After playing the washed-out housewife in "Raincoat", Aishwarya Rai was seen in her boldest role ever in "Shabd" where she is a married woman out to seduce the boyish Zayed Khan. And if you think that's an odd pair, please don't despair.

If Ash and Zayed in debutante director Leena Bajaj's film strike you as an unlikely couple, what about Dino Morea and Jaya Prada in Mahesh Manjrekar's "Deh"? The MP from Uttar Pradesh is bound to rock parliament when she's seen as a middle-aged woman in love with a much younger man.

In Dharmesh Darshan's "Bewafaa", Anil Kapoor plays husband to Kareena Kapoor who's less than half his age. But that's okay. Sameera Reddy, whom Kapoor smooched so passionately in "Musafir", is just as young.

More and more mainstream films are being devised to cut across the age-line. Perhaps this is a reflection of the changing attitude to gender equations in the film industry.

After Saif Ali Khan and Amrita Singh who were married for more than a decade, choreographer-filmmaker Farah Khan, too, has opted to marry a man who's younger than she is. And Salman Khan, who is 40, is attached to 20-year old Katrina Kaif.

A 20-year old age difference between the spouses is no longer perceived blasphemous.

"And why should it be?" reasons Sammir Dattani. "We're now in 2005, aren't we? Relationships are no longer seen as slaves to biological years. Dimple Kapadia is so gorgeous. She's playing my mother-in-law in my next film. I'd love to be paired with her in a movie."

Twenty years ago, Dimple's co-star Rishi Kapoor played a youngster who gets into a relationship with a lonely 45-year old woman in Ramesh Talwar's "Doosra Aadmi". The film flopped.

In the new millennium, there was wider acceptance for the 20-something Akshaye Khanna's romantic attachment to Dimple in Farhan Akhtar's "Dil Chahta Hai".

Are audiences ready to take the leap in sexual mores? Or will Sammir Dattani's dream to co-star with his favourite actress remain just that?