Reflecting on ‘Dil Bechara’ — Sucharita Tyagi
Years ago, while in school, I read O. Henry’s short story ‘The Last Leaf’ as part of the English curriculum. Set in a New York neighborhood during a terrible pneumonia epidemic, the story is about an old man, and a young woman, both artists. The young woman falls ill from pneumonia, and as her condition worsens, she watches the last few leaves drop one-by-one from a vine outside her window, convinced she will succumb to the disease once the last leaf falls. Upon learning this, the old man ventures outside secretly in a blizzard, once the tree is bare, to paint a leaf on the wall behind it, so the young woman wouldn’t give up hope. In this final creation, he finds his art’s purpose, his “masterpiece.”
As I watched ‘Dil Bechara,’ I recalled this 1907 story. Some emotion and thoughts from this particular movie watching experience, I will share with you in this piece, which, for the first time, is literally not a movie review.
Dil Bechara is an adaptation of author John Green’s 2012 novel, “The Fault in Our Stars”. Kizie Basu (Sanjana Sanghi) is fighting thyroid cancer, and Immanuel Rajkumar Junior (Sushant Singh Rajput), or Manny, is in remission after losing a leg to osteosarcoma. They flit in an out of a romantic relationship/friendship, but, more importantly, decide to be there for each other through it all, like only people who’ve had close brushes with cancer can. The light and breezy treatment of the film makes it an uncomplicated telling of an otherwise multi-layered existence of these characters.
On my mind, of course, during the entire film was how the world tragically lost Sushant over a month ago. But because the pandemic has altered our experience of time, for me it feels like it could have been much longer. There’s a line in ‘The Fault In Our Stars’, where Kizie’s counterpart Hazel Grace says about Manny’s counterpart Augustus, “I fell in love with him, the way you fall asleep, slowly then all at once.” You hear a version of this in the Hindi adaptation too, and here it assumes a new meaning. The realization that Sushant is gone, registered as a horrible loss and tragedy when it happened all those weeks ago, arises again here now with an unavoidable and irreversible finality, as we watch him in this last performance, his swansong.
Watching ‘Dil Bechara’ was always going to be tough and surreal. I’m certain film critics knew that going into this film. Despite trying to get involved in the universe created within the film, my thoughts stayed with Sushant and Sushant alone, because my emotional response to the film came more from outside it, than within.
In a sub-plot in the film, you see three friends with three different types of cancer struggle to shoot a low-budget Bhojpuri movie, using cinema as a medium to express themselves candidly. Perhaps they are attempting to leave a legacy behind, because despite their young age, these three are more painfully aware of their mortality than most. They seek to immortalize themselves in film, an attempt Manny eventually succeeds at; the final scene of ‘Dil Bechara’ is set at a posthumous screening of their silly home-production. This sub-plot doesn’t exist in the source material, ‘The Fault in Our Stars’.
Since watching on Saturday morning, I’ve thought over the many interlinkages between the film and reality. An actor, committed to entertaining his audience, deals with battles of his own hidden from view. In his final performance, he plays a man committed to entertaining the woman he loves, all while hiding the extent of his fatal illness from her. Within the film, he’s also playing an actor in his friend’s production. One chaotic scene, where Manny’s health takes a turn for the worse and things begin to spiral out of control, is set in a movie theatre (another major deviation from the source material), where he’s snuck away to watch his favorite actor perform.
It’s all incredibly cruel and unfair.
One must marvel at the extent actors are capable of using their art to create catharsis, for themselves and their viewers, forcing us to tap into our own emotions, by watching them draw on their own, to create a make-believe world. It’s a complicated, awe-inspiring process.
I wonder if at times it becomes difficult for actors to escape their own process. I imagine becoming another person can be equal parts liberating and isolating. While listening to the wildly popular music from their own movies or watching themselves on the big screen, do they re-live their characters? Can they distinguish that while the world might think of the lyrics as the actor’s real feeling, they were in-fact written by another person altogether?
Art tends to imitate life, but acting as an art form doesn’t quite end there, does it? An actor’s life, in the public eye, can sometimes seem as if it imitates a version of their art.
‘Dil Bechara’ is afloat in a strange ether right now, especially given the discourse around it. Some of us have chosen not to review it, because we feel we could not do so objectively after all that has happened, while some have chosen to share their opinions on the film. Both decisions are acceptable and should be welcomed, because both come from a place of respect. Respect for the departed soul, and respect for the art form he devoted his life to.
Above all, I believe it is important to keep talking to each other, because ultimately that is the purpose of films and film criticism. To generate conversations and encourage free thought and analysis.
I wish to express my condolences to Sushant Singh Rajput’s family, friends, and colleagues. And to his fans, who’ve watched the film through tear-filled eyes. Yes, “pain demands to be felt.” But feel this pain with your honesty and truth, not colored by the many unsavory conversations that have selfishly hijacked this tragedy.
The ending of O Henry’s story gives rise to complicated emotions. The young woman begins to feel better, but the old man, having exposed himself to the harsh elements in pursuit of creating and sharing his final piece of work, contracts and succumbs to pneumonia. The reader is left to feel happy for the woman, commiserate the old man’s death, and find solace in his art having found and fulfilled its purpose.
Does it really matter if it’s a “masterpiece” or not?
