Director: Kiran Rao
Writers: Sneha Desai, Biplab Goswami, Divyanidhi Sharma
Cast: Nitanshi Goel, Sparsh Shrivastava, Pratibha Ranta, Ravi Kishan, Chhaya Kadam, Durgesh Kumar
Duration: 122 mins
Available in: Theatres
The year is 2001. The state, Nirmal Pradesh, is fictional – a license to slot emotional credibility over cultural authenticity, but also a nod to the very Indian tradition of naming a place (nirmal means “pure”) to offset its ground reality. Young newlyweds Deepak (Sparsh Shrivastava) and Phool (Nitanshi Goel) are making the long trip to his village. Having married on an auspicious day, they’re not the only veiled bride and jumpy groom on the train. A late-night snafu results in Deepak alighting at his station with the wrong ‘wife’. By the time he sees her face, he’s already at his ancestral home – in the midst of celebration, in the most mortifying situation possible. His parents are not impressed; his friends are almost amused. To make matters worse, this incorrect bride, Pushpa (Pratibha Ranta), has no idea where her own husband’s home is. Meanwhile, a terrified Phool gets down with Pushpa’s new family, but chooses to wait at the station. She’s forgotten the name of Deepak’s village, too. It’s a tragedy of errors. A corrupt policeman, Shyam Manohar (Ravi Kishan), takes up the case.
Not all hell breaks loose. Setting this rural satire in 2001 is a neat way to ensure that technology doesn’t diffuse the investigation too soon. (Nokia cellphones are luxurious enough to be dowry gifts). To be specific, it’s the middle of March: A Harbhajan Singh hat-trick at Eden Gardens is called on the radio. The narrative journey that follows is familiar. Over the next few days, while their disparate worlds serve all sorts of metaphors conflating social invisibility and literal absence, the two lost brides of Laapataa Ladies (“Missing Ladies”) start to find themselves. They begin to squeeze fresh-lime soda out of life’s lemons. This is by no means a pathbreaking story. What it is, however, is solid feel-good storytelling. The fundamentals are sound: The balance between levity and gravity, commentary and one-liners, milieu and escapism, urban gaze and hinterland candour. It’s also another example of post-pandemic film-making that stays still – and straightforward – because it knows that the average viewer is the one in motion.
In other words, Kiran Rao’s second feature revels in a back-to-basics simplicity. You can see it coming from miles away, but there’s an old-school appeal about a satisfying payoff. A predictable but well-performed conflict. A convoluted but sweet chaos. Stagey but utopian humour. The screenplay is rooted in cliches – like Phool being ‘adopted’ by a gang of golden-hearted railway misfits, or Pushpa slowly schooling but affecting every member of Deepak’s household (imagine a feminist Raj from Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge). But much like 12th Fail (2023), the film commits to formula. So when Deepak is missing Phool, a corny wedding flashback appears, but it’s also elevated by a lovely moment where he tries to impress her with both his English (“I love you”) and his dramatic facial expressions when he says it. There’s a performative quiver in his voice, a spark in his eye; you can tell that he’s probably learnt it from a Bollywood movie.