new Delhi: The title ‘Jalsa’, which means festive meeting or gathering, is a misnomer for such an intense and emotional film.
Directed by Suresh Triveni, the film is the story of two mothers Maya Menon (Vidya Balan) and Ruksana (Shefali Shah), whose lives are linked by fate. Viewers are immediately immersed in the characters’ lives, their situations, and their roles in it, as Triveni skillfully narrates both the characters’ inner worlds and accounts of their actions.
Maya is a famous and formidable TV anchor working in WRD News Network. She is the mother of Aayush (Surya Kashibatla), a disabled child, who is cared for by his mother (Rohini Hattangadi) and maid Ruksana, who has two children – Kishore Aaliya and Chhota Imad.
Late one Friday night, in an unfortunate accident, Maya’s car collides with a girl – and she leaves the victim bleeding to her fate on the side of the road. Guilt nibbles at him. With jittery nerves, she confides in her boss and love interest Amar Malhotra (Iqbal Khan), who tells her that she did the right thing or else she will be accused of ‘drunk driving’, which would be detrimental to his image.
A day later, Maya learns that the victim of the hit-and-run case is Ruksana’s daughter Aaliya. She goes out of her way to help Ruksana and her family, who are still on the streets trying to figure out what their daughter was up to that late.
Ruksana shies away in shame, and so is her husband Salim, who works as a spot boy in the film industry. Salim is resigned to fate, but Ruksana is a fighter struggling to survive the ordeal.
Meanwhile, Rohini (Vidhatri Bandi), a trainee at WRD News Network, is bent on investigating this hit-and-run-case, hoping to get independent credit for a story. The police are also caught in their talk.
Designed in a diary format, the film chronicles the events from Friday, the accident leading up to the following Friday. During this stage, we see feelings and reactions that are related and always touch a soft spot in our soul.
Both Shefali Shah and Vidya Balan are brilliant actresses who act flawlessly. Supporting him with equal enthusiasm is Surya Kashibhatla, who is dear as Ayush. Your heart melts when he defends Ruksana and later calls his mother strange. Equally fascinating is his relationship with Shafin Patel, who plays Imad.
Iqbal Khan and Manav Kaul are stock characters, and Sharad as Salim is a notch better than them.
The film begins with a promise, but by the mid-point, its pace slows down and the pulse doesn’t revive. In the final act, the narrative tries to neatly resolve its multidimensional tensions, but it appears to be a flat-toned, hasty resolution, with Maya detached from her life and bonding with her maidservant. Conflict occurs as a result of, and in this instance, the promise of possible understanding and reconciliation.
Overall, ‘Jalsa’ is a well made film despite its sentimentality. The film is streaming on Amazon Prime Video.