‘Tera Intezaar’: Thanks CBFC for withholding ‘Padmavati’ (Review)

By Subhash K Jha

Film: "Tera Intezaar"; Director: Rajeev Walia; Cast: Sunny Leone, Arbaaz Khan, Aarya Babbar, Salil Ankola and Sudha Chandran; Rating: 0 stars

If God, CBFC and the Karni Sena (not necessarily in that order) had permitted, we would have been watching Sanjay Leela Bhansali's "Padmavati" this week, but the Gods below in all their wisdom, decided to pull the plug on "Padmavati".

Instead, we have this amazing homage to Indian womanhood called "Tera Intezaar" where Sunny Leone, clearly the poster-girl of our sanskari CBFC channel, cavorts in bikinis, briefs and blouses that flatter to deceive. And flutter to titillate.

The "Padmavati" haters will love this one. The makers of "Tera Intezaar" have made sure that our precious 'Bharatiya sabhyata' doesn't suffer any dent, bruise or hurt. Hence, the appealing Ms Leone dances a lot, including to the beats of a song that goes "Main Hoon Sexy Barbie Girl", but never the "Ghoomar" -- God forbid! And her leading man -- the most wooden Khan hero you will ever see -- is named, hold you breath and swords, Rajeev Rajput.

Sushant, go eat your heart out.

That apart, here is the thing about this strange collage of disembodied images masquerading as a movie. Ms Leone, who, I repeat, doesn't do the "Ghoomar", doesn't really show anything we haven't seen before. Nor does she show anything we'd like to see. She is no more your woman from the forbidden (wet) dreams. She is now this devoted intense art dealer named Rounak who patronizes a new artiste Rajeev who disappears on her.

They meet and sing songs about waiting for love to happen.

Rounak is distraught (we know, because Ms Leone's lips tremble, her eyelashes flutter and her bosom heaves). She takes the help of a clairvoyant (Sudha Chandran, trying hard to look like a school teacher who has just caught her favourite student with a naughty video clip of Sunny Leone) and a guy on the phone whom Ms Leone keeps calling 'Jijoo' probably because he is married to her sister.

I figured the relation, because watching a film like this sharpens the intellect.

The villains of the piece are four crooked art dealers. Now, the thing is, this quartet of crooks hangs around together all the time. And I mean all the time, maybe they even go to the loo together. They are together in every single frame. And I mean every frame which includes portraits hanging on the wall... Don't ask me how or why they get there.

It's too complicated to explain. All I know is that Sanjay Leela Bhansali could never dream of scaling the depths of relevance and heights of meaning achieved in "Tera Intezaar".

My heart bled for poor Rounak as she searched for her lost love. Poor things! Little did she know that the hero was missing because he was played by Arbaaz Khan, the most embarrassing Khan we've ever seen perform, or not perform, in our cinema.

It saddened me to see the very distinguished parliamentarian-actor Raj Babbar's son Aarya and former cricketer Salil Ankola playing goons and hamming so intensely, I feared for their facial muscles. Of course, I understand the fact that when you have a hero who is stiff in all the wrong places, the director (or whoever is responsible for putting together this work of timeless art) must have actors who really act with all their might.

But all shared and dumb, "Tera Intezaar" is primarily a showcaseA for Sunny Leone's unfathomable virtuosity. She goes from besotted lover girl to inconsolably bereaved beloved without missing a beat. She is truly our poster-girl for Make In India. In one sequence, she falls to the ground in a morgue weeping (with a door marked 'Mortuary Room') as Arbaaz appears before her as a ghost.

There, Ms Leone wept for all the wandering spirits of the universe.

So thank you, censor board, for putting "Padmavati" in its place by putting "Tera Intezaar" in its place.