Movie Jugjugg Jeeyo: Divorcepanti Could Have Been a More Apt Title!

If you had ever got the idea of perceiving ‘divorce’ as one of the funniest and craziest words or concepts in human conjugal life and then had dismissed the idea as a wild one…well, you were not entirely wrong. For your solace or rather vindication we have here a movie titled Jugjugg Jeeyo(correct Hindi form is ‘Jug Jug Jeeyo’ meaning ‘live long and prosperous,) that reduces ‘divorce’ to the kind you’d perceived, doesn’t matter if you’d done so with experience leaking or not as the movie itself doesn’t bother about that either. Your conviction is further heightened by the fact that the movie is not of the ordinary type, having the iconic Karan Johar as one of the producers and his famous banner ‘Dharma Productions’ to boot. And then, the star-cast is really mouthwatering with the ever popular veterans Anil Kapoor and Neetu Singh along with the immensely talented actors of the younger generation—Varun Dhawan and Kiara Advani in the lead roles—supported well by the ebullient television anchor with a good comic timing, Manish Paul. Perhaps it’s thanks to all such ‘helpful’ factors that the movie has proved to be a hit. However, the ‘divorce’ obsession remains throughout its length of 150 minutes and the storyline has reduced ‘divorce’ to such a funny-crazy-lopsided caricature that, in the glorious traditions of movies like ‘Pagalpanti’ or ‘Heropanti-2’, we’ve declared at the title level that ‘Divorcepanti’ (divorce-ism or divorce antics) could’ve been a more appropriately funny title.

 

The movie did try, however, a refreshing beginning with the indication of a budding school romance between Varun and Kiara who were attached to each other since their school days. But, as in the case of numerous other Bollywood (read Hindi) films, a boringly longish background song took full charge of the proceedings thence, watching them grow up and getting married as anticipated by us, more than the characters involved in the act. To make matters worse, the movie had undergone a further transition of 5 years by which time both Varun and Kiara were in a foreign country, with Varun struggling to earn a living by working in a hotel while Kiara is the topnotch VP material in a top corporation.

 

And things were not at all alright. For reasons unknown to us or the characters, apart from the job-difference between them, the staggering theme of the movie ‘divorce’ has already taken deep roots in their relationship. Again to make matters worse, before we could get a fair idea of the whys, another background song with heavily-loaded uncontrollably emotive sadness took us totally unawares, forcing us to get used to the ‘divorce’ phenomenon. A miserable Varun pleads with his childhood lover-wife to wait till the wedding of his sister get over in India, and then he promises her a divorce.

 

The movie comes back to Johar’s wonderful India; but the divorce syndrome does not leave any of them alone, and to the horrors of the hapless spectators that word or concept even seamlessly penetrates the 35-year-old relationship of Varun’s parents, played by Anil Kapoor and Neetu Singh. We don’t want to say that ‘divorce’ is an unrealistic concept, but as we’ve already made it amply clear we don’t buy the ludicrous proceedings centered on that word or concept. Again, the older couple decides to wait till the wedding of their daughter is over and done with. But not quite!

 

We don’t want to waste your or our time in trying to explain the caricaturing storytelling. The ‘divorce’ gets worsening more and more, even compelling the to-be-married daughter, played by debutante Prajakta Koli, to have re-think on her decision to choose a ‘reliable’ partner on parental advisory than the boyfriend she really loves. The girlfriend of Anil Kapoor, Tisca Chopra really wasted in a senseless role, heartily joins the caricaturing with ominous absurdity while the ‘wronged’ wife Neetu frets and fumes in one scene and breaks out laughing in another to perhaps help the director push the ‘comedy’ forward. There could be a near thousand background songs that never cease to litter the narrative, and heinously well supported by the grotesquely ‘comedy’ background music.

 

All the crazy happenings stop in the end when the males succeed in wooing back their female partners (legit). Therefore, you cannot expect even an iota of feminism in this worthless movie, and it’s all about the domineeringly chauvinistic husbands convincing their partners to not go ahead. Well, for the males ‘woo’ is the buzzword, they need to woo the girls in their prime youth, keep on wooing the wives later while having additional ‘wooing’ too and then when things go wrong for them they ‘woo’ back their life-partners. I write about such horrible waste of public money in these absurd and regressive movies, ‘hits’ or ‘flops’, just because of the reasons listed throughout this piece. And, when I get to watch these free on Prime Video.