1. Home
2. Blogs

10 Bollywood Films that Didn't Just Entertain but also Educate about Rare Diseases

• 
• 
• 
• 0
• 0

Bollywood movies are usually great entertainers,peppered with songs, dances, thrilling climaxes, and fight sequences. But, once in a while, you get to see a film that attempts to educate us and forces us to think hard. Take movies that revolve around certain diseases or disorders, for instance. Showing a rare disease in a movie requires great sensitivity from the stage of scriptwriting to performances. So, today, we will talk about 10 films that made us aware of rare ailments and helped clear many misconceptions about them. Watch them if you haven’t already. And prepare for medical emergencies or uncertainties too, by buying a health insurance policy. It will protect your finances in case you are hospitalised or need expensive treatment.

1. Barfi:

In this movie, Priyanka Chopra played an autistic girl. Directed by Anurag Basu, the film showed Barfi, a deaf and mute man, played by Ranbir Kapoor, who understands her needs and cares for her. Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is related to neural development and it leads to conditions where the patient faces challenges in communicating and socializing. It usually gets diagnosed during childhood.

2. Anand:

Who can forget Rajesh Khanna’s epic life philosophies from this timeless movie? But behind that smiling face was the unbearable pain that lymphosarcoma, a rare intestinal cancer, can cause. One must applaud director Hrishikesh Mukherjee and writer Gulzar for telling moviegoers not just about a rare disease in 1971, when medical science wasn’t that advanced, but also how to keep a positive frame of mind while suffering.

3. TaareZameen Par:

The many issues that dyslexic children face, were succinctly highlighted in this Aamir Khan film. The disorder is characterized by learning and reading difficulties.

4. Margarita with a Straw:

Cerebral palsy is caused by abnormal brain development and leads to disorder of muscle movement and affects the patient’s ability to maintain balance. In this Shonali Bose movie, Kalki Koechlin plays the protagonistwho suffers from cerebral palsy,but it doesn’t stop her from discovering the truth about her sexuality.

5. Paa:

Amitabh Bachchan playing a 13-year-old child shook moviegoers to the core. What they also learned in this R.Balki directorial was the existence of progeria, an extremely rare disease that causes children to age rapidly.

6. Black:

This is another Amitabh Bachchan film that made the critics stand up and applaud. In this Sanjay Leela Bhansali creation, a deaf-mute-blind girl played by Rani Mukherji is taught how to communicate by Big B’s tough taskmaster character who later gets diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. This ground-breaking film shows two people teaching each other that life is full of possibilities, only if we are willing to see.

7. U, Me, Aur Hum:

Real-life couple Ajay Devgn and Kajol paired on the screen to present U, Me, Aur Hum, a film that dealt with the topic of Alzheimer ’s disease.

8. Guzaarish:

In this Sanjay Leela Bhansali movie, Hrithik Roshan plays a quadriplegic patient. In this disease, the patient is paralyzed from the shoulders down because the damaged spinal cord can’t carry the message from the brain to the body. The film also highlighted the issue of euthanasia.

9. My Name is Khan:

Shah Rukh Khan is a patient with Asperger’s Syndrome in this movie. This disease affects a person’s ability to socialize and communicate well.

10. Ghajini:

Movie lovers enjoyed this revenge saga starring Aamir Khan, but the film also shed light on anterograde amnesia that causes short-term memory loss. Then there are films like Karthik Calling Karthik that showed the medical problem of Schizophrenia and Hichki that introduced us to Tourette Syndrome.

Conclusion

Many of these films didn’t just make us aware of these rare diseases, but also showed what the caregivers go through. Even if there is no cure for some of these ailments, they still require long-term treatment to keep the patient alive for as long as possible. And that is what brings us to the importance of insurance. Top quality treatment requires a lot of money,which is why you need the best health insurance in India with wide coverage.This way, you and your dear ones will have peace of mind and financial security even if life takes a wrong turn someday.

Disclaimer: The above information is for illustrative purpose only. For more details, please refer to policy wordings and prospectus before concluding the sales.

RELATED ARTICLES

• The importance of taking critical illness cover along with health insurance

• Importance of Critical Illness Health Insurance Policy during COVID-19

• Health Insurance: 5 most frequently asked questions

• 7 Movies That Highlight Mental Health

• Watch These 10 Films To De-Stress And Relax