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Saturday, April 20, 2024
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BOLLYWOOD KUCCH LUV JAISAA
EDITOR'S PICK
Rating: **
On paper, this must have sounded like a terrific idea -- to showcase the amazing
talents of Shefali Shah, who plays a disenchanted housewife whose husband has
forgotten her identity, not to forget her birthday.
She sets off on a day of adventure with a mysterious stranger, and discovers
reasons to love herself. Wish we could love her as much as we want to. Wish we
could share her zest to seize the day. The storytelling, sad to say, distances
us from the housewife`s zany confusions.
The idea of a woman`s 24-hour journey into self-discovery needed more careful
packaging and a mastery over the emotions that she has to pour out into the
script to give the sensitivity that it aspires to achieve.
While Barnali Ray Shukla`s writing sparkles, she is unable to put the situations
on film in that inviting spiral of compelling situations that would make the
housewife`s predicament endearing and empathetic.
Once we get over the initial excitement of watching the housewife overcome her
initial boredom, the narrative pretty much settles down to letting the
protagonist find her own centre in a story that doesn`t quite know how to get
going. The narration moves forward in fits and starts.
Some episodes hold our attention for the effervescence that Shefali Shah brings
into them. Here`s an actress who is always in command of the material provided
to her. Often we have seen Shefali go beyond the requirements of the script.
However, that isn`t a luxury afforded to this consummate actress on this
occasion, as we see her struggling with dialogues and scenes that seem to have
been written with much warmth but little conviction.
What sees the film through is the intelligent camaraderie that Rahul Bose
establishes with his co-star. This a road movie with the traffic in a state of
chaos. We know the neglected housewife Madhu is out for a day of defiant
adventure in the company of a sullen gangster who has just been betrayed by his
girlfriend. Beyond that, we aren`t really allowed to care for the two misfits.
By the time the two unlikely companions reach their destination, the plot has
reached a dead end. Ironically, the film`s best sequences comes towards the end.
It`s a stolen moment between the mother and her rebellious teenaged daughter in
the rest-room where the older woman wants to know if her daughter has ever had
sex.
This is the only time this sex comedy mentions the `s` word.
Kucch Luv Jaisa is a dissatisfying film about a dissatisfied life.
It is littered with situations that had the potential to ignite into furious
displays of intuitive intimacy. The moments are mostly squandered in trying to
appear sassy, stylish and savvy.
A bit more of sincerity and intimacy would have gone a long way into making this
film on unrealised dreams blossom into a work of ambrosial possibilities.
The pretentious songs on the soundtrack serve as a reminder of how much this
film craved for more occasion to cheer the housewife`s efforts to rise above her
deadlocked existence.
Shefali takes the character as far as it can go. Beyond a point, there is little
she can do with a script that doesn`t quite find its centre.
