Film: Gone Kesh
Cast: Shweta Tripathi, Vipin Sharma, Deepika Amin, Jitendra Kumar Biswal, Dhiraj Ghosh, Brijendra Kala
Director: Qasim Khallow
Rating: * * ½
As the moniker suggests this film is about hair loss because of Alopecia – an autoimmune disease that causes your immune system to attack the hair follicles. Certainly a noble theme when it’s about becoming self-reliant and confident enough to rise above the illness that literally prompts peers to poke fun at you. Director Qazim Khallow’s first time efforts are riddled with self-doubt regarding the kind of narrative he wants to put across. This film has neither the grit of an art house effort nor the sumptuousness of a mainstream work.
This film basically enunciates middle class, Siliguri resident, Enakshi (Shweta Tripathi) and her parents’(Vipin Sharma, Deepika Amin) efforts to deal with the life-stymying problem of falling follicles. All through her later years in school Enakshi had to combat with cruel ribbing regarding her loss of hair till she endeavours to wear an affordable synthetic wig.
The narrative then focuses on Enakshi’s wishy-washy efforts at a talent (dance) that may not earn her a living. After finishing school Enakshi works at a Beauty products stall in a Mall – a job she is not much enamoured with. So when an opportunity to take part in a dance competition arises she wants to grab at it. But the Mall management doesn’t look kindly towards an employee participating in a dance competition at the mall and she is also forced to deal with constant rejection at the marriage market.
The narrative stays sincere to the problem, representing the illness with adequate empathy but the additional plot points come across as confused.
Enakshi has a devoted admirer (Jitendra Kumar Biswal in a wonderfully underscored performance) yet she permits her open-minded parents to go on searching a suitable mate for her. And then there’s the matter about her dancing ability. Throughout the movie we never see her dancing and even in the finale where she is supposed to have proven herself, the filmmakers fight shy of showing that performance. Shweta Tripathi is effortless but this half-baked attempt at a cause celebre doesn’t do her talent, justice!
