I wrote a pre-review of the concept of PK (before watching the movie). Check this at https://manjulasridhar.wordpress.com/2014/12/26/pk-a-case-of-pot-calling-kettle-black-and-why-i-detest-this-genre/.
I was eager to see this though, this made 600 crores and one of the highest grossing movie ever. Many people told me it is quite humorous and entertaining. So as I was browsing TV last night and saw PK airing at 9 PM sat down with some good food. I also made a mental note of keeping my biases (confirmation bias specifically) aside and enjoy this.
Boy ! how disappointed I was. It was thoroughly jarring on my senses and manipulative to the core. How did intelligent and educated people enjoy this? Here are the data points.
- Where are cell phones? Why would a hero and heroin studying in foreign countries not have cell phones? Most modern folks talk it over rather than sending written paper, isn’t it? Where are friends who would normally come into play in such a situation.
- Haven’t you heard of ISRO ? or other scientific institutions. Why would an educated woman (that too with the power of press) with an intent of helping an alien not contact them in the first place? Instead, she does what morons do, get him a job on the TV? and why is Alien on the land is not bigger news than his deprecating commentary on religion and our practices?
- When the alien has the ability to read and transfer language why won't he hold the heroine's hand and learn English and normal Hindi which will obviously lead him to better communication?
- Littering: PK is shown throwing out the photos of Gandhi collected over a few days on the road once he realizes that they are not currency. Why not use a dustbin or not show this at all? Oh, wait that will only fit in “Munnabhai MBBS”. Once we made money from preaching civic sense we don't need to care about it anymore.
That is why I suffered. I couldn’t take it anymore and went to sleep promptly after one and half hour. Why are we so untalented? Why do we resort to such short cuts to get a rise out of people? Why do people fall for such cheap gimmicks? I will wait for a day when a really intelligent, truthful and entertaining story comes out of us.
BTW how is this business not unlike manipulative ashrams and gurus?
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Originally published at manjulasridhar.wordpress.com on July 27, 2015.
