I went to see Judgementall Hai Kya with my friends last weekend and I hadn’t even seen the trailer of the movie. The movie turned out to be something much greater than I expected. My first impression was “this movie will be about a boy and a girl who are misfits who fall in love.”
Man, I was wrong! They say never judge a book by its cover, and I judged a movie without even looking at the poster. Yes! I didn’t even see the poster of the movie and my friends told me that there’s Kangana Ranaut (who plays Bobby Grewal) and Rajkummar Rao (who plays Keshav) in the movie with Jimmy Sheirgill (essaying the role of Shridhar) in a supporting role.
Well, I’ve learned my lesson… because the movie was completely different from what I expected. I simply loved the movie. The following is my honest review.
The Plot
Bobby (played by Kangana Ranaut) is a patient of acute psychosis due to the haunting events of her childhood. She often reflects violent behavior towards people and gets sent to an asylum for the same, where she’s treated for a definite time and prescribed some medicines which she agrees to take. However, she tends to throw them away.
Bobby lives alone in her apartment and her uncle sends over some tenants to live in the other room for a few months. Everything seems to be going normal (in her words) for Bobby until a charming man named Keshav (played by Rajkummar Rao) moves in with his wife Reema (played by Amyra Dastur). This is when Bobby’s life takes a turn.
The Story
The movie starts with a little Bobby (in her childhood) making origami figures. She is shown as a cute little girl who has to witness domestic violence between her parents, with her father being the one who initiates the fight every time. He tends to take the fight all the way to Bobby even if she’s not there to witness it. On one particular Holi, a man puts some colour on Bobby’s mother, and she returns the gesture.
Bobby’s father witnesses the same and runs towards his wife. He drags her to the terrace and starts choking her. Bobby comes to her mother’s rescue and tries to pull her father away. However, her father slips on a puddle of water and falls down from the terrace with his wife, both do not survive the fall.
This leaves a mark on Bobby as she considers herself responsible for her parents’ death. As she grows up, she develops the symptoms of acute psychosis. She hears voices that tell her what to do and often sees cockroaches that don’t really exist. In the movie, it’s shown that in her case, seeing more cockroaches implies her triggers are worsening.
Now that Bobby is an adult, she makes origami with cutouts of newspaper articles about rape and domestic violence. This is because she’s still affected by her parents’ toxic relationship that finally led to their demise. She works as a dubbing artist for South Indian movies and envies the actresses she dubs for, as she considers herself to be more talented than them.
Due to this, she tends to get too involved with the character she’s essaying and implements the characters and the story of the movie in real life. All while placing herself in the lead actress’s role. This is what leads her to a shocking conclusion while she’s dubbing for a horror movie while Keshav and Reema (her new tenants) are living with her.
Bobby notices Keshav and marks his every move as she believes that Keshav is plotting to kill his wife, Reema. Surprisingly, Reema does die eventually due to what is believed to be an accidental death because of the gas cylinder bursting. Everyone thinks that it was an accident, however, Bobby has other thoughts in her mind.
She tries to convince the police that Keshav is the killer but she fails after they declare it an accident. Shocked and confident in her statement, an angry Bobby hits Keshav in the back of his head with a wooden chair. Doing this was a mistake, especially in front of the police officials who closed the case.
Bobby gets sent back to the asylum, but for a much longer time. She is seen going insane in the asylum catching imaginary cockroaches which only she is able to see. We can see her agonizing in pain while getting shock therapy before we see the word ‘interval’ on the screen.
After the interval: Bobby has been treated for two years in the asylum and is advised to move in with her cousin Megha (played by Amrita Puri) in the UK. I’ll leave the rest for you to see as the story takes a shocking turn from here and gets even more intense!
My Take On The Movie
Like I’ve mentioned above, the movie outlived my expectations in every way. I didn’t expect it to have such an intense and compelling story. From the first minute of the movie, I was glued to my seat with my eyes concentrating straight on the screen (except for the interval time). Every actor in the movie truly justifies their respective roles with Kangana and Rajkummar delivering mind-blowing performances.
I’ve heard people complaining about the fact that Bollywood doesn’t make intense and compelling movies like Hollywood. Well, this is it, fellas. Just watch this movie and you’ll know what I’m talking about. I don’t know about anyone else, but this movie is surely going into my favorites list.
