When was the last time you saw an Indian (non-vulgar) movie where a young dude says this to a lady in her mid fifties, and you absolutely relate to the scene? I never had, and for that reason, yes Lipstick under my burkha (LIMB) must be applauded. In fact, it had the potential to be an amazing movie. Unfortunately, it is not.
I could see how someone had a great idea for great characters – the kind that we hardly see in Bollywood movies. And then someone wrote stories around these characters. But, that’s where the problem occurred. The writing remained mediocre. Most stories for most part, were boring.
LUMB is about the journey of four protagonists.
You see all of them together in the beginning of the movie when one of them (waxingvali) is getting engaged. And then you see them together again in the end, when another protagonist (Buaji) is being thrown out of her house.
SPOILER ALERT from this point onward.
Buaji’s journey
Buaji’s story was great. It was the only good and interesting story out of all four. Ratna Pathak is a good actor in general (and she was good in this movie too), but she looked too posh to be an old Bhopali aunty. I totally loved the swimming trainer though. That dude did an amazing job and fit the role 100%.
The second oldest protagonist – Shireen – was played by Konkona and her story was pretty boring.
Shireen’s journey
I like the intention of showing that there are these assholish men who remain asshole always – even when they clearly are losers. But where’s the story? What is the beginning and what is the end? Nothing. Throughout the movie, Shireen just kept trying to ‘adjust’ to accommodate her husband’s assholishness. That’s a very very flat storyline for a 2 hour movie. With the same characters in the same scenario, a good writer could have written scenes that were engaging too.
In fact, this lack of engaging storyline applies not just to Shireen but to all the three protagonists, save Buaji.
Waxingvali’s journey
The guy who plays the photographer is a great actor in general, but in this movie, he just didn’t fit the role. He always seemed to be overacting. Or may be I know exactly how a small town studio photographer walks and talks, so that’s why I found the acting very fake. 🙂 The ‘better guy’ was really really fun to watch though. In fact, it was his presence that added some spark to this otherwise very ordinary, nothing exciting about it story-line.
And last but not the least, the most boring of all the stories was that of a college-girl (acted brilliantly though).
The college girl’s journey
Overall, other than lack of great storytelling, I think the use of four protagonists was a little too much! For the first 15 to 20 mintues, it looked like there were ten different stories unfolding and that kind of gave me a headache. And became very boring to watch, because there was not enough time to feel for any character. Yes, there have been movies made with even more protagonists (‘Love Actually’ for example, that also inspired a similar template Bollywood movie – Life in a Metro) each having their own stories. But something worked for those movies that doesn’t work for LUMB. They could have probably chosen two, like Masaan and spent more time developing a great story for those two.
So yeah, that’s about it. Should you go and watch this movie? Sure, watch it. Especially, if you are woman. Watch it for the intention behind making this movie. And try to ignore the lack of effort in writing engaging stories. On that note, want to share what a friend thought about the movie! That might explain why this movie still works, in spite of poor stories.
One reply on “Take your hands inside your blouse and unhook your bra.”
Read it again from the starting. Thank god I didn’t read the story stripsin morning that you made beautifully and stopped there. As a storyteller you might have found out that it was less engaging and the comparison made with Masaan was apt as it was much more engaging in a different way. As it ended with a line, “Pinjre me band sapno ki chaabi aakhir Rosy ke dil ke andar hi thi..this meant that stories of four of them have not ended but they have started, started in the minds of viewers(read women who are watching it and finding a protagonist in any one of them). This was that typical movie which leaves you to now think or act in your own way!