Man Woman Man Woman review: Naseeruddin Shah’s short film is a triumph for love stories

Irrespective of time or season, a Naseeruddin Shah performance always feels like a treat, something that is meant to be savoured. Working across films, plays, and now web series, the 73-year-old artiste has such an assured command over his own craft that he remains one of the few actors to blur the lines between being and performing. As it turns out, this is also the same quality that he brings behind the screen while writing and directing Man Woman Man Woman (MWMW), his first short film, which released recently on the Large Short Films YouTube channel.

Running at 26 minutes, the film revolves around four nameless characters: man (Tarun Dhanrajgir), woman (Ratna Pathak Shah), man (Vivaan Shah), and woman (Saba Azad). On paper, there are no distinguishing qualities among these four characters, who remain protagonists in their own right. But that changes on screen, as markers of age and social currency define who remains at the centre of the story and who skirts around the periphery.

In any narrative about two couples, one young and one old, the general assumption is that the story will unfold from the perspective of the young, the two people who invariably will stake a claim on romantic restlessness and our attention spans. But Shah’s screenplay subverts Hindi cinema’s decades-long fetishization of the currency of youth by reversing his, and by effect, our gaze.

A woman in love

Man Woman Man Woman opens then, with a middle-aged man (Dhanrajgir) fumbling his way around the kitchen. His cheerful mood can’t make up for his glaring lack of skill. When he bruises himself by mistake, his wife (Gitanjali Rao in a rewarding cameo) comforts him. It is only minutes later that we realise that the middle-aged man is really, a lovesick widower, the kind who keeps his late wife’s picture as his phone wallpaper and keeps her memory alive by imagining her around and routinely speaking to her to fill up his day. When the doorbell rings moments later, our perception of him changes once again. A tiffin box arrives for him and he immediately sits down to chat with the sender on video call, the woman (Pathak Shah) who adorns his laptop wallpaper. She’s the one he is in love with right now. And working with Anil Mehta’s roving camera, Shah makes it clear that they are the protagonists of this story.

It is only then that we see the two people at the periphery of this narrative — a young couple (Shah, Azad) nestled inside a room in the same apartment. They’re in love but still remain hesitant about diving headfirst into imagining a life with each other. The older couple — a widowed father and a single mother — are on the opposite spectrum: they know the value of loving someone as much as they realise the burden of losing someone. So, they never question committing to holding onto each other. He can’t wait to propose. She can’t wait to go on her honeymoon.

In fact, the film’s most tender moment involves Ratna Pathak Shah sensually grazing her feet on the legs of her lover, effectively breaking the myth that the expression of sexual and romantic desire is only the province of the young. In that sense, Pathak Shah’s casting as a middle-aged, single mother reclaiming her femininity and agency is, arguably, the strongest thing about Man Woman Man Woman. Like her role in Alankrita Shrivastava’s blistering Lipstick Under My Burkha (2016), the actress alters the collective perception of the elderly by giving middle-aged women an identity beyond caregiving. Here, she is a mother while simultaneously being a woman in love, giddy at the idea of being able to make that choice for herself; of being, more importantly, the main character in her own story.

A lovely crescendo 

On her part, the actress brings an instinctive grace to the role, not playing it up for sympathy or pity but rather, as someone made up of wants, needs, and desires that demand to be fulfilled. There are so many moments in the film when it really is hard to tell whether she is performing or she is simply being. That runs true for the three other actors as well: Shah and Azad have an electric chemistry between them, one that bubbles up without warning. This is perhaps the first time I’m noticing just how generous Vivaan Shah is as a co-star — on more than one occasion, he keeps playing down his charms to accommodate the others in the frame. Dhanrajgir, on the other hand, adds a playful quality to the proceedings, his man oscillating between goofy and sincere in a matter of seconds.

These are competent actors familiar with each other (the film is by all accounts a family affair: Imaad Shah is credited for the music and as an associate director) no doubt. But there is also something to be said about the degree of compatibility and comfort that Shah, as a director, manages to bring out onscreen. If anything, it imbues the proceedings with a gentleness that most love stories these days work overtime in manufacturing. As a director, Shah also reveals a keen eye for bodies, movement, and colours (the production design by Tiya Tejpal beautifully complements the setting). Still, I was most taken by his storytelling that seemed to effortlessly serve the medium of a short. Hina Saiyada’s cross-cutting effortlessly merges moments and emotions to a lovely crescendo.

Love, longing, and acceptance

In Hindi cinema, love is a cottage industry — nearly everyone has something or the other to say about it. A love story, then, is almost always, taken for granted. But Shah does something with the idea of a story about love here that begs a closer reading. This isn’t the kind of film that wears its progressiveness as a calling card — it isn’t interested in dispensing lessons, rather this is a film about love that just wants to be. Love might be universal, but love stories, Shah seems to suggest, are subjective — no two romances can or should look like each other. But that doesn’t dilute their purpose or essence.

It’s perhaps why the film quietly keeps underlining that the beginning of any love story doesn’t always need to depend on the end of another one. This thematic preoccupation is aptly conveyed in the film’s worldbuilding, which imagines a universe where there is no judgment or bias, where societal shame or perception can’t overpower individuality. The complications only exist when we let them. Ultimately, Man Woman Man Woman is that rare kind of a love story that reiterates that love can’t exist in any space that demands conformity. It helps that the film is bookended by a delightful moment towards the end that conveys this thought. As two newly-weds sit around a table to eat their first meal after getting married, none of them eat the same thing; we see the servers serving each of them the food item they like to eat. It’s a fleeting scene, but it says more about love, longing, and acceptance that most feature films can manage with glossy dialogue.