Deewar Response - Naveen

Deewar Reponse

            Deewar is a 1975 Indian crime-drama film which deals with a mother and her two sons living in Mumbai during the late 70’s. The film portrays the conflict which arises when one brother takes the morally sound path to success while the other takes a murkier pathway, eventually becoming part of a large crime syndicate.

            Deewar as a film has many parallels to the film Mother India. The husband of the mother, in both movies, chooses to leave his family and escape a situation of embarrassment and humiliation within his community of origin. In both films, it is the mother who toils when her children are young in order to support them and guarantee both a better future. The most obvious connection between the two films is between the two sons in both the films.

            In Deewar and Mother India, the two sons endure a situation of poverty and desperation created by powers out of their control when they are young and attempt to find success regardless. In both movies, one of the sons takes the righteous, lawful path towards success, while the other takes a more morally reprehensible and dark path in his attempt at success. And in both movies, even the definition of success for the two brothers is similar. Ramu, from mother India, and Ravi from Deewar both simply attempt to work hard and work their way to success, with no real malicious intent towards the forces which had kept them down in their youth. On the other hand, both Birju and Vijay attempt to directly attack and get revenge in some sense against the discriminatory forces which they were powerless to stop in their youth.

            In Deewar, the main force which is keeping the mother and her sons down is the wealthy class, who pay horribly low wages, and the criminal forces who take advantage of them further. It is emphasized again and again to the Vijay and Ravi that the poor always have been and always will be taken advantage of by others and that they must silently bear the pain until they can make it out of poverty themselves. Ravi takes the righteous path to help his family out of poverty, albeit funded by the toil and manual labor of Vijay throughout the years. Ravi attempts to find a job with his education and eventually joins the police force, the paragon of morality at the time, in terms of a job. On the other hand, while Vijay spent most of his early life in manual labor, working away so that his brother could make it in life, as soon has he is given the chance, he agrees to join and work alongside a Mumbai crime boss. It is made clear repeatedly that he does this as a sort of retaliation against the forced which had kept him and his family down during the previous years. He believes that money, and money only will be enough to live a happy existence, in which he and his family are in full control of their lives.

            In Mother India, the main force which is keeping the mother and her sons down is the moneylender specifically, who keeps them in perpetual poverty. Since in this movie, the force is given a face and a name, we also see how Birju directly attempts to gain redemption by targeting the moneylender, rather than indirectly through his actions, like Vijay.  Also, similarly to Ravi, Ramu takes the righteous pathway and continues to work and make an honest living while attempting to break free of the moneylender’s grasp.

            In addition to the aforementioned similarities between the two movie’s characters, there are many stark differences as well. In Mother India, Ramu is not truly in direct conflict with Birju throughout the movie. Although in certain parts of the film, he does have to reign Birju in and control him, he doesn’t come into direct conflict with Birju as Ravi does with Vijay. Ramu is more a neutral character in Mother India while Ravi is a force for good and moral fortitude who directs his actions towards thwarting his brother directly in Deewar. In addition, while Birju directly harms others, including the money lender and his daughter, in his attempts to exact revenge for the injustices his family bore throughout the years, Vijay does not. Vijay simply earns money performing tasks and being part of a business which harms others.  He himself is not going after anyone else, unlike Birju. Vijay is simply in the pursuit of money. Overall, there are many similarities and differences between Ramu and Ravi and Birju and Vijay which become obvious upon viewing and comparison of the two films.