Love in the time of MMS. (Love Sex aur Dhoka, a review)

I rarely watch movies not because I don’t love movies. On the contrary I am a major movie buff. I plead guilty of being choosy; I choose to watch only those movies that excite me. Love ,Sex aur Dhoka held out a delicious promise of being different. Well, different will fall woefully short of describing this movie. In fact it’s not even a movie; at least it’s not shot like one. Shot entirely with a handycam the movie uses three parallel episodes to depict Love, Sex and Dhoka.

I felt like a peeping Tom getting a voyeuristic kick watching uncomfortable snippets from somebody else’s life. Very in your face, it presents life in all its rawness, sans the polish and finesse. Its liberal use of cuss words had the audience hooting in delight.

The first story spoofs Bollywood and its fascination for mush. A DDLJ obsessed debutante director falls in love with his heroine. What promises to be a sweet love story ends with a chilling climax. The humour is dark, almost terrifying. The second episode unfolds in a 24-hour supermarket with newly installed close circuit cameras. This time you almost expect a sinister story to unravel. The sensible female worker develops a soft corner for the smooth talking store manager. The boy, who is in dire straits, hits upon a plan with his sleazy friend to make a porn clip using her as an unwilling partner. Sex in the time of MMS.

The concluding episode is a sting operation planned by a down in the dumps cameraman and a wannabe item girl. She wants her revenge from Lukki Lukkka the reigning pop star who ditches her professionally because she refuses to sleep with him. Loki Local is a hilarious caricature who looked suspiciously like Mika(the Punjabi pop star). In fact, all the characters in the movie seem very real, not once did I feel they were acting. The flirtatious Punjabi salesgirl at the supermarket, the hennaed, unscrupulous rich dad, the shy heroine in all her innocence, all commendable performances. But the performance that stood out was the girl who played Mrignayanee , the item girl: a sassy desperate girl who ends up falling in love with a loser and ends up using him. Irony at its sparkling best. Hats off to Dibakar Banerjee(the director) for managing to extract such sterling performances from an unknown star cast.

Go watch LSD if you expect the unexpected. A hard hitting satire on a society that does not hesitate to lay bare its most private moments and puts it to display for public consumption, the movie is definitely not meant for the faint hearted.

Watch it to applaud a new breed of bold filmmakers who are redefining Bollywood.