India Lockdown

India Lockdown tries to depict how COVID and the lockdowns that followed affected the lives of people belonging to the various sections of Indian society. Now, this is not the first film made with the backdrop of coronavirus, and in all probability it won't be the last as well, but the thing that matters is that regardless of how important an event you select as the backdrop of your movie, it needs to be told in the form of a story, otherwise it would feel like a documentary, something that holds true for this film as well. Some things are happening in the film, but it's not quite clear as to what is the intention of the director, what exactly does he want to say through this movie. It looks like the director and his research team picked up some examples from real life and put them into this movie, but forgot to weave them into a properly structured story.

Among the four stories being told simultaneously, the story that moves you the most is the one with Prateik Babbar and Sai Tamhankar. One of the most heartbreaking consequences of the lockdown was the mass exodus of migrant workers, and we get a first-hand experience of that traumatic phase through Madhav and his wife, as they wander around helplessly on the streets. It was as it is depressing to revisit those visuals once again, but the believability with which those two actors have portrayed their roles made it even more painful to watch. Prateik Babbar and Sai Tamhankar are extremely underrated actors and both of them have given a beautiful performance in this segment of the movie.

The Mehrunissa chapter with Shweta Basu Prasad also felt like a retelling of some real life instances that may have happened during the lockdown, there was no real story there. I kept wondering as to where are we headed with this, what is the point of what we are watching, but I got nothing. It feels as if the director just wanted to show how sex workers were operating during coronavirus, that's all. The problem however with this kind of filmmaking is that your movie starts to look like a documentary. Shweta Basu Prasad is a very capable actress, but in most of the scenes of this movie, she was extremely loud and over the top. Perhaps she was trying to impersonate some real life sex worker, but she should have kept it a few notches lower. It was only towards the end that she gave a glimpse of the brilliance that she possesses as an actress.

Prakash Belawadi was extremely grounded in his portrayal of Nageshwar, but his segment too felt like a soulless piece of screenplay. Through Nageshwar's story, the director was telling us something that we are already aware of. If we wanted to see things happening around us, we would watch the news or read it; we don't watch a movie for that. Events taking place around us are supposed to be used as the setting, something that helps the director in laying down the basic groundwork of his main story; turning that particular news story into your screenplay is just lazy work. The main focus has to be there on the main characters and their journey, otherwise there is no real point of making a film.

The segment with Dev, Palak and Moon Alvez was not only dull and predictable but also the weakest in terms of acting performances. While the young actors just didn't know how to act, Aahana Kumra on the other hand was extremely loud in every single scene.

No one likes to watch a boring and poorly written film, but unfortunately that is precisely what 'India Lockdown' is.