These past 2-3 years, Hindi cinema industry has got a tradition of making films on relevant subjects but with a middle the road way, so it can cater to mass and single screen audiences. But the truth is it’s not easy. It needs a screenplay doing justice to the subject and plot. And of course, direction comes after that. Toilet - Ek Prem Katha is one of them which fails.
The story is about a small town(Mathura) girl Jaya Joshi, brave, educated, bold, who gets married to a man, Keshav, who doesn’t have a toilet in his home. The film has actually two stories put into one. First one is about the social problem and the second one is about love between the couples. Screenplay just fails to keep them as one.
The first half offers many light and funny scenes keeping the narrative convincing but problems start to emerge as the story progresses. Small town portrayal looks authentic but suddenly cuts to a song in which heroin is in a sexy Ghagra-Choli dancing. After a while, it becomes too boring and unconvincing and seems long. I was just wondering and asking, why the director is taking so long to come to the central conflict?
I went to watch a courageous saga of a woman who doesn’t agree to sacrifice her dignity and fights for it but instead, it turned out the same bad Hindi film interpretation in which hero is in love.
Performances are good especially, Bhumi Pednekar and Divyendu Sharma are awesome. Akshay Kumar is in his usual way. Sudhir Pandey is too irritating who has only got to shout and yell.
Music is of the average standard having some good melodies but the film seems too long with so many unrequired songs.
Talking of cinematography, the film looks beautiful and small town feels like a small town. The film just has many higher-angle shots.