Isi Life Mein

Rating:*1/2

Movie Review: Isi Life Mein Fair-and-lovely Rajnandini Khandelwal helps her mother serve ‘aloo poori’ at the breakfast table to younger brother,father,and grandmother. This demure Ajmer girl keeps her eyes low and her ‘dupatta’ high. She knows her function is to be a good daughter and sister. In short order,she will turn into a good wife and mother. An early twist in the tale has her arrive in Mumbai,and turn from a ‘seedhi-saadhi-salwaar-kameez’ clad ‘kanya’ into a short-dress-wearing,beauty-parlour-going modern young miss.

Anyone who’s watched films from the Rajshri banner will know what happens next in ‘Isi Life Mein’. Enraged father ( Behl) will shake his finger at daughter’s ( Dhar) suspiciously chummy college-mate Vivan ( Oberoi). There will be loud recrimination : how can a daughter of their illustrious ‘gharana’ put their ‘kul ki maryada’ at stake? Debutant director Vidhi Kasliwal,reportedly Sooraj Barjatya’s niece,airs the family wares all over again,before letting a late twist take the film away from the Rajshri template of good girls turning into good wives. But it comes so late that it might as well not have been there.

For a production house that’s been struggling with irrelevance ( it’s last one on ‘prem vivah’ sank),‘Isi Life Mein’ is not the way to go. College life in Mumbai– and how it can liberate shy small-town girls– translates into a bunch of young things trying to put a musical together where,naturally,Rajnandini,dubbed RJ,and Vivan get lots of chances to get cosy. More than half the film is shot in the auditorium where a foul-mouthed tomboy,and a jealous harpy are show the error of their ways. And everything spools out in the most creakingly familiar way.

There can be a sweetness about this kind of film which is missing here. First timer Sandeepa Dhar has a spark but it gets overwhelmed by the saccharine sweetness of her character. Her co-star,the light-eyed Akshay Oberoi melts into the obvious sets that make up this movie. No one in Mumbai will recognize this college,and its inmates. Will viewers in Ajmer?

shubhragupta@expressindia.com