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Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga movie review: Anil Kapoor and Sonam Kapoor present an ode to acceptance

Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga movie review: Sonam Kapoor and Anil Kapoor's film is a progressive drama that intentionally binds itself within mainstream convention. Rating: 3.5 stars.

Raja Sen
Hindustan Times, New Delhi

The grandmother's name is Gifty Chaudhury. Played memorably by Madhumalti Kapoor, she is quite the package: a matriarch who orders her son out of the kitchen, and tucks all objects of importance inside her cavernous blouse. Yet the name exhibits a certain mindset, one where women of the house are considered presents and trophies, objects of adornment as opposed to action. When Gifty's son wants to marry off his daughter named Sweety his wishlist for a groom includes the word gundeya,' to imply toughness, as he wants a man who can take care of his girl.

Directed by debutant Shelley Chopra Dhar and co-written by her and Gazal Dhaliwal, Ek Ladki Ko Dekha Toh Aisa Laga is an admirably progressive drama that intentionally binds itself within mainstream convention. It looks like yet another Punjab-based comedy about big weddings and eligible girls, but the trappings have been kept in place to comfort an easily offended audience while selling them on the big idea of accepting a same-sex relationship.

This is an uphill climb in a country where homosexuality was decriminalised only last year, and is still widely regarded an aberration. This film's syntax, however, is anything but radical. Instead, here is a film so preoccupied with masala that the heroine's father is intoxicated by the scent of kasoori methi.

Balbir Choudhury, an affluent manufacturer of undergarments, is called the Mukesh Ambani of Moga,' a small Punjabi town. He happens to be played by Anil Kapoor, who unforgettably lost his head 25 years ago, to the song giving this film its name. His daughter Sonam plays his on-screen child, Sweety, repurposing that great RD Burman song to remind us that it isn't only boys who fall for girls.

The start is straightforward. It is hinted Sweety has a secret lover, and there is speculation this might be a Muslim man, which would predictably cause much consternation. Now enters unsuccessful young playwright, Sahil Mirza, who optimistically imagines himself to be the rumoured paramour. This is all shadow-boxing, first revealed through a clumsy childhood flashback and later by a pained Sweety herself, who tells Sahil about her lover. The film takes too long to get here, especially when you can sense the swerve coming. Then begins the true drama featuring the staging of a drama, no less and this is done with sensitivity and empathy, an ode to those who feel like others.

There is much self-awareness on display. The first song is the frequently remixed and overplayed Ishq Mitha, and it's a smart move to make a family let their hair down to a song they and we would know. When Sahil casts a play starring the Moga residents, he asks Balbir to play Sweety's father, justifying it as a "real father-daughter connection. The film itself adheres strictly to Hindi film tropes, from lovely sequences featuring Anil Kapoor and Juhi Chawla looking longingly at one another, right down to a Babuji-Simran go for it' endorsement straight out of Dilwale Dulhaniya Le Jaayenge.

The performances are quite entertaining. Anil Kapoor is in top form as the father who finds himself challenged by extreme unfamiliarity, while Rajkummar Rao is suitably over-the-top as the filmi' writer trying to be arty (and failing), both as a person and as an artist. Sonam Kapoor makes sure Sweety appears anguished, but there isn't much personality to the part we never get to see what she's like, or even what she likes. Then again, this could be an attempt to universalise the character so more people may identify with this simple, sad girl. The bright-eyed object of her affections, Kuhu, played by Regina Cassandra, remains even more of a cipher.

This is a film about the way parents love their children. Sahil's mother only makes video calls to him perhaps because that makes it harder to fake a brave face. She also gives the writer sterling advice: that to write one's own truth.

Ek Ladki Ko Dekhi Toh Aisa Laga concedes the unlikelihood of entertainment to change bigoted minds. When Sweety performs in Sahil's play, we see disgusted and intolerant audiences get up and leave. Yet I was struck by the image of an old man, sobbing as he leans on the empty bench in front of him, reserved for VIPs who have left. There will be plenty who leave their seats unconvinced, but this film will make some wonder many of whom may never have considered it. This could have been a bolder and more explicit film, but sometimes cinema should work like a street play. Sometimes we need to preach beyond the choir.