Rajjo is a story of a nautch girl. Her life in a brothel (kotha), and her escape from the ignoble life. Eventually she finds love, and lives her dream. Remember Madhur Bhandarkar’s Chandni Bar?
Rajjo (Kangana Ranaut), the little has lost her childhood in an infamous brothel in the dingy red light area of Mumbai city. She’s the “Queen Bee” of her domain, commanding the highest rate card, and harbors a dream of being a classical dancer. But before she can proceed, a twenty one year old Chandu (Paras Arora) walks into her kotha and is besotted by her.
Love blossoms; purely platonic though! Supervising this love story is Begum (Mahesh Manjrekar) – the eunuch who runs the brothel. Chandu decides to rescue his love from the clutches of Begum, but the best part is he does not have a plan for it! He eventually marries her.
Shunned by society and his parents, they begin life afresh. But her past and the stigma of being a prostitute doesn’t leave her. Coming face to face with the same people from her past, the film is a tale of this girl and how she finally finds social acceptability.
Kangana Ranaut tries very hard to do justice to her role, but seriously fails at that. And she is not the only one to be blamed. It’s the script.
Paras Arora is average, Mahesh Manjrekar is effective, Prakash Raj, as Hande Bhau really needs a reality check post this film.
Uttam Singh, who is known for his melodies, and still remembered for Yash Chopra’s Dil To Pagal Hai, falls much below expectations. The only song you can remember is Julmi Re Julmi. The background score, and all other tracks are below average.
Coming to the director: Vishwas Patil, well, he has no clue of what he is doing. He has miserably failed at execution level, and immensely showcases his sheer talent of ‘no script sense’. What is amazing to know is: how could he let such a half baked product hit the screen? The editing is jerky; it all looks like his film is just an amalgamation of scenes put together with no thought.
Last Friday, if you thought there can’t be anything worse than Satya 2, then please hold on your guns! Here is Rajjo, and it perfect fits the bill. It really makes Satya 2 look like a blockbuster.
To sum it up, this film is filled with crass, below the belt and cheap dialogues; a weak script, average performances and below average direction. It is disturbing to watch such a film, as it totally challenges your intellect.
I seriously wish the director had done his research properly, or least he could’ve done is watch Chandni Bar twice or thrice, before attempting this film.
