enough to ignore these stupid things but not cool enough to handle your feminism.
Sanket D.
Was so surprised NOT to find out that this was written by a self-proclaimed ‘feminist’. Worst. Rant. Ever.
Indranil
Stop reacting so much. It’s just a movie. If you are so hurt don’t watch. If you always carry a halogen light of feminism don’t watch. It’s perfectly OK to make such movies and its absolutely OK that it is getting an audience. And why not? Isn’t male bashing nowadays the culture in our so called educated society?
So stop posting nonsensical.movies and move on.
Ayesha
Hi Preeti,
With due respect, I have to ask, have you watched the movie? Also, do you live in an urban Indian city? Have you ever witnessed or been part of a modern relationship? Do you have any male friends who have been victim to bad relationships with completely empowered modern women ( in no way implying that women must not be completely empowered, independent and strong)? Lastly, do you have a basic idea as to how a review must be written?
Your article is much more of a 12th grader’s essay on ‘Female Inequality in India’ than the review of a comedy. Being a staunch feminist myself, I didn’t miss noticing the stereotypes either but did it completely fly by you, the male protagonists were aware and happy to be dating woman who weren’t necessarily complying to any female stereotypes ( except knowing the names of more shades of pink than I do), in fact one of the ‘misogynist’ ‘chauvinist’ male lead even let his girlfriend handle his finances (And I hope you felt some sympathy for the guy knowing how she handled it, considering you watched the movie). What a patriarchal view of the director!
The driving scene in the woman didn’t imply that women are bad drivers, it implied that one must not drive when drunk; you have a different view on this? We’d really like to know.
That point about the guy doing household chores wasn’t meant to show that guys don’t want to do household chores while they expect women to do the same. Please do not mislead readers who haven’t watched the movie. It showcased the efforts of a guy who genuinely wanted to get married to his girlfriend and his efforts to impress her parents. He cribbed to his friends because in spite of all the work he was doing, he knew that his girlfriend wasn’t making any efforts of creating an impression on her parents about wanting to get married to him.
Youth Ki Awaaz, there was a time when your articles were inspiring and women authors didn’t write articles in the name of feminism that demeaned feminism. These kind of chutiyapa posts kinda really piss off honest women feminists.
Bhumika
Exactly what I wanted to say!
Priya
Exactly… we follow YKA for its great articles that provide us valuable insight but this is utter feminist shit.Being a girl Yes i dont support it. Dear author before going for a movie please go check the trailer of the movie and save urself the pain of writing such a crazy article.
Preeti Pratishruti Dash
Hi Ayesha,
I’m sorry if you don’t like my style of writing, but I never aimed at making this piece similar to the kind of stellar literature you must be familiar with.
Anyway, where I live, whether I have been in a ‘modern relationship’ (whatever that means) or not and whether I have male friends who have suffered in relationships is immaterial if you call yourself a feminist. Are you implying therefore that only women living in urban cities, who have been in relationships and have male friends can speak on women’s issues? Or do you even remotely suggest that every English speaking educated woman is empowered? If you do, then, at the cost of bursting your bubble, let me tell you that it is not the case at all.
As far as your points about my views on the film are concerned, let me make it clear- my problem with the movie is not what the guys or girls are doing but the manner in which every girl is shown as shallow and dumb while every guy is shown as trusting and nice. And that, my friend, is sexist in itself. If you don’t think so, request you to read up on what sexism is all about. My views on drunken driving are similar to yours, but again, did the movie correctly drive home that message? Great for you if it did, definitely not for me. It is heartening to see how beautifully you have understood every point that the filmmaker was trying to make and found it non-sexist, especially in a movie that prides itself on a dialogue beginning with ‘Problem yeh hai ki woh ladki hai’.
Your feminism might be different from mine, but labelling a post by a ‘woman author’ (as if the sex of the author should make a difference) chutiyapa is uncalled for, even if it did ‘piss off’ an ‘honest feminist’ such as yourself!
Also, on a lighter note, you’ve left me wondering what the term ‘dishonest feminist’ entails.
Avinesh Saini
The clash of the feminists. This could be the subject of misogynist Luv Ranjan’s next movie. You guys need to interview the great man. What exactly inspires him to make the movies he eventually makes.
Ankita
Very True, Ayesha!!
Chinmay
Bravo ! This is more of gender equalized view than the view of main article writer.
After reading this article, can I build a stereotype that all women lawyers are biased and suffering from inferiority complex ? Alas !!
vivek
The writed looks like an independent girl who can think something. I think the movie is about the majority of them who are dumb not confident women like you. I was able to relate to many issues in the movie.
The Game
Women are self-centered and selfish. My crazy wife nearly drove me to suicide with her cunning, manipulative, and abusive ways, and constantly threatened me with a false dowry case. Her brother also issuef threats. Finally I was able to divorce her and get my life back.
tamal sheikh
Sorry to hear that.
Priya
Sorry to hear that that but please stop stereotyping!…. Maybe that woman was bad but trust me you cannot say this about all those u haven’t yet known! U are reacting the same way as our “feminist” author reacted to this movie.
Jigsaw
I can relate to the scene when the girl asks for his password. The modern Indian woman treats her boyfriend/husband like an ATM and uses him like tissue paper.
Batman
More and more men today, including myself, are refusing to get married today, to avoid putting up with misandrists whose only goal in life is to suck man out of his resources. The more you give them, the more they will want, and they will never be grateful. Not to mention the daily nags, taunts, verbal, mental, emotional, and psychological abuse
The Joker
Do you know that only the female mosquito sucks blood?
Avinesh Saini
What a great and fitting analogy.
ajinkya
Wats wrong with you….
Movie reviewing is just not your cup of tea. I mean its just a movie whose sole purpose is to entertain the audience. Why the hell you putting all that society stuff in between.. Do u even know how to review a movie.
Asi
Now you are sounding misogynist. Since you are a feminist lawyer don’t try to sell yourself with this stupid review. The guys shown in Queen and Highway are also can’t be stereotyped. It’s a movie about the real urban gals, how they behave and use their BFs to get their work done and how selfish they are. It’s very true. Don’t bloody needlessly relate to serious issues like sex ratio of women or violence against women’s with this comedy movie. This has another view point toward modern day women, that’s it.
Whatever shown in movie is very much true with respect to today’s gals and accept it or ignore it, your choice, Don’t politicize!!!
rahul
after reading two lines of your review.. i was 98 prcnt sure this review is written by a girl… and as i scrolled down… surprise surprise!!! so really sorry i read only two lines..
Rahul Agrawal
Please take a movie in a lighter note. Audience like it and it includes girls and women also. They laughed like anything because they took everything in a humorous way. Dont want to sound misogynist, but I have seen all the review by female critics are bashing the movie and all the males are praising it for the laughter jokes. So, if you want to be a critic, kindly have a neutral view. Kindly dont bring the feminism here. Thanks
tamal sheikh
Batman and Joker agree for once . ha ha ha .. [below in the comments]
Krati
If we look critically, every other Indian show is showcasing the same and strengthening gender roles.
tamal sheikh
By the way , reviewer , did you watch Gulab Gang ? Wasn’t every single male character in that movie an implied monster/potential rapist ? And that was not even a comedy film(seriously, who takes comedy films this seriously as you ?), a very serious film indeed . Did you consider that male-bashing ? We did not see any male reviewers whining about that one (Is that because the men ,deep down, loath themselves to some level? whatever). This was just one example, there are plenty of movies out there wherein very offensive male stereotypes are not only included but also encouraged to be believed . No one opposes those. Learn to look at the both sides of the gender-biasedness coin , madam . And for you kind information , I personally know girls of this kind , manipulative,insensitive and the worst kind , who take boyfriends not for love but for other “empowered,respectable,independent” reasons giving women empowerment and the womenkind a bad name. Here is another female stereotype : ” Women don’t have any sense of humour” . Can you relate , huh?
Preeti Pratishruti Dash
Offensive stereotypes about men are products of patriarchy, not feminism. Gulab Gang did not do well at the box office, for various reasons. PKP did. Hence, I find it imperative to critique it.
Sanket D.
Everything’s offensive if you want it to be. Even the nice things in life. And make no mistake about it, this isn’t a critique (which btw is a perfect example of wrong usage of a word by someone that doesn’t entirely understand it), this is more of a personal rant, and in some cases outright misrepresentation.
nijam
Damn my rating would be 6 out of 5…Its shows all aspect abt a woman… n ya the review is done by a lady so we might to see some negative line by her… once again awesome movie better than before .,
Sam
Miss Preeti, do you even know what a movie review is? I mean have you read one ever? You completely wrote the story of the film, did not even mention SPOILERS ALERT at the beginning.
As for your hate, let me clarify- IT IS JUST A MOVIE.
To be precise, it is a comedy film (a comedy film is a kind of film where situations are exaggerated to make the audience laugh, go watch any sitcom). Every movie has villain right? In this film, the villains were girls, as simple as that. Whats wrong with that? Or do you think that girls can never be wrong?
I think if you wrote the review of Sholay, you will write that sholay is stupid because its biased against Gabbar!
Why do you have to insert feminism in everything?
If the situations are reversed, and the story is based on male-bashing, I am sure I am going to love it, oh wait it has already been done. ”It’s a Man’s World” by yfilms. And I loved that show!
Point of the film- Understand different points of view and work on your relationships.
And youth ki awaaz improve your editorial team, quality journalism is not propaganda based, just be objective!
Nitin
Question: Did you enjoy AIB roast n laugh and call ppl shallow n idiotic when they said things against it.. lets not sink into their levels n get a perspective.. its fun intended.. n theres also a disclaimer at the beginning. Did you really miss the point in the movie that how stupid n idiotic men can be. It is a new world. Men don’t care if they are superior or women are while women arise to glory with new rules about how to be treated.. Curse a woman. hes bad. Curse a man. shes a feminist. Feminism: the most misinterpreted word of 21st century. Please get a perspective and find some sense of humor. Its not like ppl gonna take life changing advices from the movie and apply it.
P.S : Noone will remember you or you shallow article but everyone will remember the movie and director
Avinesh Saini
Actually, neither will be remembered. And most critics have agreed that the movie is indeed misogynistic in it’s tone.
B
Domestic violence is a woman’s issue – really?
98% men have faced domestic violence
http://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2012/09/domestic-violence-not-just-a-womens-issue-men-suffer-too/
A man is assaulted by his wife/girlfriend every 14.6 seconds.
http://www.chowrangi.pk/domestic-violence-against-men.html
When husbands are victims of domestic violence
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/life-style/relationships/man-woman/When-husbands-are-victims-of-domestic-violence/articleshow/26031858.cms
Why are so many MEN becoming victims of domestic violence?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2518434/Why-MEN-victims-domestic-violence-Its-Britains-remaining-taboos-abuse-men-home-rise.html
A Hidden Crime: Domestic Violence Against Men Is a Growing Problem
http://www.dailyfinance.com/2010/01/30/a-hidden-crime-domestic-violence-against-men-is-a-growing-probl/
Women More Likely to Commit Domestic Violence, Studies Show
http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/crime/item/19133-women-more-likely-to-commit-domestic-violence-studies-show
Male domestic abuse victim: men are scared to come forward
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/30303405/male-domestic-abuse-victim-men-are-scared-to-come-forward
B
Majority of victims of dowry are also men
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/chandigarh/Harassed-over-dowry-men-demand-fair-play/articleshow/5241108.cms
22.000 male suicides vs 6,800 female suicides – Who is the victim?
cinemaprofile
“Pyaar Ka Punchnama 2” Movie Live reviews & Ratings from Top media’s [reviewers] @ http://goo.gl/YDWhSa
Ankita
Actually this article deserves a PUNCH!!! You ruined this, first go and see how to write a review!!! And above that you call yourself a lawyer!! that too feminist lawyer… You neither understand the meaning of FEMINISM (for that matter there is difference between feminism and anti-male) and LAWYER (you seem to be on the same coin as advocate ML Sharma, just the other side of it).
manish
I am feeling elated. Feminists going crazy ass over this movie as expected. BTW there are plenty of man bashing movie and ads (the recent one – grofers) never heard them talking about it. This article really was what you thought it would be, word by word, line by line. Looks like feminists have a single script world over, and they just keep reproducing the same shit until it gets boring, and then nobody cares about shit they wanna say, we know it all.
Susaant Menon
About the author from the bottom section of this review – “Preeti is a feminist lawyer, who attempts to subvert patriarchy in each small and big step of her life. She is also a lover of books, cats, sleep and food.” —- She attempts to subvert patriarchy in each small and big step of her life….. Well good for her…. But I am astounded at the pathetically harmful level of her intelligence, that makes her think that the director or makers of the file doesn’t have their constitutionally guaranteed rights to subvert feminism in each small and big step of their life…… Or does she thinks feminism is the holy grail of life, which every living should should abide by, or else they can be convicted for blasphemy, which deserves punches as punishment ??? Alas even for those punches, although soft-internet based ones feminists like her need the systems and machines designed, operated and maintained by men, brought into this world by women (mothers) and sired by men (fathers)……. I know I am expecting too much from feminists, by expecting them to understand my comments, but only if they could remove hate tinted glasses and laugh out loud like many men in modern Indian and the world who suffer daily at the hands of women, yet live and laugh…….