‘I want to give my child a better life and that’s why I’m here illegally’ is a great premise for a film. You expect a gritty film like The Illegal (starring Suraj Sharma) or a satire like Aandavan Kattalai (starring Vijay Sethupathi) but this Punjabi film is a situational comedy which falls on Neeru Bajwa’s shoulders to handle.
Beautiful Billo is filled with situations that get more and more odd, calling for a full-on slapstick comedy, but advice like, ‘Jaga apne andar ki chudail aur kar de uske saare waar putthe’ (wake the witch inside you and beat her at the game) keep you engaged.
This movie has it all: a pregnant woman with no identity documents, a wife who’s fed up of her husband’s relatives, a docile man who’s being blackmailed for his bachelor party photos, a slap happy granny, a flirty aunty with a grown-up son, girlfriends who give advice, and a cop who has caught 98 illegal immigrants and wants to make a century…
‘My name is Bajirao Birmingham!’ is the funniest introduction I have heard in a while. A sardarji cop who claims that his ‘eyes are always red’ and should he open his mouth, out will come ‘maa-behen ki gaalis’. But I get ahead…
A meek man called Navi and his feisty wife Sonika have just moved into an independent home. Sonika doesn’t want to be an unpaid slave to her husband’s family (and assorted relatives) who just make her cook and do dishes all day, every day, until her hands look like they belong to Sunny Deol. The two are dealing with a long line of unwanted guests. The very first is Billo.
Billo is beautiful. Billo knows how to get her own way. Billo needs to stay in Navi’s home until her husband comes back from Scotland with papers to ‘make permanent’ their immigration status. Billo is also pregnant. How many lies can Billo tell until her documentation is sorted? Do her lies work?
Navi’s grandmother lands up with the aunt and her son to make things more difficult for Billo. Grandma believes Billo is Navi’s wife. Navi and Billo have to tell more lies to make grandma believe Sonika is the wife. Sonika needs to find a way to get Billo out of her house and live like a queen. Things get even more muddled when Navi insists that his friend Shinde is Billo’s husband.
Dadi slaps more people and soon Shinde has also moved into Navi and Sonika’s home. You feel for Navi but the women dominate the film. Even though the aunt’s son - who is constantly being berated as Kalya (darkie) - is suspicious (and rightfully so) about the goings on in the house, his quest for the truth gets him into trouble…
I liked the fact that they are single-minded about Billo’s illegal status in everything that happens in the movie. We know Billo has a husband because she calls him ever so often which keeps the tension alive.
The laughs are associated with the dialogue (‘I will hit you so hard, even your non-existent kidney stones will get out of your body’, ‘You think you’re going to make me do the dishes? I’ve made my husband do the dishes…’), but the one time it becomes true comedy is when dadi inadvertently panhandles…
I’ve liked Neeru Bajwa since I watched Jatt & Juliet, and unlike many Bollywood heroines, she can tackle the narrative single-handedly. And this film is all Billo… I mean Neeru Bajwa. Everyone else pales in front of her. Neeru’s sister in real life Rubina Bajwa plays Sonika, who can be pacified with a Gucci dress, is very pretty and has great screen presence.
The background music is a constant presence and I wished at many points that I felt we could have done without it, but with so many people being slapped, the background music works… The song ‘Lemme make a tik tok video’ has so many home truths, I forwarded the link to my Insta reel mad nieces!
This film belongs to the ‘could’ve been funnier but a great one-time watch’ category. Beautiful Billo plays on Zee 5.
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