DIL JUUNGLEE
In Dil Juunglee, before anyone with a sane mind can muster “Where are these characters going?” debuting director Aleya Sen pushes them out on a road trip. This very literal answer to a metaphorical question doesn’t simplify things.
The trip is superficial and awkward, just like the movie, but it does springboard the story before one asks deeper questions; those questions, though, we must ask.
Koroli — Koro for short (Taapsee Pannu) — is a dorky girl in love with the swooning idea of love found in romance novels. She is a billionaire heiress who left her business management studies in the UK and teaches English literature in Delhi. Being a dork (complete with glasses and a klutzy attitude), she is, of course, unlucky in love — having recently been dumped by a pudgy middle-class crybaby.
Down and tipsy one night, her juunglee (wild) nature jiggles out in a pub where one of her students realise that there’s a hot party animal within her reserved nature. The student, Sumit (Saqib Saleem), though, isn’t really falling head-over-heels for her. Actually, despite what the clichéd climax has us believe, he never does. She doesn’t love him either from what I’ve seen (or it might just be Taapsee’s inarticulate acting and ineffective writing).
Koro and Sumit fall in love, decide to elope, fall apart and reunite in London seven years later. She is now mature (meaning: she has fashionably short hair, no glasses and dresses in a business suit), handles her father’s business and is engaged to her childhood friend. Sumit too has succeed somewhat; he is a low-budget actor, and in a relationship. The two crash into each other again.
Dil Juunglee is preposterous, pondering and pitiable at the same time. Its lack of groundedness, blitzing pace and a haphazard narrative layout alienates people (even though the editor does a good job of trying to keep the film sane). The scenes are choppy, uneven and uninteresting; the acting (with the exception of an actor or two) just as bad.
The screenplay (Tonoya Sen Sharma, Shiv Singh) wants to talk about screwed up people yet it only ends up with bad (and clichéd) characters. The juunglee dil the plot proposes comes out domesticated — and you don’t feel bad for them at all (if one felt anything for them in the first place).