Hichki Review - No Bad Teachers

Hichki couldn’t have come at a better time. One month after legendary actress, Sridevi’s passing, Rani Mukerji is back to set the screen on fire. Like Sridevi’s comeback, English Vinglish, Hichki will make you feel for the protagonist and watch in awe as she turns her frown upside down. Both these films chronicle the life of two happy go-lucky women who decide to actively work towards bettering their lives.

Yet, unlike English Vinglish, I never felt for Naina Mathur (played by a superb Rani Mukerji) like I did for Sridevi’s Shashi. Perhaps, I shouldn’t. That is the triumph of writer-director Siddharth P. Malhotra. He never sets the film as a sob story for Naina, because God was ‘unkind’ to her by granting her Tourette’s Syndrome. Instead, he makes a light-hearted dramedy that changed the way I felt both about teachers and about under-privileged children.

Irregardless of what I say in the next few lines, Hichki is nowhere near a perfect film. Its pacing is uneven (but never slow), its writing sometimes gets lazy and it lacks those one or two laugh out loud moments like films before it like Taare Zameen Par had. The reason I will end up giving the film 3.5 stars out of 5 is for one thing and one thing only - its heart. The film is designed as a feel-good picture, so while there are things, especially in the first and last acts that will wring your heart dry, Sid and his writers never leave you without a smile on your face and more importantly, a tear in your eye.

I’d never heard of Tourette’s Syndrome before this, nor had I met anybody with it. I don’t know how accurate the stellar Rani Mukerji was in respect to the actual Tourette Syndrome - but in the film’s setting, she’s pitch perfect. For the first time, a film made me as a reviewer feel utterly useless. Because Hichki doesn’t deserve to be critiqued on the things that a movie is usually critiqued on (its writing, cinematography, screenplay, etc.) Irrespective of its many flaws, the actress led by Rani, charge through the film and make you feel for each and every one of them.

Rani’s performance elevates a so-so screenplay but interesting story into much more. She’s perfect. Her triumphs are ours and her hichkis (hiccups) are felt by us. Rani plays Naina with such a heartbreaking likability that she forces you to love her. In the hands of another actress, this would’ve been much less. Unlike other Bollywood films where syndromes/diseases are used for convenience, Hichki never forgets that Naina has Tourette’s. At regular intervals, she has her tics, assuring audiences that writers Ankur Chaudhary, Ambar Hadap and Ganesh Pandit know what they’re doing and are in control of the screenplay and story.

Jasleen Royal’s music and score make the film cuter in a sense. I remembered Secret Superstar’s childlike whimsy that helped me remember the film so many months later. Royal’s debut as Music Composer is assuring, and while she doesn’t reach the heights that Shankar-Ehsaan-Loy did with Taare Zameen Par, I’ll be damned if I said that it wasn’t a great soundtrack. The children of the municipality or the ‘basti ke bacche’ are perfect. Especially Harsh Mayar as the problematic Atish. I couldn’t find the names of the rest of the kids, but the actors playing Oru and Killam also command you to care for them.

The film teaches us that there aren't any bad teachers. So even when Siddharth and his writers use Naina as a tool for social commentary (and it makes you feel like you're watching reruns of Padman and Toilet Ek Prem Katha), and attempt to teach you something, they do it with so much heart, that it rings true that there aren't any bad teachers (maybe some shameless ones), but nonetheless.

Hichki is filled with holes in its plot and Siddharth never risks it, and I come back to my earlier point that Hichki doesn’t deserve to be critiqued by basic standards. I’m critiquing it based on how much it made me cry, how satiated I felt and how happy I was that a large production house like Yash Raj Films put their might behind such a special film. Hichki moves forward because of the force that Rani commands. This is her film and nobody can argue that. Her Naina made me sob, cry, laugh but never made me feel bad for her condition. That’s a triumph in itself. I’m going with 3.5 stars for the film. A few hichkis in the plot never hurt anybody.