Hindi Medium - A sad kind of funny!

This is how it starts. There's a beautiful and soaking romantic Atif Aslam song playing in the introduction, where you see this young, blossoming but potentially unlikely love story where a tailor's son harmlessly (it is always harmless at least in the movies) stalking a customer he's fallen for. The credits roll lazily as you listen to this lovely song and watch him pursue her, without saying a word, becoming the rickshaw wallah, hiding behind the bangle seller, doing what not on the crowded lanes of Chandni Chowk  just to get a glimpse of her. And suddenly, you cut to Raj Batra's garment store in the same area where you see Irrfan teach his staff how to sell better to stereotypical Punjabi aunties and their spoilt daughters - in this case the adorable Mallika Dua. But from this point till the end of the movie, I continued to feel sad that this love story wasn't fleshed out enough though the movie does what it should do in the topic of education which is its primary purpose. I felt so sad, that a week after watching the movie, I'm still tempted to write about it to start cribbing with this very part. While the love story only serves to establish the premise that Raj Batra dotes on his wife and will do anything for her - a theory time and again tested and proven throughout the movie. If you've found a husband like Raj Batra, its likely you've lucked out and you can't complain.

Hindi Medium is about Raj Batra (Irrfan Khan) and his wife Mita (Saba Qamar) who do everything they can (quite literally) to enrol their child in an English medium school. They stand in lines for forms, hire consultants, think of offering bribes, eventually "become poor" to be able to enrol in the Right to Education (RTE) quota. The circumstances they choose to live in to prove their RTE eligible status is where they cross paths with Deepak Dobriyal and his family. As every movie Deepak has been with, he brings a new life to the movie and this one by now is sagging and the popcorn is getting over. The situations with him and his family prompt Irrfan Khan to disclose the truth to the Principal (Amrita Singh) who as annoying as any red tapeist is more than happy she can move someone from RTE to general and earn that extra buck. Amrita plays her annoying but thankfully short cameo well enough, in the end. Finally, the couple decide to send their child to the Government school which they have refurnished and sponsored to fix, to absolve themselves of the guilt they acquire from the Deepak Dobriyal situation.

The goods - Hindi medium tackles a topic which could have been incredibly serious and depressing, yet uses humor to bring out the worst in every situation. I would imagine it can't be entirely fictional, so it is a bit sad that the movie manages to bring out the flaws in our system and one might cringe when they're reminded of a family member or friend from what they see onscreen. It addresses a topic everyone knows and deals with but doesn’t want to talk about. It addresses how our country is hypocritical when we berate our own for not being able to speak correct English, but how we find it endearing when a Frenchman struggles with English in his own pronunciation. Though it overdoes the phrase "tumhe spelling bhi aati hai?" with Meeta asking Raj Batra time and again, it reminds you how we judge people for misspelling or misspeaking something in English. Grammar Nazis, please be prepared to feel a bit guilty and less vain.

Irrfan Khan is par excellence in every scene he is in. He's hilarious with every line he has and yet seems so natural in a very relatable way. You can almost be the guy who goes nuts dancing when Sukhbir's Oh ho ho ho plays, you can almost be the guy who gets admonished by his wife for kicking her at night, be the guy who lies to his wife saying I'm on the way when he hasn't left. There's a lot of natural elements at play in the movie, which work for it more than any other movie on such a topic.

There are some things which don't work - Firstly, how a well to do family who can afford a bungalow in  Vasant Vihar at the drop of a hat, uproots their living in days to go to a chawl is a bit beyond me - But I guess that's shoved in to show how desperate this family is for an admission, especially since their store employee gets admission in the same school they're giving tooth and nail to get. Mita's OCD for cleanliness shown in her first scene does nothing for the rest of the movie except add to her crazy quotient every time she takes a small potential issue and makes it end with Pia taking drugs and getting depressed. Plus, with Irrfan Khan being his level of awesome, Mita should've been played by someone who has more than one emotion. You don't feel for her, you don't relate much to her except her desire to enrol her child in an English Medium school. Amrita Singh's logic for being money minded and commercial don't work - she claims to have come from very modest beginnings but now feels a sense of power when rich parents who bullied her as a child are at her mercy for admissions. It’s a bit insane.

The story gets more overbearing towards the end with one too many emotional drippings (Dobriyal faking an accident to extort money, Ration collection and water filling fiascos, etc). In particular the song where Raj Batra tries to prove that Government school children are incredibly talented completely defies logic - How do those kids get there in a zap, how do they seamlessly perform with the elite school kids is a mystery to me.

If 30 odd minutes shorter, it is however much less flawed. It still remains the kind of movie you want to see because you'll laugh your gut out, but you realize you must see to understand the state of education even amongst the affluent lot in India. Release wise it competes with something as trashy as Half Girlfriend, which still gathered more than deserved moolah at the box office so it’s a good thing that Hindi Medium has been made tax-free in Maharashtra, something the other states should do as well. Go, definitely watch if you have time to spare and need some laughter therapy!