A love story of a nautch girl and a Brahmin boy. Kangana Ranaut is the star in this drama highlighting the decline and plight of the age old tradition of Mujras and Kothas.
Primarily a love story, it also looks into the issue of the mujra houses that are dying a slow death in today’s competitive world of high rises and corruption.
There was a time when areas like Mumbai Central and Nagpada were known for kothewallis and their kothas. Due to the sudden rise in prices of real estate in South Mumbai, it is these age old structures which have fallen prey to the eyes of the real estate developers who have only one aim, to clean out these kothas and build multi storey apartment houses which are sold at exorbitant rates.
Gradually and steadily they are all disappearing in the midst of a heart-wrenching romantic plot.
Kangana Ranaut plays the nautch girl, at certain moments she is also referred to as a dance (bar) girl. This woman oriented story was an opportunity for Kangana to prove herself in the industry, which doesn’t exactly turn out in favour as expected.
She plays a Rajjo, a girl in Mumbai’s red-light district, determined to start a new life when she finds love while dancing before a group of lecherous men.
Rajjo is spotted by a 21-year-old Chandu (Paras Arora), who’s instantly obsessed with her. He makes the maximum run in a college match and his team wins the tournament. The team mates decide to party out and by their mechanic friend takes them to visit the red light district of Mumbai.
Chandu is smitten by Rajjo. He is now dreams of her every now and then. While during his college lectures, gives excuse to leave the class, he bunks college, and spends his time traveling from Virar to Grant Road in South Mumbai, to visit the red light area.
Chandu derives his pleasure holding hands with Rajjo, being with her all the time, and gets inspiration from a social worker to get married to a prostitute. The social worker (Avtaar Gill) promises him a house and a decent amount of money for settling down with a sex worker.
Rajjo and Chandu tie the knot. But the boys parents throw them out, the couple struggles to find a place to live. Nowhere to go, they spend their honeymoon in a friend’s broken-down van while, the next day they are shooed away from the mechanic’s wife.
The film is centered on Rajjo’s fight against society’s bias towards ‘fallen women’, and to add to her woes, there is a local politician Handa Bhai/Seth (Prakash Raj) who wants her to stay around as a nautch girl and be available to him at his will and wants.
It has a genuine premise as that of a journey of a girl who was sold off to a brothel by none other than her elder sister. It would have been a better film if it had a clean straightforward powerful story, but we end up with a film that itself has sleazy undertones.
Performances by Prakash Raj as the don is understood, but a veteran like Mahesh Manjrekar is wasted. The initial story of a middle class boy who scores high for his cricket team, and then he is treated to eating out, booze and then taken to a fully paid trip to a red light area seems illogical.
Furthermore, Chandu lives happily with his family and for a 21 year old (boy – not a boy anymore), he is a man who decides to marry a prostitute without thinking of his father, mom and his younger sister. This is unthinkable given his circumstances.
There are several half baked tracks as that of the suspended police officer, the social worker and others which seem hurriedly included in the film and in the process it turns out to be a half hearted attempt to tell the story of a ‘fallen girl’, which otherwise could have been a contemporary masterpiece – given the talented team of the award winning director, and his talented cast.
For a debutant, Paras Arora is quite in his role with National Award winners Prakash Raj and Mahesh Manjrekar.
Cast:
Kangna Ranaut as Rajjo
Paras Arora as Chandu
Mahesh Manjrekar as Begum
Prakash Raj as Handa Seth
Jaya Prada as Jankidevi
Avtar Gill as Social Worker
Vipin Sharma as Chandu’s father
Upendra Limaye as Suspended Police Officer
Kishore Kadam as Mechanic
Dalip Tahil as Businessman/Developer
Sharad Shelar
Tanushree Chakraborty
Swati Chitnis
Kritika Chaudhary
Anand Ingle
Shubhangi Latkar
Credits & Crew:
Banner – Four Pillars Entertainment Pvt. Ltd.
Distribution – WAVE CINEMA Ponty Chadha Release.
Produced by Four Pillars Entertainment, M. H. Shah, U. A. Karande
Directed by Vishwas Patil
Written by Jayant Pawar, Vishwas Patil
Cinematographer – Binod Pradhan
Music & Background Score- Uttam Singh
Editor- Rajesh Rao
Production Designer- Muneesh Sappel
Executive Producer – Priyadarshini
Lyrics – Sameer Anjaan, Dev Kohli
Action Director- Salam Ansari
Choreographer- Ganesh Acharya
Dialogue- Atul Tiwari & Vishwas Patil
Costume Designer – Reza Shariffi