A sweet film that resonates with spices of talent

One word governs the whole of “Dum Laga Ke Haisha”: weight. It’s never really the physical kind, but ranges from the weight of small-town mentality, which leads a family to constantly needle their daughter-in-law whenever she shows sparks of her education, to the weight of emotions that instantly breach boundaries outside a divorce court when the women from families on the opposite sides decide to hug and cry away their worries.

Dum Laga Ke Haisha
Hindi (U/A) Cast: Ayushmann Khurrana, Bhumi Pednekar, Sanjay Mishra and others
Director: Sharat Katariya

However, the heaviest of them all is the combined weight of the acting and directing talent on display.

Prem (Ayushmann), a 10th-fail Kumar Sanu fan, runs an audio-cassette shop with his dad (Sanjay Mishra), the fear of whose footwear can make him consent to an arranged marriage. Prem’s wife is Sandhya (Bhumi), a soft-spoken rotund schoolteacher who is not one to back down when it comes to making her husband consummate their marriage.

Their marital strife, coupled with the lives of those around them, make “Dum Laga Ke Haisha” a perfect slice-of-life story out of any Indian small town, which is stuck in a time warp with no cellphones and CDs.

Ayushmann fits his role to a T. The real revelation, though, is newcomer Bhumi Pednekar, the weight of whose acting talent is heavy enough to make the audience look beyond her appearance and into Sandhya’s heart. The film-makers had definitely taken the right call when casting this member of the production team in a starring role.

Anu Malik’s comeback with some lilting tunes and nostalgia is music to the ears, literally! Director Sharat Katariya’s helming of the entire project, where each emotion moves you from mirth to melancholy and more in minutes, is a sweet breath of fresh air.

And there’s something for those nostalgic about the 1980s and 90s, too! Watch out for the sweet quarrel between our leading pair, played out through songs from the bygone era. It could well be a case-study in film-making.