Haseen Dillruba Dons A Refreshing Woke Cloak To Begin With, But Then…

Watch Haseen Dillruba, take a deep breath, give a nod to Massey, missy and the unholy mess. Then move on!

Watch Haseen Dillruba, take a deep breath, give a nod to Massey, missy and the unholy mess. Then move on!

*Multiple spoilers alert!

Haseen dilruba
Milein do dil jawaan
Nisaar hogaya
Shikaar khud yahaan shikaar ho gaya
(A beautiful girl- two young hearts meet. The hunter became the victim)

An old, famous song! Sounds just about apt for this movie!

Taking doubt-filled steps through the narrative

After watching the flick, #HaseenDillruba mann main uthi kayin alp duvidhaien (I have a few niggling doubts).

1) Just because the Dilli-Ki-Kudi (Girl from Delhi) is a heavy-duty Mangalik, pushing 27+, had a couple of affairs, would the parents hitch her to a seedha-gharelu (homely) type engineer boy Ganga Ke Ghaat Se? Apparently yes!

2) When the Mommie and Maasi (maternal Aunt) advise over video calls on how to seduce the less-than-willing-to-get-frisky Pati, would they be wanting to take the Manmarzi (willful) Gal back for a few sobering days? Apparently No!

3) Homilies on Being-Homely! Are the Onion Fritter and Chai Making Skills still the Maap Dand (standards) of an Ideal bahu? Still very, Honey!

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4) The Husband being the gent and also overwhelmed by the beauteous rebel, wants to take it slow, in spite of enough skin provocations. Once the Wife strays, Mr Fixit engineers enough death traps. Ahh, the repentant wifey sees only love in his designs! Is this amour? Apparently so!

Where are mommy and Maasi now? Maybe the bored editor chopped them off!

5) Enter the hunk. He adds ‘meat’ to the tale, shows off his mutton chops while doing bench presses on the terrace. Weaned on pulp fiction, the lass loses her Dil(l) to the Macho man. Hook line and ‘sinker’. Who is doing his hair?

6) Is a woman’s cooking still the way to a man’s angry heart? Is Prayaschit (atonement) akin to getting domesticated? Yaani, get cracking, get those masalas out and whip up a storm – Yup so spot on!

What were the makers smoking?

After starting with a big bang literally, the movie dons a woke cloak by questioning the stereotypical Saas-Bahu tropes, and the arranged marriage dynamics then takes a sharp turn with a nod to marital transgressions arising due to incompatibility between the spouses. Then an emo avalanche gets unleashed where the husband breaks bad. Simultaneously Taapsee travels many curves from an enfant terrible to a simpering wifey!

Not done still with us hapless viewers the director turns the flick into a ‘whodunnit’.

If you are a regular Joe/Jane with reasonable viewing hours of the crime genre, you will smell the twist long before your munchies are over.

Watch it, take a deep breath, give a nod to Massey, missy and the mess. Then move on!

Two gripes though

a) Choppy Water, Chapping marriage, mutton chops -There is a lot of chopping in the flick but definitely not by the editor!

b) Mommie ko khandaan dekhkar shaadi karvani thi. Varna Jwalapur mein jwalamukhi ka visphot na hota! Aur shayaad hum bach jaate from this ‘khoda pahaad nikla chooha’ types! (Instead of toiling to match the couple’s natal charts, if only her momma had checked for their mental match, we would have been spared of this angst!)

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About the Author

anupama_jain

Anupama Jain is the author of: * ’Kings Saviours & Scoundrels -Timeless Tales from Katha Sarita Sagara’, listed as one of the best books of 2022 by @Wordsopedia. Rooted in the traditional storytelling of Indian legends, warriors, read more...

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