Laila movie review: An unimaginably unfunny tale with crass comedy and churlish characters

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There are two sets of primary villains in Laila. One is a father-son duo of Chiranjeevi fans. They are also ruthless people. The son is a bachelor because the father won’t accept any woman less than a Chiranjeevi heroine to be his daughter-in-law. Somehow, due to a variety of random occurrences, an originally fair-skinned actor plays a dark-skinned character, who applies makeup to look like a fair-skinned person, and marries the son. After they consummate their marriage, he realises she is dark-skinned, and gets angry. Her father-in-law sees her dark skin, and gets paralysed. Her mother-in-law is horrified. And… we’ll get back to the bunch of them in a while.

Then there is a womaniser in the garb of a police officer, whose wife and girlfriend have a catfight in the middle of a busy street. This fight is instigated by Sonu’s machinations, and this makes the police officer get pissed off with him, and vouches to take revenge. He isn’t just a womaniser, but a pervert too. And then, there is a random guy who is pissed off with the police officer, and dresses up in various costumes to find proofs of his corruption. This is quite the funny gag, and it begs the question why the makers opted for below-the-belt humour, when they could deliver such a hilarious and clean idea. Anyway… we have to get back to them in a while.

Oh, the hero is caught in a scam due to his golden heart, and celebrity status, and has to go into hiding. He can’t completely go into hiding because he loves his women’s beauty parlour. And he loves his women’s beauty parlour because it was his mother’s gift to him. He has to stay back and salvage his reputation. And how does he hide? By dressing up as a woman, calling himself Laila. And… unfortunately, this is the time we have to get back to all of those people.

You might think the stage is set for a comedy of errors with its fair share of risque and adult humour. But even before Sonu turns into Laila, the film is filled with despicable humour that strongly believes the average age of its target audience is… Nope, I won’t do the same mistake and infantilise sections of people by saying their penchant for humour is down in the dumps. Nor will I say that their only reason to watch a film is to get titillated by the choice of frames. The makers believe any allusion to sex, any display of cleavages, any substitution of physical anatomy with oranges, any display of cleavages, any depth of perversion, any display of cleavages, any juvenile attempt at double entendre, any display of cleavages, a last-minute message about beauty is not skin deep, and more cleavage and of course, any display of waist is appealing enough for the audience to sit through a film. Again, there is no moralistic point to be made here either. It is just that the jokes are mostly unfunny, the visuals are always voyeuristic to a fault, and the film confuses depravity and titillation.

Also, the whole idea of Laila isn’t explored enough either, and for lengthy stretches of the film, the character is objectified, and never allowed a moment of honesty. If the idea of Laila was to show heroes how insulting it is for many heroines in quintessential commercial films, then the makers have hit the nail on the head. Otherwise, the jokes are just relics of a forgotten past. The film literally opts for low-hanging fruits, and the lack of ambition is the most disappointing aspect of the movie that is held together only by the earnestness of Abhimanyu Singh, who hams it up to an outlandish degree. In fact, Vishwak Sen doesn’t do enough as Laila, and is abysmally unfunny and unimaginative.

The film scores heavily on the exasperation front, and it goes around in circles before remembering that there is a story hidden beneath the layers of misogyny and very risque scenarios. And voila!, the film comes to an end, but not before being an assault on all possible senses. Once again, it isn’t the morality of the film that is a problem. It is the clear lack of efforts even to go full blown with the adult humour. It is the absence of intent to throw caution to the wind and make an honest attempt at aiming for laughter even at the risk of being politically incorrect. Now, it is both boring and politically incorrect. Basically, this adult comedy is loud, crass, rudderless, carries the cross of being terribly unfunny, and unfortunately, does the cardinal sin of them all… and becomes boring.

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Let me leave you all with a parting thought. The hero of Laila is called Sonu Model… and guess what other words do these letters make. In fact, those words actually act as a fair warning. Honestly, it is all on us. Why? The word it makes is… LOUD OMENS. Coincidence? I don’t think so.

Laila Movie Cast: Vishwak Sen, Akanksha Sharma, Abhimanyu Singh, Prithveeraj
Laila Movie Director: Ram Narayan
Laila Movie Rating: 1.5 stars