The titanic clash of cultures

Pattikada Pattanama' (Village or Town, Tamil; 1972)
During the seventies, as Indians charged ahead to the future with industralization, they were ambivalent of the loss of their traditional Indian values. Hence, to preserve Indian culture and make them feel good about themselves, many films were made in the early 70s to ridicule the 'modern' way of Western living and to impress upon its audience the greatness of Indian way of life. 

The Hindi side of movie-making had their share of this genre of offering. Manoj Kumar was one of the leaders in making these patriotic movies, the classic example being 'Purab Aur Pachhim' (East and West).

Kollywood's offering of the same seem to be this 1972 flick 'Pattikada Pattanama' (Village or Town). In keeping with the typical melodrama and histrionics of Indian drama, stereotyping was maximum here.

It won the Best Feature film for that year with excellent acting calibre and crowd pulling capability of Sivaji Ganesan and typical depiction of Indians' view of how a spoilt London-educated rich girl should be like in the moon-faced Jayalalitha. It is quite comical how she sometimes becomes so naive in certain aspect of village culture but suddenly knows the other aspects like dressing to the nines like a typical village lass in some scenes. Like what my wife says, "Shoo! Don't ask too many questions when you are watching an Indian movie. Just enjoy the show!". So much so that she has given up watching Indian movies - she likes the razzmatazz and glitz whilst I savour the dialogue and analysis.
Coming back to the PP, Kalpana (Jayalalitha) returns home from London after studies in high fashion of the era. She visits her cousin in the village, Mukaya (Sivaji), a village brute with knotted locks and earrings who is a respectable figure with clout and wealth. Kalpana's mother hates his guts as she glamourises Western education and culture, which Mukaya lacks.
Talk about stereotyping, here all educated/town ladies are depicted as pushy domineering and the husbands are hen pecked and powerless. Just by a stare or a raise of voice, the husbands cow into submission. Kalpana's father is one such man!

No country bumpkin

Kalpana's mum arranges an educated philandering young man for hand in Kalpana' marriage. Realising his wayward habits, her father instigates Mukaya to help. In the Tamil communities, first cousins on maternal side are allowed and encouraged to marry. They believe that the female counterpart of the union carries passive DNA which is countered by the dominant male chromosomes (just my theory).
Mukaya kidnaps the bride from the dais and marries her in his village temple.
After the initial honeymoon period of singing and dancing, reality sinks in. Kalpana misses her carefree jolly party going light and easy days. On her birthday, she invites her town friends for a party. The villagers are appalled by the drunken dancing behaviour of the attendees. A showdown ensues. Mukaya physically abuses her like how a circus trainer whips the lion into submission !
That was the last straw for Kalpana to pack her things and leave. A divorce notice follows.
Realizing his mistake, Mukaya sheds his locks, dons flower power ala Hare Krishna baggy shirt and pants to woo back his loved one and convert her into a believer of the highly respected Indian culture. Then starts the wooing by Tamil movie style, which in present day construed by harassment, molestation and even rape. He successfully impregnates her.

Honeymoon over!

Another time for showdown - this time, Kalpana point blankly tells him to buzz off for the last time. Disappointed with tails between his legs, Mukaya returns to the village.
Meanwhile, a son is born to Kalpana who is smuggled off to an orphanage by his grandmother without a sedated Kalpana's knowledge.
The villagers persuade Mukaya to remarry. All preparations are set in place. Invitations are out. After seeing the wedding invitation, the now remorseful Kalpana, after losing her child, long to return to her Godly lawfully wedded husband. She shows up just in the nick of time as Mukaya is about to enter the hall to partake in the wedding ceremony. It is only then revealed to us the scam. Actually it was another guy with name Mukaya who was due to marry, not our hero. Kalpana's mother turn over a new leaf through the time  the old fashion way - whacking by the newly reformed, rejuvenated and courage found husband. Kalpana falls at her husband's feet for forgiveness conceding defeat that Indian culture is superior. The baby also finds it way to Mukaya 's house.

Transformation

A person not from an Indian background will flip at the behaviour of the men in the movie. The ladies from the village obediently follow their man's orders without flinching as though they are divine decree. And this is condoned by the movie as the true Indian way of life.
Well, with education and exposure, the fairer sex is not going to take these type of hierarchy lying down. Maybe it is just correcting the status quo as it used to be. Evolutionary theorists propose that the female gender was awed upon during pagan era for their ability to create life and reproduce. With the introduction of religions of the sons of Abraham, a male dominated female suppressing population was born. Now, it is just correcting itself, with the inequality being a thing of the past.