Don’t hold on to your past….Ask your past to ‘Go back’…to where it belongs!
Film is trying to tell us about our tendencies to follow the oft beaten paths. Our tendencies to follow the historical characters that we are made to mug up since our childhood. In Bengal…or in fact in India, our education system is more inclined towards ‘Ratta maar’ (mug up) the contents of the books, appear for exams, get pass marks, get the degree stamp in your resume….and then start your journey called ‘life’ – which hardly has anything to do with whatever you were made to mug up in school!
So obviously we have youths trying hard to cope up with reality! They then start following blindly whatever their successful contemporaries do to survive …which includes:
Be selfish even to the extent of forgetting your own parents. Eg. one the the guy that Columbus meets is a radio jockey (RJ) who wants to release a music album of his own, so he has left his parents and spending his life in the city and struggling for 8 years to get a break.
Lie & cheat to get your work done – So this RJ pretends to be in love with the dumb rich daughter of a petrol pump owner – he spends time with her so that she convinces her father to sponsor his album!
Pretend that you know more even if you don’t – The loser male methods – Another guy in this film – who works in the corporate sector – let’s call him corporate guy (CG) is shown as an unconfident fellow who has been waiting for a promotion but is unable to get it. His English writing (& speaking also) skills is not good enough so he cannot face the corporate presentations confidently. He also cribs the fact that females get promotions because they open 2 buttons of their shirts!! This is a typical loser-male syndrome that most losers spread when they have to blame the world around them. They do not see their own mediocrity but happily play the blame game!
Watching such movies, the already dumb-headed losers get more fuel to add to their frustrations! If a company is giving promotion to the female candidates based on her cleavage size…then such a company can never grow! It is talent and only talent of both men and women that take the company to the next higher level! Maybe in certain offices which deals with glamour/ media/ advertising/ films and marketing, some bold and aggressive females get the promotion based on the number of male clients she could rope in because of her sensual charms…otherwise in most offices or corporate organisations, if you are not talented, you are just shown the door….or given a cookie-cutter kind of a job that one is capable of!
Mir’s Message
Columbus (Mir) suggests in the film that reading about great historical personalities is okay but one need not continue to look up for his examples all the time. Historical personalities used tricks of their generation – the same tricks will not necessarily apply to the current generation which is technologically much more advanced.
Mir says to a small girl in the mall that when the school books ask about Christopher Columbus – just say that ‘He discovered America’ – nothing more is required – he is basically hitting at the essay like answers that West Bengal Board students have to write when appearing for exams!
Also the fact that great personalities also have certain negative qualities…that one needs to overlook and even if one is trying to follow that ideal, he has to curb the negative qualities and only follow the positive qualities of the personality.
Film also focuses on 3 types of girls:
- Dumb daughter of the petrol pump owner – shallow, only taking selfies and updating her social network profile. Dressing up to turn on every man on street.
- Calculating and manipulative corporate girl – the senior of the CG – knows which side of the bread is to be buttered.
- Simple and practical working girl – working with RJ in his office – has a weakness for RJ but never shows it aggressively. Her quiet and patient ways eventually succeeds to win RJ’s heart.