Queen Review
Director- Vikas Bahl
Genre- Comedy/ drama
Can be watched on- Netflix
Kangana Ranaut ,our queen is an unapologetically stubborn, fierce and opinionated woman was born in a small town called Bhambla. Due to her parent’s constant pressure to pursue medicine while her heart was set on performing arts ,she ran away from home to fulfil her dreams.She was the kind of woman who had no tolerance for discrimination and did not care about fitting in into the moulds made by society for women. Infact, Kangana also turned into a dialogue writer for this film as it the character Rani was very personal and relatable for her. She is also known as the ‘queen of controversy’ as she is not afraid to live on her own terms and never minces her words .This often spikes controversy among the press.
Queen introduced us to a timid ,dewy eyed, innocent girl called Rani who is preparing for the biggest and most awaited day of her life-her wedding day.After being dumped at the altar, she embarks on a journey of self transformation and comes back from her “honeymoon/heartbreak holiday” to Paris and Amsterdam with the realisation that she is worth so much more than what anyone ever gave her credit for.This is not a typical movie in which a woman after being betrayed by her lover avenges him or magically transforms into a completely new person .This is the story of a vulnerable girl who finally gets the chance to grow into a confident and independent women. Seeing new kinds of food, new cultures and new lifestyles bursts her bubble and introduced her to people who truly live only for themselves, people who aren’t concerned about what society thinks of them.
Some girls dream of standing on their own feet and proving to society that they can do what a boy can’t ,while some dream of getting happily married and serving their family. Rani had happily accepted that she was the latter as she had never even seen different type of women.She never realised that the itinerary of her life was laid out by everyone but her..She was so sheltered in “mummy-daddy’s mithai shop” that she never listened to her heart or her head. Her heart beat in Vijay’s life and his word was law. Vijay ,played by Rajkummar Rao casually broke up their marriage over a cup of coffee and seemed unmoved. On the other hand, you could see in Rani’s eyes that her entire world had come crashing down. Her parents were extremely supportive and understanding whether it was respecting her decision to go on a honeymoon without a husband or her strange antics like calling them at 3am to ask the english translation of “hing”.
Being a typical Delhi girl obsessed with her earrings from Lajpatnagar, only Bollywood songs had the power to make her dance her heart out and bring out the party animal that had been crushed by the words of the infamous aunty -jis and mummy jis. Only after getting drunk does she truly speak her heart out about the restrictions she had all her life, something she would’ve never been able to do in a conscious state.
This movie taught me that you find happiness in unexpected places. Rani went to Paris as she wanted to lick her wounds alone but instead found the friends of a lifetime. Strangers who she met by chance-(Vijaylaxmi, Oleksander, Taka and Tim) were her partners in crime and pillars of support. It taught me that love and marriage is not about who is superior. It taught me that its never too early to reinvent yourself. It taught me that we shouldn’t compare the length of a relationship with its strength. After her eventful trip ,Rani hugged and thanked Vijay as he was the one who helped her walk away from a toxic relationship ,from a man who would have always stopped her from blossoming.She learnt countless lessons on her trip but the most important one was that a queen doesn’t need a king to rule the world.
