Pagglait: – Satire on Indian Family

Netflix and Balaji telefilms brings the dark comedy drama Pagglait. Directed and written  by Umesh Bist, Pagglait tries to explore family who is stuck in crisis situation and how their relatives and family members behave and act during the course of time.

The Plot

Pagglait is a slang used for Crazy is a story of a young newly married woman Sandhya (Sanya Malhotra) who has lost her husband. She stays in joint family with her Father-in-Law Shivendra (Ashutosh Rana), Mother In-law Usha (Sheeba Chaddha) and some other family members like Elder brother of Shivendra (Raghubir Yadav). The entire family gathers at home till Tehrvi (13^th Day ritual after death of a person) in their home showing grief of demise. But unexpectedly Sandhya is not able to feel any emotion on her husband’s demise, and this behavior causes worry to her mother Alka (Natasha Rastogi) as well as other family members.

During the 13 days’ time Sandhya also comes to know about the pre-marital affair of her husband with one of his colleagues Aakansha (Sayani Gupta), post which she realizes that she didn’t even know her husband. At the same time there are problems in family like lack of funds and ongoing loans and at the same time nominee for insurance policy is Sandhya. How well Sandhya able to understand his husband in 13 days or get attached to her in-laws? How family manages these issues? How relatives try to take benefit of situation and How people create double standards on name of rituals forms the rest of the story.

The Pluses

The movie scores on family emotions with some top-notch act by fine actors of industry. The grief of Ashutosh (best in recent times) & Sheeba on losing their son. The hypocrisy on name of rituals and customs being eldest in family by Raghubir Yadav. The ego clashes with elder brother by Rajesh Tailang and feeling less widow by Sandhya as Title role have all pour their heart in the role. In the high emotion drama. The music of the movie by Arijit Singh goes with the mood. There is also right flavor of comedy by Aasif Khan as Parchun and others which maintains the right balance of emotion with laughter.

The Minuses

Somewhere I always find that in most of these movies, there is direct attack on Hindu rituals and people are shown in negative light which was also prominent through few scenes in this movie. Production value of movie is not very high and at the same time though most of the movie is shot at home, the name of the town is not mentioned not sure the reason behind same. Also due to many characters around screen time reduces for few characters. Also the plot of movie will remind viewers about Ram Prasad ki Tehrvi which was a recent release and well appreciated by critics & audience.

FFC Take

Pagglait is not a perfect movie but still it’s a right mix of human emotions with good comic timing. Hence this movie will make you happy with moist eyes too. Overall a good family entertainer.