Ahh the '80's, often reviled and termed a bad period in Bollywood, however upon careful inspection there are lots of lovely great movies, Ek Duuje ke liye (Made for each other) is one of them, a love story with a difference as it blends in romance, great chemistry between the lead actors and perfect comedy timings.Vasu (Kamal Hassan) a tamil man from southern India moves to Goa City to live with his parents, he meets Sapna (Rati Agnihotri) a North Indian woman, who is his neighbour. Although they find it hard to communicate at first due to the language barriers, they soon overcome this and a romance starts between the two of them
Both their parents argue constantly, with the bone of contention mainly being their different south/North Indian divide, especially with Sapna's Mother (Shubha Khote)
When their parents learn of Vasu & Sapna's romance, they aren't happy and attempt to break them up, the two lovers resent this but eventually agree to a contract with their parents that they would stay apart for a year without any contact whatsoever, Vasu moves away to Hyderabad and during their months of seperation both their parents try numereous schemes to disrupt their love for each other
Will their love withstand this test? What schemes will Sapna's mother come up with during their time of Separation?
I totally love this movie and it's definitely among my all time favourites, as i've said above, the great chemistry between the lead actors, great comedy timings especially Kamal Hassan's English dialogues and his little quirks had me in Stitches. I also loved the unconventional ending, although at first i found it somewhat disturbing, but eventually i found it necessary to drive home the message that LOVE should always prevail over class, race, caste & religion, and i applaud the director K. Balachander for going with the unconventional ending at the time and not bowing to pressures to change it, as he had been advised to. Kamal Hassan gives a great passionate performance and i'm a lifelong fan after seeing this movie
and Rati Agnihotri whom i just love was so natural and expressive, she's definitely one of my favourite actresses
Shubha Khote is fantastic as the wicked mother and the rest of the cast also give great performances, Other things that stuck in my memory include Kamal Hassan's fabulous Bharatanatyam dancing which i tried very hard to recreate on my own, and passionate scenes like Sapna mixing a burnt picture of Vasu into her Tea drinking it and then licking the tears off her face, to spite her over controlling mother
The music by the incredible Laxmikant Pyarelal is fantastic as usual, from the haunting soulful 'Tere Mere Beeche' which was featured in the Mr India parody song to the catchy 'Hum Bane Tum Bane' and Mere Jeevan Saathi which will get every true blooded bollywood fan in stitches, as it references a lot of movie names. For a bit of bollywood trivia, have a go and see how many movie names you can pick out in the video clip below
