What makes a man?

Bollywood star Ajay Devgn feels today’s heroes lack the answer

Want to know the difference between a man and a real man? Apparently, the answer does not lie in the gym or the weight room. Or at least that is what we can glean from Bollywood star Ajay Devgn, who laments on this very subject in a recent interview on The Ranveer Show.

“In today’s world, you don’t see a dominating male personality,” rues Devgn. “Actors don’t become men by building a body, but are defined by their attitude.”

Man vs boy

Just what is this all-encompassing but mysterious attitude? If Devgn is anything to go by, it all lies in how our body-building hero asserts his dominance before the unforgiving eye of the camera and his fictional nemeses. “In today’s world, you don’t see a dominating male personality,” Devgn informs us. “All are boys; you don’t see men-men. In the earlier generation, we saw men. Even in my generation, from Jackie Shroff to Amitabh Bachchan, they were all men.”

For those wishing to take notes and mend their unmanly ways, Devgn does not give us clear-cut answers. In an effort to enlighten us, however, he does point us in the direction of fellow stars Akshay Kumar and Sunny Deol.

“When Akshay Kumar was thrashing ten people or Sunny Deol was pulling out a hand pump, we would clap because we believed they could do it,” reminisces Devgn. “In today’s generation, we don’t feel that anyone could actually do that.”

Being perfect: not just for men

Whilst Devgn’s pursed-lip complaint about boys is bad news for the male segment of the population, many of whom will be doubtless mortified that they lack the magical ‘it’ factor that transports them into the rarefied air of men-men, it is great news for women. Not, I hasten to add, because Devgn’s strictures may soon produce a series of men-men who can assert their dominance by disposing of ten people, but because the pressure is no longer on just women to be perfect. Men can now join the club!

As any woman will tell you, however, it is not the happiest of clubs. The pressure to be perfect is real and exceedingly tiresome. Since time immemorial, the unwritten rule is that the woman who has it all will be put on a pedestal. There is even a term for this woman: the brilliantly imaginative title ‘superwoman’.

We all know what a superwoman is. She is usually found on social media, wowing us all with her serene countenance, multiple beautifully clothed children, spotless house, and thriving career. To gather her thoughts, she wakes up well before sunrise and manages to fit in a half marathon before serving breakfast. Her shower doors sparkle. Her clothes are always ironed and fit her most flatteringly. Her children have their bags perfectly ready by the door. The superwoman rarely resorts to shouting. In a bid to pull off the perfect humble brag, she may also dazzle us with a sped-up clip of herself cleaning her already clean house after work, usually by wiping down an already shiny sink and straightening a leaning cushion on a sofa. There is nothing she can’t do.

It would seem that in Bollywood, what Devgn wants is the male equivalent of this superwoman: being fit, but also inspiring fear, and making it all look effortless. Like the perfect woman manages her body, children, career and beauty effortlessly, Devgn wants the perfect hero who dismantles his foes with the dominance of a lion finishing off a hunt, but with the effort used by a man giving an opinion on his wife’s nail polish. (In other words, zero effort.)

Devgn was careful to name no names, but did remark that there has been a “change in upbringing” which has brought about a “change in attitude and approach towards life.” As he has taken pains to point out, it is not enough to go to the gym. Ergo, perhaps Ranbir Kapoor may want to take a closer look at Animal to see just how he can use those gym muscles to better assert his dominance. If he wants to remain in Devgn’s good books, that is.

Does Devgn have a point?

Some of us are inclined to ponder if this change in attitude that has so upset Devgn is not, in fact, a welcome shift. You would be hard-pressed to find a woman who yearns for a man eager to display “dominance”. Besides, heroes of days past did not all model inspirational behaviour. Shah Rukh Khan – no slouch in the world of Bollywood heroes – recently let us all know that he has given up smoking after thirty years. Meaning that during his heyday as a hotshot hero, when he was out there being “man-man”, he was chugging away like there was no tomorrow. Must we return to the days of yore and watch a parade of male role models (or action heroes) who openly endorse smoking?

Of course, we needn’t drag Devgn down into the cesspool that is cigarettes, because what he really wants is someone who can make us believe that their beloved hero means business when he pulls out a hand pump or starts pounding ten people simultaneously (regardless of their smoking habits). And in defence of Devgn, neither size nor Johnny Bravo muscles are the end all or be all. Hollywood superstar Tom Cruise – who has never been the tallest or the bulkiest – has been showing us for years, via a series of some seriously impossible missions, that bodybuilding is not the only way to action glory. Cruise will be back in cinemas in May in The Final Reckoning, the eighth in the Mission Impossible franchise, with an action-packed tale involving dangling off biplanes, diving down to the depths of the ocean, and an awful lot of running.