Director: Sonal Joshi
Cast: Shilpa Shetty, Amit Sadh, Kusha Kapila, Dilnaz Irani, Pavleen Gujral and others
Where: In theatres near you
Rating: 2 stars
Love and regret, marriage against parents' wish, thankless mommy duties, routined life dominated with the patriarchal nature of a middle-class Punjabi family, college reunion, rekindled love story— what’s new in the film? Director Sonal Joshi narrates a simple story of a girl Sukhpreet Kalra aka Sukhee in the most regular way. However, the film has moments but again, they all seem aimless.
Sukhee (Shilpa Shetty), marries her school sweetheart Guru (Chaitannya Choudhry) and moves to Anandkot from Delhi against her parents' wish. 20 years later, she gets an opportunity to meet her friends and relive old good days at a school reunion.
Sukhee bumps into her old school friend Vikram (Amit Sadh), who still is head over heels for her. Will Sukhee leave her mundane life at Anandkot and start afresh in Delhi or she go back home to her family?
Sonal Joshi picks up a subject that is done and dusted. Although, she creates certain emotional scenes an aimless plot ruins the whole mood of the film. Why make a film that has absolutely nothing new to offer? A female director tells a story through a female protagonist— sounds like a sexist joke but, what is it that Sonal wanted to voice out?
Agreed that there are women, who are suppressed by the males in the family and it has nothing to do with any class, status, or strata of society— it is about treating the other gender with love and equality. Lipstick Under My Burqa (2016), and Veere Di Wedding (2018) are two different examples of portraying empowering women and their rights; one in a subtle and artistic way and the latter in the wildest way possible in a mainstream commercial setting— but, Sukhee is none of the above.
For a subject like this, a 141-minute runtime is way too long. Sonal along with Paulomi Dutta, Rupinder Indejit’s screenplay is bumpy and highly disappoints with the predictable climax. Roaming around Delhi streets in a fancy car, abusing cuss words with your girl gang, hogging food like never before, using public toilets (that appears to be an adventure), cracking jokes, emotional breakdowns amid unravelling dark secrets is what you call FREEDOM? Sonal’s definition of a modern woman is too ambiguous.
Shilpa is refreshing before and after in the film— her d-aged face looks terrible though but gets away with it when one tries to focus on not-so-endearing plot-line. Kusha marks her Hindi film debut and she is apt for a Delhi brat, who ends up becoming a single mother with pride. Pavleen and Dilnaz are noticeable in their respective roles. However Chaitannya’s character is stinky and stale but he puts an effort to make it somewhat believable.
Amit aka Chamkadar in a special appearance is a big relief from the boring and tiresome film. He does his scenes with utmost honesty and conviction— makes his character loveable.
Sonal Joshi’s Sukhee tries too hard to be a sweet, slice-of-life film and pester enough to make it look like a big deal out of a woman’s life (not a misogynistic approach). The film is totally zest less!!!
