When I gave a thumbs-up rating to Balki’s ‘Ki & Ka’, I got a lot of finger-wagging coming from various quarters. A filmmaker friend accused me of selling out. No no, don’t get him wrong. He wasn’t accusing me of taking money in exchange for a favourable review. He just felt I was being generous to a film that ticked off all the right boxes in my head.
That, it did. Other critics were savagely austere in their rating, including the revered Times Of India which gave the film 3 stars on Friday morning. Post the weekend when public opinion seemed to favour the film, they bravely and unapologetically revised it to 4 stars.
Well, der aaye durust aaye.
Here is why I fell in love with Ki & Ka. It sparkled with a disarming energy as it put the man in what is traditionally considered a woman’s domain. The kitchen. When Arjun Kapoor sportingly wore the apron the critics in one voice called it gender stereotyping. But audiences don’t care for labels. They loved the crackling hissing snarky chemistry between the two Kapoors.
Indeed if Kareena Kapoor proves in Ki Aur Ka that she is in every sense, one of her kind, Arjun Kapoor comes into his own with a performance that controls his pent-up energy much better than all his earlier films.
Balki gives his leads ample leeway to grow into a marriage of convenience. By the time the film ends, we feel the change in the couple.
I came away cheering for Kiya and Kabir. They didn’t tell us about an ideal marriage. They told us about a marriage that survives all odds because the couple approaches the institution of marriage honestly.
Just the tone that Balki adopts to tell their tale. No punches pulled. No gimmicks.
Balki, who is a dear friend, did a terrific job. I wanted to know more about Kiya and Kabir’s marriage. Let’s have a sequel. Or better still, a television serial. To see where this marriage of a working woman and her house husband goes. We know Kiya is petrified of pregnancy. Would she realize later that motherhood doesn’t end a woman’s career? Can she come to this state of nirvanic awareness without being accused of pandering to….
Gender stereotyping!!!
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Though happy to see his film’s statement on gender equality being given such wide acceptance Balki completely disowns any claims to a gender statement in Ki & Ka. “I was happy to see guys reaching out into the feminine side of their personality. We all need to stop slotting men as the macho bread earners and women as the homemakers. I know of so many husbands who like to lend a helping hand in the kitchen, make a cup of tea for the wife when she returns from a hard days work, or massage her head. It’s no big deal.”
How helpful is Balki in the house when his wife Gauri Shinde is working in the kitchen? “Neither of us has to swap the ‘ki’ and ‘ka’ roles in the house because fortunately neither Gauri nor I have to do housework. We have a wonderful help who cooks and looks after the home. But yes, I do like to cook, though I’m told I’m a disaster at it.”
Balki says he had no difficulty convincing Arjun Kapoor to play the house husband. “I wanted an actor who was beefy and manly and yet able to carry off the role of the homemaker convincingly and effortlessly. Arjun fitted the bill completely. Kareena Kapoor was of course my first choice for the wife’s role. I had been a fan of her work for some time.”
Once Balki got the cast in place the rest fell into place.
Says the director, “We had a ball shooting Ki & Ka. We had not set out to make a film about women’s empowerment We just wanted to make a fun film about a marriage where the couple exchanges traditional roles. Would I ever do something like that with my wife? Ki & Ka is not about me and my marriage. It’s about that guy you see on screen. Let him do what he likes, na. Don’t attribute with him truckloads of ‘isms’. He’s just doing what he feels like. This is just Arjun and Kareena’s stories. Don’t look for social statements here.”
