Helicopter Eela Is Not A Particularly Bad Film, It Is Just Embarrassingly Dated

A little bit of Nil Battey Sannata, a little bit of Tumhaari Sulu and a whole lot of dated Pradeep Sarkar, that in nutshell is Helicopter Eela .

The story of the film is exactly what the trailer tells you. Eela is middle aged single mom who life revolves around her son Vivaan. The film actually delves into a back story to somewhat justifies her over-protectiveness about her son, but it actually quite flimsy. In fact, everything in the film is exactly that- flimsy. Neither the conflicts nor the resolutions are strong enough to make a convincing impact.

Director Pradeep Sarkar offers nothing new and quite frankly the fact that he is totally out of touch with modern filmmaking is quite evident. He is extremely dated and it shows and how! There are scenes in the film which are downright corny. For a sequence in the film the story plays out in flashback and we are taken to 1994 when Eela is a happy go lucky woman trying to break into the music industry. First of all when you are re-creating the era of 90s with one of the most iconic faces of 90s, Kajol , one should probably exercise a little caution to make things look a little authentic. Using 90s inspired modern costumes and copying styles from Rachel Green really does not make the cut.

There is a MTV India launch party scene where Eela is invited after her ‘Ruk Ruk Ruk’ remix become a big hit. She and Arun, her boyfriend played by Bengali actor Tota Roy Chowdhury meets the singer Ila Arun and yes the Eela Arun and Ila Arun joke is cracked, followed by a bad rap by Baba Sehgal. And the less we talk about cameos the better it is.

Talking about Kajol, it is always a delight to see her on screen and quite frankly she looks gorgeous in the film. But Pradeep Sarkar’s poor direction does the impossible, she makes Kajol look like she is hamming all the way. Her efforts to be ‘cheerful’ shows and it is a major deterrent. Performance wise it is the national award winner Ridhhi Sen who brings a certain element to the character of Vivaan. He is relatable and honestly quite adorable and does not make his role stereotypical. But his lack of stereotype is over-compensated by all other characters which include Neha Dhupia and the actress playing Eela’s mother-in-law. A super dependable Tota Roy Chowdhury is a total waste as Eela’s loving boyfriend and then estranged husband and his character arc is the most ridiculous.

The music although soothing, is again, something that we not heard before. It leans heavily towards the Farhan Akhtar in Rock On zone and that is definitely not cutting edgeHowever, to give credit where its due the film does a have the heart in the right place. The constant gag about Kajol and his love for dabba and Kajol asking Vivaan why he has kept methi in a box when she founds his box of marijuana are actually situation variations of which we ourselves have been in. There is a tinge of relatablity in certain sequences and there is general feel good vibe to it, but apart from that Helicopter Eela is superbly dated. Watch it if you are a fan of Kajol or don’t mind films that offer nothing new.