Friday 24 April 2015

When Worlds Collude - 8 (What Is It About The Germans And Kal Ho Na Ho?)

What do the Germans see in the title song of the Bollywood movie Kal Ho Na Ho? The movie is a love triangle in which one of the vertices is played by Shah Rukh Khan, who, unknown to the other two, is dying of a heart condition. Before he dies, he brings the other two together.

A bit maudlin and overdone in true Bollywood style, but surprisingly, Germans seem to like this movie so much that I have seen not one but two re-picturisations of the title song with German actors. In the second, India's former foreign minister Salman Khurshid, German ambassador to India Michael Steiner, Steiner's wife Eliese and well-known Indian writer Madhu Kishwar play the lead roles.

This is the original.
Shah Rukh Khan, Preity Zinta and Saif Ali Khan in the three main roles

This is the first fan remake that I saw. The guy playing the Shah Rukh Khan character also manages to get his trademark arms-spread-wide gesture down pat.

A fan remake by three regular German folk

And this is the latest from the German Embassy in New Delhi starring ambassadors and former foreign ministers.

The German Embassy remake "Lebe Jetzt" ("Live Now") with a relatively well-known cast


Interesting!

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