Akshay Kumar, Bhumi Pednekar, Aanand L. Rai Plan Revival of Bollywood Family Drama With ‘Raksha Bandhan’ (EXCLUSIVE)

variety.com:

Naman Ramachandran The nearly moribund Bollywood family drama genre is set for a revival with “Raksha Bandhan,” directed by Aanand.

L. Rai (“Atrangi Re”) and starring Akshay Kumar (“Sooryavanshi”) and Bhumi Pednekar (“Badhaai Do”).Films revolving around the family unit, which used to be a staple in Bollywood, peaked with blockbuster “Hum Aapke Hain Koun..!” (1994), starring Salman Khan and Madhuri Dixit, and made a brief reappearance with “Badhaai Ho” (2018) featuring Neena Gupta, Gajraj Rao and Ayushmann Khurrana. “Raksha Bandhan” hopes to emulate the heydays of the genre.“In ‘Raksha Bandhan’ there is a lot of hunger — hunger to come out with Indian values, hunger to depict the culture, hunger to talk about the bonding, the relationships, which are there with us, we’ve not gone insensitive towards them, but somehow they’ve taken a back seat, we don’t talk about it,” Rai told Variety. “Let me bring all those emotions to the forefront, which we have unknowingly sidelined.” Set in the bustling Chandni Chowk area of Old Delhi, the film follows Kumar, who runs a street food shop, the third generation of his family to do so.

His primary concern is getting his four sisters married, except that 2022 India is still beset with the problem of dowry, where the bride’s family is expected to provide a substantial amount of cash and gifts to the groom, despite the practice being illegal.“Dowry is a big problem in India, and many other places also,” Kumar told Variety. “The best part about the film is, it not only talks about the problem, it also talks about the solution.”Rai adds that there are two Indias today, with different mindsets.