"Hum Tum" - to enliven your spirits!!

"Hum Tum" (Hindi: "हम तुम," english translation: "You and Me") is a Bollywood movie, released in India on May 28, 2004, directed by Kunal Kohli and produced by Aditya Chopra and Yash Chopra. The movie stars Saif Ali Khan and Rani Mukerji - in the lead roles - as Karan Kapoor and Rhea Prakash respectively.

"Hum Tum" (which translates as "You and Me" or literally as "Me, You") was loosely inspired by "When Harry Met Sally..." (the 1989 film about love and friendship, starring Meg Ryan as Sally Albright and Billy Crystal as Harry Burns) following the encounters of the two main characters until they, after several years and various meetings, become friends and finally fall in love at the end of the movie.

The comic characters "Hum" and "Tum" have their own animated sequences in the movie, where they represent the current state of Karan's and Rhea's relationship.

Animation for this film was done by Kathaa Animations and the Special Effects by Tata Elxsi.

The film won several Filmfare Awards, including Best Actress (Rani Mukerji), Best Director (Kunal Kohli), Best Actor in a Comic Role (Saif Ali Khan), Best Female Playback Singer (Alka Yagnik for the title song) and Best Scene of the Year.

In the film, the characters "Hum" and "Tum" are the creations of cartoonist Karan Kapoor (Saif Ali Khan) who works for "The Times of India" (and is a self-styled ladies' man). Karan's daily comic, named "Hum Tum," explores the battle of stereo-typical behaviour. These characters come to life through live animation and take the film forward in a unique way. This movie in turn helped inspire an entire series of 'new' "Hum Tum" comic strips, which went on to become immensely popular - these strips were published in "The Times of India" and received tremendous appreciation.

The Character Sketches:

Hum: Hum is "cool". A little self-absorbed, a little egotistical, Hum is very confident in social situations. His sharp intellect, and a quick wit, is most often used to achieve his primary goal - bugging girls in general, and Tum in Particular!

But deep inside, Hum is just a boy. Sometimes a bit too eager to impress, sometimes surprisingly sensitive, Hum is not a uni-dimensional character with single minded characterizations. His actions and emotions reflect that there is a "nice guy" within Hum who understands the difference between pulling someone’s leg, and hurting someone’s feelings.

Tum: Tum is a girl, and she’s proud of it. She stands up for herself and who she is. While she’s often
not a match for Hum’s quick wit and incessant bugging, she surely considers herself to be more
"grown up", and appeases herself in knowing that she is more "mature" than Hum.

Tum has her own brand of attitude. She may sometimes be a little aloof, but she genuinely cares
for those around her. She's a "sweet" girl, thoughtful, generous, but sometimes a little reserved.
She keeps trying to go one up over Hum, to prove once and for all, the facts as she sees them.

According to Vivek Karandikar, the Character Designer, "We had to get a uniqueness in the character. Something that people could identify with. The hair do was a great idea. It just gave the character a whole new dimension and a whole new attitude."

Note: Information gathered - courtesy Wikipedia.

Photographs: "Hum Tum" comic strips (Yash Raj Films).