A tale of two ladies

                                                        A tale of two ladies


                                Finding a relaxed evening away from home after a stressful period, the offspring and I did something I hadn't done in thirty years;  watched two Bollywood releases back to back! On laptop, streamingly!  Dawat-I-ishq and Khoobsurat. Here's what we thought:

                                Dawat-I-ishq is a light, funny, easy comedy, woven around the culinary USPs of Hyderabad and Lucknow, with a serious core: dowry and section 498A. It's a delightful watch with Parineeti playing the Hyderabadi girl, frustrated by constant rejection in the marriage market due to the greed of dowry seekers! She finally decides to banish all thought of marriage and realise her dreams with a little help from Section 498A. Anupam Kher, as her father,  hesitatingly but brilliantly plays her con game along! He's at his vintage best here! The two towns are captured beautifully from a middle class, non-elite lense and Aditya Roy Kapoor turns out the role of a principled Lucknowi restaurateur with an effortless credibility, the likes of which have not been seen in recent times. With an easy climax, just turning away from the looming threat of mafia dons, the movie did, however, make me think whether it was wise to treat a seriously enabling clause for Indian women ie section 498A in this nonchalant, flippant manner! Otherwise a nice enough watch. Parineeti steals the show, as usual, but should now steer away from the simple, middle class, girl-next-door type of roles, if she wants to prevent being stereotyped!

                             Now Khoobsurat was another ball- game! This Sonam Kapoor, she should be exiled to her own fairy tale castles or better still, Dad should find her an out-of-work prince as a husband and give her a real opportunity to play out her royal fantasies, in a more convincing manner!  So that we are spared from the trash she dishes out repeatedly!  I mean, she really suffers from a false sense of entitlement to act like a lunatic, scatter-brained, fashionista who can do anything and genuinely believe people will lap it up! In an effort to look cool  she  donnes a near gypsy style in the movie, even destroying her beautiful room in the palace with scarves and chunnis, tied to the four poster bed! In a further attempt to enhance her coolness she calls her mother by her first name in a most  affectatious  manner, eats noisily, makes stupid, unconvincing attempts at physiotherapy, delivers dense statements like " tum ko dekh kar mujhe gandey gandey khayal aatey hain" :  in short she gets everything wrong! Poor Fawad, who I loved in Zindagi Gulzar Hai, tries to redeem the show, but he can't, such is the all - pervasive stupidity of the theme and chief protagonist, Sonam! Ratna Pathak Shah shines but it's impact in terms of watchability of the movie is minuscule. Perhaps the only redemption is some off beat, different type of music, lifted from Rajasthani folk songs. Ugh, no more Sonam for me, please. We plan to watch Rekha's Khoobsurat again tonight to wash away the ill-effects of this inane "inspiration"!