‘Dukaan’ (2024) Movie Review - A Dull Drama from Siddharth Singh and Garima Wahal

Siddharth Singh and Garima Wahal have worked as screenwriters and lyricists in various films like Goliyon Ki Raasleela Ram-Leela, Bajirao Mastani, Padmaavat, Toilet: Ek Prem Katha, Batti Gul Meter Chalu, Kabir Singh, and Animal. You can spot how their Dukaan got influenced by all these films. From the three Sanjay Leela Bhansali movies, they got their colorful aesthetic. From Toilet and Batti Gul, they got good intentions. From Kabir Singh and Animal, they got a brazen, unapologetic protagonist. How awesome things could have been if Siddharth and Garima had creatively blended these influences to cook an exquisite dish. As directors, however, Siddharth and Garima come across as incredibly unimaginative. They are too obvious, too concerned with underlining their "poetry." It's not enough for them to mention Radha and Krishna in the lyrics. They show us a woman posing near a painting of Radha and another near a painting of Krishna. These two images are then joined through a split screen, but you don't see a line in the middle. Take this as foreshadowing. Dukaan is telling us that the conflict between these two women would disappear eventually, giving rise to a connection devoid of a boundary.

Jasmine (Monika Panwar) and Diya (Monali Thakur) are the two women. Things get bitter between them because Jasmine, a surrogate, runs away with Diya's baby. There is a reason why Jasmine becomes very attached to this particular child and not other babies (not even her own son). That reason, though, is more of a feeble drama generator than a credible point. Dukaan often reminds us that Jasmine herself is a child (the movie has a habit of accentuating almost everything). The characters point out how childish she is. Panwar's performance also screams the same thing. It seems as if the directors simply told the actress to act like a spoiled kid. We hear Jai Jasmine in the background, and at the same time, the character, the actor, exudes self-admiration. As a result, the entire screen reeks of self-congratulatory behavior. This sense of complacency can also be found in rhyming lines that want to be dramatic but sound as if they are trying too hard to impress the audience due to uninspiring filmmaking.

If Jasmine is immature, Sumer (Sikandar Kher), her husband, is mature. How does the movie present this fact visually? It first shows us Sumer riding a bike (a man's vehicle), then cuts to Jasmine riding a cycle (a kid's vehicle). Sumer may be mature, but he is also gentle, and kind. She is the man, and he is the woman in this relationship. Hence, the scene where she, like a horny male teenager, gets excited during her wedding night. When she sees Sumer taking his pillow to the floor, she goes to him and demands sex. What happens next is that instead of the husband taking out his wife's earrings before lying on top of her, the wife removes her husband's adornments before lying on top of him. Later, we watch some husbands bringing lunch boxes for their wives. All this role reversal might have sounded fun on the paper but on the screen, the fun, the intentions get diluted amidst a plethora of dullness.

Sumer dies in an earthquake. His death is announced to us through the breaking of a jar of red chilly. Someone like Bhansali could have imbued drama and poetry into such touches, but here, a moment like this makes you chuckle. It's too on the nose - the cinematic language does not have flair. We first see Diya pointing a knife at Jasmine while talking about her feelings. Later, we see Jasmine pointing a knife at Diya while talking about her feelings. There is a wedding scene where guests gossip about Jasmine. There is a welcome (or, I think, birthday) party where guests gossip about Diya and her child. In both these scenes, the tone instantly shifts from comedy to emotional/teary. What this means is that Dukaan is infected with tonal inconsistency. It suddenly goes from being funny to being serious to being funny again to being serious again, and so on. To make matters worse, the mood, on a scale of 1 to 10, remains at 100. Everything is pushed at us so forcefully that our minds become numb, and we stop responding to the events on the screen. I came out of the theater like a zombie.

Sometimes, a movie's opening scenes tell you how good or bad it will be. Sometimes, a movie becomes better after a while. This is why I always watch a film until the end (unless it's as horrible as, say, Ae Watan Mere Watan). There is, however, a moment near the beginning of Dukaan that immediately made it clear to me that this is going to be a terrible film. A pregnant woman is told, "Push kar," and the camera cuts to a board with the words "Pushkar." Siddharth-Garima were also involved in Raabta. Did their filmmaking also get influenced by that awful Dinesh Vijan film?

Final Score- [2.5/10]
Reviewed by - Vikas Yadav
Follow @vikasonorous on Twitter
Publisher at Midgard Times