COVID and a Hindi movie trope revisited

One of the most enduring tropes of Hindi films, almost from the time Hindi films started is that of 'lost and found children'.

The typical film using this trope will start with a sweet happy family probably enjoying a picnic or singing a song together. A 'significant' bit of dialogue especially about how happy they are and the experienced viewer knows that this is just a prelude to a tragedy striking the family and that violins will start wailing soon. The cause could be a flood, an earthquake, villains killing the parents, one child being kidnapped or missing a train - the script writer's imagination takes care of the reason. Again, the hard core film buff knows that by the end of the fifteenth reel or maybe the seventeenth, after eight songs, a cabaret dance, sixteen fights, a court scene and a hospital scene or two, everything will end like a fairy tale. In the process of growing up, one of the lost children will invariably be a policeman and another a villain. But the latter is a 'good' villain - he sees the light at the end - as different from the 'bad' villain, who invariably gets pasted or wasted by the hero and the 'good' villain acting in tandem.

O yes, how do the siblings identify each other? It could be a birthmark, an amulet, a tattoo or even just a song which the family sang together in good times - see Yaadon ki Baarat!

Let us now trace how this trope has progressed so far

Version 1.0: in the 1950s mainly - the family gets separated during a mela, preferably the Kumbh mela

Version 2.0: perfected by the film maker Manmohan Desai as part of his winning formula but also used to good effect by Nasir Hussain. The family gets separated when villains kill the parents or are coming to kill them.

Now that this trope has gone slightly out of fashion, it can be revived. Most of us have noticed a strong physical similarity between the President of the United States (POTUS), Mr Donald Trump and the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Mr Boris Johnson. This gives me the idea for Version 3.0 - the lost children grow up and head Governments in the USA and UK.

Version 4.0 is even more contemporary and I believe, in the writing. This addresses the most important part of how the brothers recognise each other. One of the brothers contracts COVID 19 (alright, I know one of these two Heads of State did contract COVID - but life should reflect art, shouldn't it?!). Yes, our script looks at one of the brothers being in a serious state and requiring plasma for treatment. Voila, the other brother's plasma reaches and is compatible, leading the doctor in the movie to say 'Tajub hai bilkul 100% match hai - ye dono sage bhai toh nahi hain?'

Please don't look for scientific logic - there isn't any! But you knew it, didn't you ?

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