Lajja

I happened to catch Lajja the other night and I must say it was pretty entertaining.

Although the individual stories were engaging, they didn't fit with the overall story arc, making it seem unbelievable. How many female hating incidents can a woman possibly come across whilst she's on the run from her own abusive husband?

Having said that, Manisha, Madhuri and Rekha all put in solid performances and Mahima, Ajay Devgun and Anil Kapoor did well in their brief roles. Jackie was over the top but did have a certain menace about him. And of course Johnny Lever was excellent as one half of an inept private investigation team.

The worrying fact coming from this film is the fact that a lot of the themes explored in this film are very much real. The Mahima/Anil portion dealt with dowry and how the poor are often held ransom by the grooms family should they wish to get their daughter married in to a respectable family. In Rekha's portion we saw how villagers saw the birth of a baby girl as a burden rather than a blessing and watched in horror as the father tried to drown his daughter in milk, luckily Rekha came in to save the day. And of course the overall story of Manisha and Jackie and domestic abuse was highlighted even though the ending was very lame.

A decent film with some fine acting a lot better than some of the crap being churned out at the moment.

2.5 out of 5