Marriages are made in heaven, or so they say. As society has set up certain norms which women and men are expected to do such as women have to be fair-skinned though opportunity may not be fair, Women should know how to handle ghar-grahasti first, the men supposed to be stronger and do all ‘manly’ things and so on.
It has almost become a genre of sorts- to give a social message mixed with desi humour, Badhaai Do is one such film, it is comedy-drama which is written by Suman Adhikary and Akshat Ghildial, and directed by Harshavardhan Kulkarni. The film is produced by Junglee Picture, this serves as a spiritual sequel to the 2018 film Badhaai Ho. It stars Rajkumar Rao and Bhumi Pednekar as a couple in lavender marriage.
As in the trailer, we know the main conflict, that the gay man marries a lesbian woman. It’s an arrangement they agree to in order to escape their parents and the gazillion taunts and question. The film is set in Dehradun, he is a police officer, while Bhumi is a Physical Education teacher, living like roommates and leading separate lives. Shardul and Sumi are quite comfortable with their own truth it’s the noisy neighbour and poking relatives which creates problems. The other big problem arrived when the family wants them to have a child of their own. The movie feels a little long. Alongside Rajkumar Rao and Bhumi, the film has Chum Darang, Sheeba Chadha, Seema Pahwa, Nitesh Pandey and Loveleen Mishra, who had to manage to keep things in place.
Bhumi and Rajkumar have given solid performance and have done justice to their parts. Rao, in particular, with his vacant impassive expression, make you realise how stifled he feels in a police uniform, all the while desiring to own his truth openly. Bhumi’s acting grief as she looks for support from her father in a crucial scene is delicately and sensitively done.
The first part of Badhaai Do could have been edited better, as for narrtives were well but lost on a few occasions, but finally, it hits home. The movie has beautifully captured the beauty of Uttarakhand. The title track by Tanishk Bagchi and Bandit Tot stands out.
