Catch on: Life OK, Monday-Friday, 9:30 pm
Thank God for the forward button on my DVD player! Watching Junoon requires a lot of patience and a cool head because the characters in the show leave no stone to make you lose it!
A cancer-stricken mother (who doesn't look the part of a soon-to-be-deceased woman), her young daughter who prances around in Fashion Street clothes in a village, no less, gets pulled and pushed by two young men, and has time to act funny even while her izzat is under constant danger, a tall, young man who is Omkara-meets-Chulbul-Pandey sends goons flying in air (Rohit Shetty and Co. would be proud) are some of the strange characters crowding this soap.
Did you ask for the story? Well, Meera is a soon-to-be-married young girl who calls her mother, Bittoo (aww, cho chweet, no?). Bittoo's days are numbered and Meera and her fianc want to do everything possible to make Bittoo's last days happy. So they go to a marriage bureau to find a 50-something groom for her. Next, fianc catches mom-in-law doing karva chauth for her absentee father (in a hilarious scene where mother does aarti of the phone 'kyunki unki aawaaz sunkar hi main vrat todti hoon'). Daughter overhears weeping mother tell her damaad that her last wish is to spend some quality time with her husband. So Meera, being the dutiful daughter she is, puts her own marriage on hold and lands up at the village of her father.
Her father, Daata Thakur, meanwhile has everyone in the village believe that his wife and baby girl have died 20 years back. There is a bhabhi at home, who when not pounding chillies is plotting against the holier-than-thou Thakur and cursing his dead wife. There is also a kohl-lined devar, who hams to the hilt, flares his nostrils, mouths abuses and generally behaves like a hooligan. Then there is Prithvi, the Omkara reincarnation, who worships Thakur and almost kisses the ground the latter walks on.
Prithvi's path crosses often with Meera's and before you can say bachao, a love story will be brewing in the Chambal-like landscape. But all is not lost as some of the dialogues are very sharp and the direction crisp in places (Santram Verma, thank you for making it slightly bearable) but clichs abound. Firstly, we fail to understand why would a young educated girl venture on her own to find her father after 20 years and continue to live in the village, all dolled up despite repeated rape attempts and jaan ka khatra? Why doesn't she call for her fianc? Secondly, what is this family structure? Daata Thakur, who's lost his wife; the bhabhi who wears a big bindi,but her husband is nowhere to be seen and a young, good for nothing devar, who all live together in a house, large enough to host a cricket match!
But we guess, looking for logic and realism in prime-time soap is too much to ask. There is only one upside in this mediocre enterprise and that's Aditya Redij as Prithvi who lets his fierce eyes and well-fed biceps do all the talking. He has great presence and is extremely easy on the eye. Thank God, Mouni Roy has good taste in clothes and jewellery because she doesn't have a single bone of acting in her delicate frame.
All said and done, stay away from this junoon filled love story, will be good for your health and your head!
Jhanak
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