Nakhrewaalii tries to disguise a dated cross-dressing comedy as quirky entertainment, but its contrived writing, clueless characters and outdated humour make it a thoroughly tiresome watch, complains Sreeju Sudhakaran.
Key Points
- Ansh Duggal plays Sumit Mishra, a misogynistic small-town man who disguises himself as a woman to secure a government job and marry his girlfriend.
- Nakhrewaalii recycles the familiar cross-dressing comedy trope of Chachi 420, relying on contrived situations, implausible plot developments and deliberately foolish characters.
- Despite its attempts to explore the challenges women face, Nakhrewaalii is let down by outdated humour, problematic characterisation and a screenplay that mistakes absurdity for comedy.
Sometimes a film leaves you wondering what exactly convinced its makers that they had a winner on their hands. What was the idea that made them go, ‘Arre, yepicture to banni hai bas!‘?
Nakhrewaalii, the new rom-com from Colour Yellow Productions Pvt Ltd, is one such film. A production house that once brought refreshing stories from small-town India now seems content to recycle old ideas and pass them off as quirky comedy.
Despite its familiar small-town flavour, the film, directed by Rahul Shanklya and written by Divy Nidhi Sharma (based on Satya Vyas’ novel Dilli Darbar), has little of the charm that made Aanand L Rai and Himanshu Sharma’s earlier works.
Nakhrewaalii once again has that small-town flavour, even though most of it is set in the capital. The hero, Sumit Mishra from Hardoi (Ansh Duggal, decent), carries the same misogynistic flamboyance you have seen in the protagonists of Rai’s Raanjhanaa and Tere Ishk Mein. He wears his heartbreak like a badge of honour, and we are expected to take his wounded ego lightly this time because, unlike those films, this is a comedy.
Even if his first reaction to being rejected by his ex-lover is to snatch her dupatta.
Outdated Tropes, Character Arcs
The heroine, Paridhi (Pragati Srivastava, very promising), is your typical Colour Yellow leading lady. She is a ‘modern’ girl, who smokes and makes the first sexual move, but remains trapped within her family’s small-minded, traditionalist mindset of trying to marry off to the next (un)suitable boy.
However, Paridhi has even less agency than a Tanu or a Kanu, silently agreeing to become a bargaining chip in marriage deals struck by her parents or accepted by her boyfriend.
There is a quirky element here, too. But unlike the erectile dysfunction plotline of Shubh Mangal Saavdhaan or the gay romance of Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhaan, the quirk here is simply that the hero cross-dresses. And not for any queer reasons. He has been doing it since childhood to gain access to female-centric ceremonies.
Come on, peeps. This isn’t quirky. It is a trope that has been done (Rafoo Chakkar), perfected (Chachi 420), dusted off (Apna Sapna Money Money), crapped on (Paying Guests) and discarded (Aunty No 1) over the years.
Of course, the hero also needs a dedicated funny best friend-cum-sidekick. Someone who looks up to him and supports him regardless of his flaws. He must also be played by a supremely talented actor. Joining the elite CYPPL club of Deepak Dobriyal and Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub is Akash Makhija (Gram Chikitsalay, Raakh) as Jhaadi.
Contrived Situations, Lame Comedy
Sumit and Jhaadi leave Hardoi for Delhi after the former suffers a heartbreak and decides he needs to get over it by scoring more girls.
In Delhi, they become tenants of a middle-class family who are looking for marriage alliances for their daughter, Pairidhi.
The contrived circumstances through which they secure accommodation offer an early indication of the film’s problems. When we first meet the homeowner (Gopal Datt), he is watching porn on his laptop with the volume turned up. He doesn’t even bother to minimise the window when people walk into his room, purely so Sumit can catch him and blackmail him into giving them a place to stay.
And when the video accidentally plays, the volume is suddenly loud enough to attract his wife’s attention, setting up yet another comic gag. Is it funny enough to be forgivable? No. The film repeatedly mistakes such manufactured situations for comedy. And even for dramatic purposes.
The same problem surfaces in Sumit’s interactions with Paridhi. During their first conversation, he immediately launches into an argument about how girls have it easier than boys. This exists purely so Paridhi can declare that God should turn him into a woman in Delhi for a day, making him realise what women actually go through. We know he will eventually get a taste of that when he starts cross-dressing.
Even the moment Sumit realises he is in love with Paridhi feels equally contrived, with a rickshaw driver having to tell him that people in love are always the last to realise it. Not only does that piece of advice feels so random in the movie, it doesn’t even makes sense. Just like the movie’s tagline: ‘Kabhi kabhi pyaar meinMajnujo bhiLailabanna padta hai.’
Unbelievable Plot Developments
The cross-dressing comes into play around the halfway mark. Sumit and Paridhi have a fallout after a night of lovemaking, when she overhears him telling his friend that she is not girlfriend material, and he prefers his air-headed rich collegemate (Aayushi Verma).
He eventually realises he is in love with her, but instead of properly convincing her that his feelings are real, he goes straight to her father to ask for her hand in marriage. Oh, Paridhi, please find some agency urgently, even if it is a travel agency.
Her father has one condition: Sumit must secure a government job within a month if he wants to marry her. Since that is practically impossible, Sumit remembers a random telephonic conversation he overheard, which gives him a sneaky opportunity to land an easy government job.
The catch? He has to be a woman. Don’t ask why.
Somehow, within a month, he clears a government entrance exam, gets the results and secures a job allotment as ‘Sumita Mishra’, all without any proper document verification. Sure, this is India, where Aadhar cards can apparently be made for anyone! But it is also a country where securing a government posting can take months, sometimes years.
Wait, is this supposed to be satire? If so, the joke is lost on me, much like most of the other jokes in the film.
What follows is Sumit as ‘Sumita’, trying to fend off advances from creepy, perverted middle-aged uncles who are so obsessed with her feminine wiles that they remain completely oblivious to her questionable body language. Like her noticeably masculine gait or how Sumit magically manages to hide his stubble.
The second half essentially turns into a Meesho version of Chachi 420. Sumit has to keep his government job for a month to marry Paridhi, while Sumita has to dodge the obsessive advances of her boss (Kumud Mishra, put through some embarrassing motions).
The film’s biggest problem, beyond its tired premise, is how deliberately foolish it makes almost everyone around Sumit to keep his charade going. Take Paridhi’s parents, who are fooled when he shows them a fake workplace. Given their obsession with having a government employee as a son-in-law, shouldn’t they know that no government office functions at full strength before 9:30 am?
Then there are Sumit’s sisters, who should know about his cross-dressing quirk but instantly assume Sumita is his wife after bumping into her and finding IDs in both their names after snatching her bag. Come on, he isn’t even pulling off the look properly.
Lack Of Cohesion
Sure, through his cross-dressing misadventures, Sumit begins to realise that being a ‘hot’ woman in Delhi can be a massive pain. But the film tries to frame his scheming ways as heroic struggles when he is actually pulling off enough conmanship to land behind bars for years.
Worse, it doesn’t even follow through on its own lesson-teaching ‘quirks’. On his first day, a male colleague immediately sends him a d**k pic. Honestly, I’d rather take a frying pan to the head than endure the forced dramatics of this screenplay.
What follows is even stranger. In response, ‘Sumita’ sends the employee a d**k pic right back. He is shocked in the moment, but the incident is never discussed again.
So, wait, does everyone think Sumita is a woman or a transsexual? Why is this never brought up?
Alas, like everything else in the film, I must dismiss this as just another annoying nakhra of a movie that doesn’t know which decade it belongs in.
Perhaps Nakhrewaalii is simply a reflection of the comedy we continue to consume without questioning. Between its dated cross-dressing gags and the kind of humour that still finds a place on shows like The Kapil Sharma Show, the film seems to believe that anything goes as long as someone dresses up as a woman. Sadly, the joke has worn thinner than Sumita’s disguise.
Nakhrewaalii Review Rediff Rating:
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