E is for 'Eli re eli'

Okay, who here has watched the monstrosity called Yaadein? No no, admit it. I won't judge. For I too, have watched it, my friend. I too have watched it.

You have?

*points squarely*

Shame shame poppy shame hawwwww you have watched Yaadein! Aur koi movie nahin mili?

For the uninitiated, Yaadein is a 2001 movie about three sisters, the Wikipedia entry for which casually states 'The ensemble cast crossover film starring Hrithik Roshan, Kareena Kapoor, and Jackie Shroff in lead roles, was released worldwide on 27th July 2001 to negative reviews.'

Now this song 'Eli re eli' was quite the rage in those days, dubbed by one YouTube commentator as 'Flop film ka hit gana'. Another commentator expresses his/her concerns with 'What kind of a song is this? What if someone random enters the house and sees their eli re eli moments. Matlab kuch bhi?'

So let's take a closer look at what these eli re eli moments are.

The songs starts with a shot of their gorgeous mansion.

But it's all a facade. The truth is that these girls can't even afford clothes and most of the time make do with towels and bedsheets. You'll see.

In fact, they lack even basic comfortable beds and mattresses, and as a result, ALL of them suffer from chronic back pain. The poor things. You can see them writhing in agony as they wake up each morning.

Writhing sister #1

Writhing sister #2

Writhing sister #3 toh couldn't go to sleep only.

After deciding that sleep is rather pointless, they are up and about...

...dressed in bedsheets. Satin bedsheets. All three of them. 

And they dance. 

I grew up with a sister and I can tell you we never did weird shit like this.

The song talks about how akeli their tanhaaiyan are. Translation: Their loneliness is very lonely. Methinks it was written by the same person who wrote 'Ishq wala love'.

They also keep singing about how they wanna get married. Goals, sistahs!

No prizes for guessing whom the award for the ugliest mehendi ever goes to.

Then they change so they can do their weird Sister Act again, but not into normal clothes. They wear bedsheets again, but they're all of different colours! Wow. 

And then they bathe. Their daily routine is all screwed up, I tell you.

And the viewer is subjected to the torture. One by one the sisters bathe. God forbid one of the actresses cries discrimination -- "Mujhe nahaate hue kyun nahin dikhaya??!!"

Bathing sister #1

#Bathing sister #2

Bathing sister #3 (as you can tell, she's the most extra of the trio)

You'd expect them to get dressed into normal clothes now that they've bathed. 

But, no. They stay in their towels. Then they lie down on their beds and sing and dance and roll around like toddlers. 

And then... HALLELUJAH. They get into regular clothes. Like, finally!

But wait a minute...

Are they wearing... identical clothes? Let's take a deep breath and a moment to process this. These 20-something sisters are wearing identical clothes. Because why not?

Reiterating my earlier point, I grew up with a sister and we never did weird shit like this. 

They dance. There are many bum shots. 

Many. 

That's all these sisters do ALL day long. They writhe, wear bedsheets and towels and identical clothes, and dance the bum dance. This song should have been called 'Veli re veli'.

And then our main man Hrithik enters. 

And because he's Hrithik, of course he has to enter dancing. 

The girls run to him. He has news. About a boy. 

They are curious.

"Tum mein se ek hai dulhan woh naveli." He says. "One of you is going to be a bride."

The girls don't seem too pleased about this 'marriage by Indian roulette' system. 

But then Kareena breaks into a happy dance because she suddenly remembers that she's the youngest so it can't be her. 

For no reason again, the girls start dancing. More bum shots. 

Now the whole family -- bungla, gaadi, naukar, chaakar included -- is dancing too. And playing hopscotch. 

Cut to the wedding. It's the eldest who has lost the game -- akkad bakkad bambai bo, shaadi karo and off you go. She leaves amidst much shaadi wala rona-dhona. 

The sad dad steps out just to make sure that #1 is really gone. 'Cos with these girls, you never know. They might just come prancing back. 

Oh hell, she's not gone. She's standing at the gate. We are never told why. I'm thinking maybe the car broke down and the baraat party are all leaving on foot or something. 

But he doesn't go to ask her why. He waits and makes sure she's really gone before heading back inside to start worrying about how to get the other two married off. Especially the annoying youngest one. 

Recently, I saw a meme about this song that went something like 'Eli re eli, kya hai yeh paheli, I want to be fit but eat samosa daily'. Definitely more relatable than the original song. 

Enjoy, my friends. Spread the joy.