Ujda Chaman (2019)

#FinalVerdict

Ujda Chaman is a very simple film which will bear the brunt of haste to release before producer Dinesh Vijan's Maddock Films' Bala, based on the same issue. The haste will surely prove fatal for it. Won't strike a chord with the audience.

It won’t be erroneous to state that Ujda Chaman has the right intentions but it fritters away its advantages & director Abhishek Pathak gives us a half-baked product. Also, the loud background score (Amar Mohile) ensures that there is no scope for subtlety or gentle humour. Even the claim - Takle ki Pehli aur Asli film - is false because Ujda Chaman is a *poor* adaptation (Danish Japjeet Singh) of 2017 Kannada film Ondu Motteya Kathe. Even the first hour doesn’t cut ice, focusing on the mandatory light moments that seldom seize your attention. While the original Kannada film held the spectators by its ears and eyes, Ujda Chaman suffers because the grip is absent from the very start itself. The inane comedy drama is without wit & warmth, making it unfunny, tiresome and also frequently cringeworthy. The best they should’ve done it is to copy and paste the material. The second half redeems itself to a certain extent by bringing in the message of accepting people for who they are but overall, the writing (Danish Japjeet Singh) gyrates from interesting to ordinary to unconvincing and that bogs the film down.

Director Abhishek Pathak has handled a few scenes well, but the writing is ineffectual. The most important angles of baldness & fat shaming are wasted and appear to be dragged spoofs. Gourov-Roshin's music is nothing to write home about. Sudhir Chaudhary's cinematography is of inferior standard/quality. The movie is so exhausting that the run time of two hours feels like four (editor: Mitesh Soni).

Performances are decent but easily forgettable. Sunny Singh & Maanvi Gagroo portray their parts with elan but they deserve better written characters. Gagan Arora has a charming screen presence & contributes to some light moments. Saurabh Shukla and Sharib Hashmi are wasted. Atul Kumar, Grusha Kapoor, Karishma Sharma and Aishwarya Sakhuja play their parts well despite characters not being properly fleshed out. Guru Randhawa's special song in the end credits lights up the screen.

Final words - Lack of directorial skills and facetious writing rob Ujda Chaman of any possibility of being realistic and relatable. Also, the repetitive silly gags and heightened bickering make this film a non-starter. Flop!