The little-big birthday party

As a child, birthday parties used to be all about friends, gifts and games. But looking back now, I realise it was really about the several little-big sacrifices that parents make to get it all right. Watching Madan Tiwari (Vinay Pathak) and his wife (Tillotama Shome) bake a cooker cake, put up the decorations and build the excitement in the run up to little Chintu's party in the film Chintu Ka Birthday, made me long for my folks back home. Written and directed by Devanshu and Satyanshu Singh, the film brings to life the story of the Tiwari family who live in war-torn Iraq in 2004. Apart from his friends, some uninvited guests hijack Chintu's (Vedant Chibber) party: soldiers and shelling. While there are larger questions of home, war and insurgency explored in the film, what perhaps stayed with me was Chintu's blue-eyed innocence. That, and Tiwari's never-say-never attitude — isn't that what superhero fathers are made of?