Queen - When Life gives you Lemons, make Lemonade!

It is like a tall glass of freshly squeezed lemonade on a warm summer afternoon. At the same time, it is like a power packed pill of courage on a day chock-full of trials and tribulations. It is Delhi’s 'gol-gappas', colour and love, Amsterdam’s hostels, beer-bikes and pole dancers and the parties, glitz and allure of Paris - all blended into a heady medley. And amidst all this is Vikas Bahl’s Rani, a.k.a Queen, who takes us along on a journey from the bowels of helplessness and heartbreak to the pinnacles of strength and confidence.

As the film begins you find yourself standing in the courtyard of a classic middle-class household in Rajouri, New Delhi where wedding preparations, reminiscent of films like ‘Tanu weds Manu’ and ‘Band, Baaja, Baaraat’ are at their peak. Bearers balance steel tumblers brimming with frothy lassi on trays and decorators streak bare walls with strings of marigold. An endearing Dadi and her retinue of spirited friends sway to the tunes of Hindi dance numbers. With restrained euphoria, Rani – the much protected daughter of the family – gets her soon-to-be husband’s name painted on her palm with henna. Despite a couple of customary hiccups like power cuts and missing photographers, the smiles, ‘thumkas’ and blessings flow unbridled, blissfully unaware of the tragedy that is about to strike them down.

Days before the wedding Rani’s shy smile is wiped off her face in an instant when her London returned fiancé suddenly deems her unsuitable to be his bride. In one callous sweep he dusts not only the dried grains of her henna off the table but also the shattered remains of her dignity off his conscience. That moment sticks with you and your heart goes out to this lost girl clad in a simple hand knitted cardigan, tears threatening to tumble down her cheeks any moment. It appears as if her whole fragile world of dreams and hopes has come crashing down right in front of her eyes. The story could have ended here, leaving us with a pitiful image of a jilted girl withering away till yet another knight in a shining armour appears on a white steed to rescue her from a life of stodginess.

Instead, with growing respect we observe Rani surface from under a film of shock and self loathing to nurse her own wounds and experience by herself the hidden joys that the world has to offer. Drawing strength from the kindness and encouragement showered on her by the family, she quells her fears and heads to Paris – a city she had earmarked, what seems like an eon ago, for her honeymoon. At first, her insecurities plague her and she misses the presence of a man by her side, guiding and instructing her through life. Nevertheless, one cathartic monologue and a shimmy to the tunes of ‘Hungama ho gaya’ later you see her breaking the chains of propriety and releasing all her pent up emotions. The weight lifts off her chest and she spreads her wings and takes off.

Rani’s adventures have only just begun. With wide-eyed amazement she watches, learns and discovers her own potential – to make friends, to charm strangers, to drive a car, to earn a living and to take care of herself. Slowly, buried under layers of pain, she unearths her smile as well and with that fixed firmly on her face she lights up the movie infinitely. Soon she finds herself enjoying all those harmless things that are otherwise labelled abominable for 'girls belonging to good families' back home. From befriending boys to savouring a night of drunken revelry and from turning down her ex-fiancé’s offer to take her back to experiencing what she calls  her first 'lip-to-lip' kiss with a firang whom she has a crush on – Rani does it all and with the merry abandon of a soul who has snatched peace and happiness from the clutches of despair.

What makes it even more believable is the fact that she does not undergo a total transformation. She is still the girl who thinks that a vibrator is a joint-massager and that losing her ‘virzinity’ is a total no-go for an unmarried girl. It is refreshing beyond words to see Rani retain her identity and her innocence without a care for people who might find it hilarious. And, it is exhilarating to know that when she was at a fork in her life from where she could have chosen to either go down a path inundated with pity, hurtful gossip and self destruction or opt to forget her misery and start afresh, she selected the latter. Even though the film has a women-centric overtone, I believe that there is something that all of us, irrespective of gender, can learn from it. We can all learn to take life as it comes and to never forget who we really are. As for me, in addition to all of the above, Queen was exactly what I needed to mop clean the gloom that a sky full of clouds had cast on my day off.