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Select Recurring Imagery in Om Shanti Om

A film I really enjoy is Om Shanti Om (2007). One of my best friends is Indian and her and her other Indian friends would often play songs from Bollywood movies, and I would have to listen and watch. Recently I was reminded of the songs they would play, and I decided to watch a film that I enjoyed some of the songs from, that being Om Shanti Om.

This film is a Bollywood movie, complete with the songs and dance numbers and everything. And it’s in Hindi, so English subtitles are required for me. I really enjoy the film and some other Bollywood movies, but I do recognize that some things just go over my head via culture blindness or through the language barrier.

One thing gained from rewatching this film, or any film really, is that you notice repeated elements and bits of foreshadowing. There are an awful lot in this film, but I want to talk about a couple of them. One recurring element is fire, and to best explain that, I need to bring up something else.

I did not know this when I first saw the film, but the protagonist Om Prakash dies about halfway through the movie and is reincarnated as Om Kapoor. The audience sees Prakash dead on the table, then hears a baby wailing. The next scene is Rajesh Kapoor and his wife and their newborn son. This is a beautiful transition done with audio and visual that explains to the audience that Om Prakash is now part of Om Kapoor.

The film begins 30 years ago. Om Prakash is an aspiring actor; his mother and his friend Pappu believe that one day he is going to be a star. Pappu talks up Om as this big star to get them roles in different films, but they only ever play background roles in big films.

One of the films they are in has a scene where the leading lady is trapped in a burning field, and the hero of the film is supposed to jump into the fire to save her. This leading lady is played by Shantipriya, a famous actress that Om is in love with despite having never met her in person. Shanti is trapped in the burning field and the blaze gets out of control, and the ‘hero’ of the film doesn’t want to risk his life to save her. Om overhears this and jumps in to save her, getting burned on the back in the process.

Shanti later finds Om to thank him for saving her life, and this opens up a dialog between them and they become closer. Om becomes heartbroken when he overhears that Shanti is secretly married to film producer Mukesh Mehra, and one night he finds himself in a position to snoop on them. Turns out, Mukesh cared more about money than making Shanti’s dreams of marrying him publicly come true, and he sets the studio on fire with Shanti still inside.

Om sees Mukesh lock the doors while Shanti is banging on them, her distressed face visible through the window. Om tries his best to open the door, eventually breaking the glass and getting inside. He’s unable to save Shanti, a blast of fire throwing him out of the building and onto a nearby road. He ends up getting hit by a car, this car being Rajesh Kapoor and his very pregnant wife on their way to the hospital.

Flash forward 30 years. Om Kapoor is a big movie star and has a distinct phobia of fires. He ends up remembering his previous life, and orchestrates to reveal what he knows to Mukesh to get justice for Shanti. Several dramatic things happen, (including a portrait of Shanti spontaneously going up in flames) and eventually there is an altercation between Mukesh, Om, and the ghost of Shanti.

Mukesh and Om are tumbling and knock over a set of candles, and the studio, the same studio that was rebuilt after the fire 30 years ago, goes up in a blaze. The same three players from the event all that time ago are here again, surrounded by roaring flames.

I feel like this recurring imagery of Om and Shanti in a fire works very well because it appears to follow the Rule of Three, that being where the first two times set up and build the tension, and the third and final time releases it. There are some other recurring elements that happen more than three times and I feel like they are less successful than the dramatic fire element, or even the elements that only happen twice.

Another recurring element/bit of foreshadowing that I enjoy stems from the Bottle Award scene. Om Prakash and Pappu are drinking after sneaking into the premiere of a new Shantipriya movie and talking about how Shanti will win the upcoming film award for sure. Pappu tells Om that he will definitely win the film award one day, and in the meantime, will present him with the Bottle Award (which is really just an empty bottle).

Om gives a speech as he receives the award to his audience of Pappu and the children on the street. He talks about how he’s wanted the film award so badly that the universe worked to give it to him, and that “they say that if you wish for something from your heart, the entire universe will try to get it for you.” He concludes the speech by saying that their lives are like their films where there is a happy ending, “and if everything does not turn out well in the end, then that is not the end, there is more to the movie.”

In the present, Om Kapoor wins the film award. Echoes of the beginnings of the Bottle Award scene start to play over a shot of him walking toward the stage. As Om begins to speak has he receives the award, the echoes of the original speech start to play, and Om starts reciting the speech to the crowd in front of him with a glassy look in his eyes. The camera slowly pans from a wide shot of Om on the stage over to the crowd, back to Om, now standing in the same suit he wore during the original Bottle Award speech, holding the same bottle and comb as a pretend microphone.

I think this is just a fantastic scene, and one that I can’t imagine would be as impactful if this were a text novel. Seeing the present day but hearing the dialog of the past, then seeing Om Prakash on the stage where Om Kapoor once was is such a powerful scene and representative of the film’s themes of reincarnation and starting where something was left off.

One last thing I really want to mention is Om’s tattoo. The first shot of the film is Om’s right hand raised up out of a crowd, a tattoo of the symbol of Om (🕉) on the inside of his wrist. We next see the tattoo when Om’s bracelet gets caught on Shanti’s sari at the movie premiere, again when Om and Shanti are dancing together, when Om is ranting to himself about Mukesh’s infidelity, and lastly when Om reaches out to Shanti in the burning studio.

The audience is given plenty of opportunity to see the tattoo, most of the shots featuring it don’t show anything other than hands. When we first meet Om Kapoor as an adult, he raises his hand to greet the fans, mirroring the opening shot of the film. The camera slowly pans down from the tips of his fingers down to his wrist, where a birthmark in the same shape as Om Prakash’s tattoo is plainly visible. If that doesn’t drive home the idea that Om Prakash was reincarnated into Om Kapoor, I don’t know what does.

I don’t have any groundbreaking revelations or analysis of this film, but after some repeat watches, I noticed several repeating elements and pieces of foreshadowing that greatly increase my love for the film. I’m reminded of a quote I saw from John Darnielle:

This is why people cry at the movies: because everybody's doomed. No one in a movie can help themselves in any way. Their fate has already staked its claim on them from the moment they appear onscreen.

This isn’t the most applicable to this film in particular, but watching Om Prakash and Shantipriya go about their lives knowing that they both die is suspenseful and a bit sad in a way. On the second, third, etc. viewings of the films, you notice the little pieces that turn into big things and nobody in the film can do anything to stop them.