Blackout Curtains Retro
When the Curtains Opened
It was a hot summer evening, and I was barely ten when I stayed up past midnight for the first time. My mother was asleep, and my father, a quiet man with a secret love for cinema, whispered, “Let’s watch the Filmfare Awards.” That night, under the dim glow of our old television set, I watched Shah Rukh Khan walk up to the stage, smiling, his voice shaking as he thanked his fans. I didn’t understand everything back then but I understood the magic. Something sparked inside me. That was the night the entertainment world stopped being just “fun” and became something more a doorway to stories, emotions, dreams.
As I grew up, Bollywood became my parallel universe. I found pieces of myself in movies like Taare Zameen Par, where a child’s struggles were finally taken seriously. I felt empowered watching Queen, where a woman discovers her worth after heartbreak. And when Gully Boy came out, I saw how even the streets had poetry. The characters on screen were not just stars they were reflections, sometimes of who I was, sometimes of who I wanted to be.
But it wasn’t just Bollywood. Slowly, the world of entertainment around me began to expand beyond borders. I saw my younger cousins dancing to K-pop, speaking words in Korean they didn’t fully understand but deeply felt. Netflix started showing us Spanish, Korean, and German series. Shows like Money Heist and Squid Game were suddenly as familiar as any Indian serial. That’s when I realized the entertainment world had gone global.
This globalization brought people closer. Someone in Delhi could cry over the same drama as someone in Seoul or Madrid. But it also brought a risk the risk of sameness. Local languages were sometimes replaced by English dubs. Storylines began to mirror one another. Was this a cultural exchange, or were we losing what made our stories unique?
Behind the glitter and the glamour, entertainment is deeply personal. For some, it’s escape from loneliness. For others, it’s inspiration. And for many, it’s representation. When I saw a dark-skinned girl as the heroine or a gay character not used as a joke, I felt progress. But the journey is far from over. Many stories are still waiting to be told stories of the Northeast, of tribal communities, of ordinary lives that don’t always shine on screen.
Today, as I write this, the cinema hall near my home has been turned into a shopping mall. I still walk by it sometimes, remembering the excitement of weekend movies with popcorn and a beating heart. But I’ve realized something important, even if the buildings disappear, the stories stay. The entertainment world is not just a place it’s a feeling we carry, shaped by our memories, our identities, and our hope for something larger than life.
Entertainment, in all its forms, is more than just escape. It is how we see the world and how we wish the world to see us. And perhaps, that’s why it matters now more than ever.
By: kanishka Chaudhary
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