Dum Maaro Dum - A song that everyone in this world associates with the gorgeous Zeenat Aman has been remade. Now I should probably leave that statement alone, you know...just a fact, no opinions. But it seems to me like the headline in a newspaper waiting to be analyzed, urging me to criticize, tempting me into commenting on the ridiculous concept of 'sexy' in today's world. I tried to resist but I failed so here goes...
I'd like to divide this analysis into three parts. I will try and keep this as short as possible. I'm hoping it won't be too hard considering I hardly saw a minute of the video before I ran out the room screaming 'MY EYES!!!!MY EYES!!!!"
1. The song itself. The original was sung by Asha Bhonsle. Now, she might not be as 'cool' as she was then but to replace her voice with the voice of some teenage popstar who sounds like she has a cotton ball stuck in her throat and is yelling on top of her voice in the hopeless attempt to get rid of this aforementioned cotton ball is just...well plain ridiculous. At one point, I believe she makes an attempt to rap in Hindi.To be honest, it did take me some time to figure it out, for in the beginning I was clearly under the impression that she was yelling at someone for tearing up her skirt(oh but let me not get there so soon). To beat it all, everytime the phrase 'Dum Maaro Dum' is uttered someone in the background yells 'ha' and 'ho' altogether reminding you of a Bruce Lee meets Santa sequence.
2. The dance moves. I read in the newspaper that Deepika Padukone wanted to beat Katrina Kaif's Sheila ki Jawani with this song. To be honest, if that was indeed her intention, probably asking an amazon warrior to choreograph the song wasn't a good idea. I clearly remember seeing her jump around in tribal style between bamboo sticks. Her clothes too were very tribal and altogether the whole hippie nature of the song was converted into something sinister - like a group of tribals dancing around a carcass celebrating their victory over a neighbouring tribal village.
3. Deepika Padukone. When you think of Dum Maaro Dum, you think of the beautiful Zeenat Aman in the orange clothes. What Deepika Padukone was doing in the new video is a completely mystery to me. For one, we see more of the tattoo on her body than her face so it takes you atleast forty five seconds before you realize that it's her behind all that hair(which is supposed to indicate that she is stoned(???)). And before you can look at her properly, she starts yelling things at you which is completely unnerving and then she starts doing the tribal dance and at this point you wonder why you didn't just opt to watch a rerun of friends instead of this.We see so much of Deepika's abs and legs and abs and legs that by the time you actually reach her face and then watch her horrendous dance moves, you wish they had just continued with the abs and legs.
I'd like to end with this - just let classics be. We don't have actresses like Zeenat Aman and Parveen Babi anymore. Replacing them with the likes of Deepika Padukone and Sonam Kapoor is a failed attempt at regaining the lost glory. All they can do is wear skimpy clothes and prance around in a horse-like manner - and that has never been or ever will be considered a tribute.
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