Hyper, Overactive, Dramatic Gay Bois Meet Even More Melodramatic 'Bollywood' Small Town Family. A Very Gaudy Fare.
0.5 stars
Mini Review:
Two lads in love go to a small town for a sister's wedding and end up telling the family they are gay. The family hyperventilates and hyperventilates until your head hurts and in the end the 'over my dead body' dad who never really says over my dead body, comes around. Bollywood small town is loud and everyone tries hard to be funny all the time and you come away with a headache, and eyes burned by all the garishness.
Main Review:
Kartik and Aman Tripathi. What a Horrible Pair.
Ayushmann Khurana plays Kartik, a nose ring wearing gay lad who is partners with Aman Tripathi played by Jitendra Kumar and the film opens with both of them wearing toothpaste superman outfits, selling toothpaste at a mall.
From the mall they go off to help a girl run away from home. She gives them a lakh rupees, but because they bungle she runs away with their motorbike.
Is this their job? Bhumi Pednekar in that small cameo seems quite capable of running away on her own, no? Especially because she knows exactly how long her dad is going to sit glued to the TV, watching KBC.
Why are they trying to be clever, you wonder. And you are not enamored of protagonists who say they want to help lovers unite but take money for it, and also bungle the whole operation.
Hmm. But Ayushmann Khurana leaning on Jitendra Kumar on the motorbike is cute.
Woah! Kartik throws a tantrum wanting to attend Aman's sister's wedding. Aman gives in because they sleep on a train then run (still in the toothpaste superman suits) to the train to Allahabad. Do they not have a home? What happened to the mobike bhumi pednekar appropriated?
Such a horrible pair, they are shown bickering all through the movie. There are angry glares, but no looking longingly at the person you love, nothing redeeming about their love. They even discuss how Aman is 'not wholly in' the kiss or whatever...
Why should the audience care what happens to these two?
Sonam Kapoor - whom everyone disses for being unable to act because she's a pretty face - did a hundred per cent better job in her 'coming out' film Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga... You liked both the girls in the film, their relationship and hated Rajkummar Rao for outing them in public the way he does in the film...
Bollywood Small Town Is Nuts
There will be Mother and Father and chacha and chachi and neighbours and one annoying relative (possibly old grandma who coughs, or a dead grandpa, and in this film, a lad with an ipad).
The gas in the kitchen will always have tea boiling away and people will drink tea.
If they eat, god forbid they should have manners. Everyone will eat as if food was meant to be eaten noisily. And there will be Jalebi.
And to annoy the intelligent audience and to get laughter from the cheap seats, there will be the ghastly burp after eating.
Bodily functions like pooping and peeing will be shown generously. And the bathing with buckets. I try to not puke into my neighbor's popcorn when i see toothbrushes in mouths.
Such a horrid surprise to see Neena Gupta and Gajraj Rao play full on Nautanki parents. Manu Rishi and Sunita Rajwar who play Chacha and Chachi are less OTT. (The half star for this film is shared by the two.)
Maanvi Gagroo is a relief because she really looks like she's having fun. But they should have given her gold lines goggles for the wedding, no?
And the scene where Gajraj Rao pretends to kill himself: Neena Gupta should have given any one of the sarees in the cupboard in the room instead of taking off the 'new shaadi ki saree' no?
When men write these supposedly funny scenes, they forget to put themselves in a woman's place! Neena Gupta would have given him the sheet on the bed to make a noose instead, no?
Ghanta Promoting A Gay Narrative
Maaf karo! If this is how you want to help the gay cause, I am sure the community might not want it.
First Bollywood need to get over the fact that gay men DO NOT LOOK LIKE BOLLYWOOD'S IDEA of gay men. They don't always have floppy wrists, neither do they wear nose rings.
And members of the LGBTQ+ community DO NOT WANDER ABOUT WITH A RAINBOW FLAG EVERYWHERE THEY TRAVEL.
I am sure gay men do not feel the need to be overly demonstrative (read 'act despo') all the time. If nothing, Netflix has a teenage show that deals with gay kids in a smarter way than this film does. The show is called Sex Education' and it deals with teens with hormones.
It's a lame excuse to say this movie is pathbreaking because it is challenging/breaking the patriarchal system. Patriarchy is like Sairat. It uses guns.
Even the lame Sooryavamsham got patriarchy right. Here Gajraj Rao just comes across as sham, not once talking about his vansh...
The film promotions said that the writer-director wrote the script for over a year. The audience could have waited longer for him to get this script right.
P.S. When people start selling you the film as if it was going to do 'uddhar' of a community that didn't have a voice so far, I'm sure the people from the LGBTQ+ community would rather wait for real tales than this gaudy, loud movie.
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