'Helicopter Eela' movie review: A banal flight

Helicopter Eela

Hindi (U)

Cast: Kajol, Riddhi Sen

Director: Pradeep Sarkar

Rating: One and a half stars

Kajol plays the most common creature on earth — an overindulgent mom. Her son is her oxygen. But she is his choking agent.

The next big player in the great Indian maa-beta show is, gasp, the dabba! A million battles are waged over the tiny blue tiffin box in two hours. Eela (Kajol) turns hysterical whenever her son refuses to carry the container to college or forgets to bring back the treasure.

When she is not fussing over food, the helicopter mom hovers around Planet Son and his universe, checking out stuff in his room for any adolescent vice in the closet. “I need my space,” protests the poor soul (Riddhi Sen), articulating the collective angst of an audience suffocated by an over-the-top Maa.

Yes, the movie is all about an overprotective parent but Kajol comes across more as an irritating matron — a little too nosy, with a good pair of lungs. Silence is alien to her.

The theme — a single parent trying to revive her passion for singing after being told off by her offspring — is laudable, but the execution is banal. To show Eela’s past brush with stardom, the movie parades a bunch of Indie pop artistes from the 90s. But it all looks like a roll call when Shaan, Baba Sehgal, Illa Arun and Anu Malik queue up, waving alongside Mahesh Bhatt and Amitabh Bachchan.

Big names all, but no high notes here.