A perfect jugalbandi of characters

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Chalo Dilli is a seemingly innocent study of contrasts, of two worlds that mostly live in isolation and revulsion of the other — at one end is South Mumbai and at the other squats Chandni Chowk. At one end is Louis Vuitton and at the other poplin cut-pieces. Yet the heart-warming thing about us Indians, the film believes and reiterates, is that when the twain meet, one changes the other.

No prizes for guessing who humbles whom. If looked at slightly deeply, there is far too much manipulation here, and machismo. I don't care for the film, but I enjoyed it. Because of Vinay Pathak’s animated act, because Lara Dutta finally got a real role that she deserved, and because I can’t recall the last time I laughed out loud so much in one film.
Chalo Dilli's story is straight-forward. Mihika Banerjee (Lara Dutta) heads a Rs 200-crore investment banking firm. She is finicky, hygiene-obsessed — can’t stand delays or dirt. After a busy morning at office she is rushing to get to the airport to catch a flight to Delhi when a man’s striped kachcha flies in her sunblock-protected face. Traffic, flying kachcha et cetera and she misses her flight and is forced to take a budget airline. The obnoxious owner of the indelicate piece of garment is on the same plane. The flight gets diverted to Jaipur and late at light Mihika hires a cab. But the driver, sleepy and crabby, tries to throw her out. That’s when Manu Gupta the kachcha owner, or Bhai-saab (Vinay Pathak), steps in. He and his three bags pile on — to protect Behenji and to drive her home safely.
Thereon begins Mihika's rural bharat darshan — first meeting is with a sweet and sharmila truckwalla, then a visit to a dhaba to sample some oily and crawling delicacies. Phones go bust, bags get lost, laptop and money get stolen. Stranded, she has no choice but to admire the beautiful sun rise and dig into a plate of puri-aloo. Soon, to burn all the calories, there’s a camel-cart ride, a run-in with a Gujjar gang, and a visit to a make-out joint in Jhunjhunu where a rangarang karyakram is scheduled, for gents only.
All the while Bhai-saab and his chutzpa protect her, help her, and he keeps reassuring her that nothing is as bad as it seems, that life’s true mazza can be found in the next plate of kachori and its real meaning is in having lots of children. Girls, if you please.
Bhai-saab is a creature high-on life, he knows how the system and people work. He belches, farts, and is both repulsive and endearing. Behenji has few life-skills in the real world. She is lost without her phone and husband Vikram, and is both annoying and pitiable.
After life's lessons are taught and learnt, husband Vikram (special appearance of a star) arrives and immediately sucks life out of the film. Chalo Dilli could have ended here. But director Shashant Shah felt the need to levitate aam aadmi with the power of a heart-rending tragedy.
Vinay Pathak as the warm-hearted Dilli ka banda is over-the-top and fabulous. Lara Dutta is a very good too as the moisturised memsahib. They both play exaggerated characters who find themselves in the most bizarre situations, and yet the film works well, held together rather nicely by ludicrous situations, hilarious dialogue and perfect comic timing of the lead pair.
Must add that in a devastating jugalbandi, Yana Gupta and music director Roshan Balu have brutalised the song Laila main Laila.