1/ Dil Se is a dark film which deals with a lot of moral greyness
Against this backdrop, we have the colourful song Satrangi Re.
While the song drops at exactly the 1 hour mark..
The 7 min song song sums up SRK's slow descent into madness & foreshadows the ending
⚠️Spoilers⚠️
2/ In the book "Conversations with Mani Ratnam" Mani Ratnam told @baradwajrangan that
He gave @arrahman a very specific brief to compose a song abt the 7 stages of love
While stumped at first, the Mozart of Madras composed the banger song.. in 1 hour 🤯
3/ Arabic has 14 stages. But Mani Ratnam condensed them to 7 for this song:
❤️ Hub (attraction)
🧡 Uns (infatuation)
💛 Ishq (love)
💚 Akidat (trust/reverence)
💙 Ibadat (worship)
💜 Junoon (madness)
🖤 Maut (death)
SRK addresses his muse Manisha as Satrangi (the seven-hued one)
4/ At the start of the movie, we see SRK smitten by Manisha.
He is instantly attracted to her (hub) w/o knowing anything abt her.
In fact after stalking her, he finds out her (fake) name only 53 mins into the movie.
After missing her narrowly, in Chaiyya Chaiyya SRK sings:
5/ At the start of Satrangi Re, SRK sings:
Koi noor hai tu
Kyun door hai too
Are you a light
Why are you so far?
This reminded me of Pink Floyd's poster for Dark Side of the Moon
Side note, @arrahman got Pink Floyd's bass guitarist Guy Pratt to play bass for Dil Se Re
6/ At the start of the song SRK and Manisha both are wearing black.
While Manisha's costumes change colours (to reflect the 7 colours of the rainbow)
SRK wears only black till the end.
His life is drab till she requites his love
SRK then falls to his knees in the desert.
7/ Manisha then appears ethereally in white, with snow flecked hair, across a small stream.
The river symbolises the distance b/w them
To reach her he has to undertake a journey, and move from darkness (black) to light (white)
She mystically whispers a Ghalib couplet abt fire:
8/ SRK then sings,
halka halka uns hua
slowly slowly infatuation grew
This is uns, the second stage.
While his costume is still black, Manisha's dress changes to red.
In the next scene, her dress changes to yellow while a tree is in on fire behind them. It emits yellow light
9/ Then:
Tere jism ki aanch ko chhoote hi
Mere saans sulagne lagte hai
Mujhe ishq dilaase deta hai
Mere dard bilakhne lagte hai
He says that touching the 🔥 of her body
his breath catches fire
His pain makes him cry
But his❤️🔥(ishq) for her consoles him
This is the 3rd stage
10/ In the next scene, they are in a monastery. She lights a lamp.
He drops to the floor & swirls around her singing:
Main farsh pe sajde karta hoon
Kuch hosh mein kuch behoshi se
I pray on the floor
At times in my senses & at times not
Akidat & Ibadat - worship
Stage 4 & 5
11/ Then we see them against the backdrop of the beaut Pangong Lake
They are swathed together in a red cloth (symbolising love). There is a push & pull.
Farah Khan took inspiration from contemporary dancer Martha Graham's Lamentations
The cloth signifies fluidity of emotions
12/ In this, SRK & Manisha fuse together as one.
The cloth blurs the difference of where one starts & the other begins.
In the next scene, they are both embracing in water.
The moment Manisha walks away, SRK collapses as if parched. He can't live w/o her.
13/Next Manisha is in a white rope blouse
Teri raahon mein uljha uljha hoon
Teri baahon mein uljha uljha
Sulajhane de hosh mujhe
Teri chahon mein uljha hoon
I am entangled in your path & arms
I want to untangle my senses
I am entangled in your love
The ropes signify entrapment
14/ He then sings
Mera jeena junoon, mera marna junoon,
Ab iske siwa nahi koi sukoon
My life is my obsession
My death is my obsession
Now without this, there is no peace
If you read Arabic, you will notice that the words on SRK's robes read "junoon" / "obsession" in silver
15/ SRK and Manisha spin around in a frenzy.
This is the penultimate stage - junoon.
In the last scene, SRK transcends the distance in the desert.
He meets Manisha in the snow.
Now both are clad in white (which is the colour corpses wear in India at funerals).
16/ Mujhe maut ki god mein sone de,
Teri rooh mein jism dubone de
Let me sleep in the lap of death
Let me drown my body in your soul
In the end of Dil Se, a frenzied sped up version of Satrangi Re plays
When a beaten up & bloody, SRK runs to find & futilely save Manisha.
17/ In the end, SRK finds Manisha who is on a suicide bomb mission.
She asks him to save himself - but he cannot live without her. She knows her squad/police will kill her.
They embrace.
The bomb explodes.
The haunting last lines of Satrangi Re play while the credits roll.
18/ Satrangi Re shows the stages that SRK, the crazy lover goes through
❤️🔥 attraction/infatuation > madness > death 💀
The song also foreshadows the ending several times, through references to:
🔥Fire
🕯️Flame
☠️Death (maut)
Despite this, none of us still see the end coming!
19/ Well that ends my own junoon (obsession) with the song.
For this trivia thread, I stand on the shoulders of giants.
Notably, I want to thank @sachdeva_pankaj who wrote on this song in his blog.
He v sweetly encouraged me to make this thread too! 🥺
dichotomy-of-irony.blogspot.com/2014/07/satran…
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