Bombay Begums

Bombay Begums review :

Released on Netflix earlier this month, Bombay Begums got in to an ongoing controversy for its alleged drug abuse involving children as well as immoral relationships. Frankly, as a viewer, these things least bother me as long as the filmmaker has an entertaining story to tell. Something which can grip you till the end. Unfortunately, Alankrita Shrivastava's six episode web-series is over-stretched to extent that it exhausts itself within the first two to three episodes.

The plot revolves around a medium sized bank whose CEO Rani (Pooja Bhatt) is battling the internal politics along with her nagging menopause. She re-hires a fired fresher Ayesha (Plabita Borthakur) for a new CSR project which involves rehabilitation of a prostitute Lily (Amruta Subhash) who lives for her child's future. Fatima (Shahana Goswami) is finding it tough to balance the hectic worklife with her impending motherhood but nevertheless, takes the call to get promoted after Rani persuades her.

Next, the creepy male CEO aspirant (Manish Chaudhary, effective) lays his hands on unsuspecting Ayesha while Fatima falls for the charms of her firangi client and cheats on her hubby (Vivek Gomber). Meanwhile, Rani's step daughter Shai (Aadhya Anand) has a drug overdose at a friends party.

One interesting fact about Bombay Begums is that all its characters - big or small and male or female - have grey shades to them. No one is swanky clean; no one is disgustingly evil either. They are flawed persons vying for name and existence in this material world. Ayesha is shown a bisexual who is struggling with her preferences. Fatima loves her hubby but still gives in to the temptation of a torrid affair. Shai is a confused soul who speaks through her art and misses her dead mommy to point of living a fantasy.

Alankrita's characters are well etched but the screenplay is so overlong that you lose attention after the first three episodes. The sex scenes get repetitive. So does all that corporate world mumbo jumbo. A crisp four episode series would've made Bombay Begums infinitely better...and recommendable. As for the drug abuse bit, Madhur Bhandarkar's Page 3 (2005) had more shocking scenes than the one depicted here. That film won a National award while poor Begums is on verge of getting banned. Truly unnecessary!!

All said and seen, the series' biggest positive are the brilliant performances from the girl gang - all of them. Pooja Bhatt and Shahana Goswami are clear standouts and it feels great to see Pooja back in action after being relegated to a photograph in pappa Mahesh's Sadak 2 last year. Pooja Bhatt rocks. Unfortunately, Bombay Begums don't!!

Regards, Sumeet Nadkarni.

Bombay Begums focuses on lives of Mumbai women belonging to different parts of society. It's female oriented show with high dose of feminism and flawed too, but then you can't deny the fact that the series is engaging.

I didn't liked the fact that there was too much of sensous scenes which was not necessary. Too much of booze.

The thing I liked most was the portryal of corporate women in the series which looks convincing. The characters are flawed but I guess the heart of the story is in right place.

Alankrita Srivastava, the writer and director of the show is known for pushing boundaries with her portrayal of women's sexuality and Bombay Begums is no different.

Corporate politics, struggle for women for survival seems real in the story and is engaging.

The performance of each and every lead actresses is top notch. Pooja Bhatt is simply superb in this.

If they are simply showing 5 lives of women without any disclaimer, then, it's fine. But how are these women portrayed as Begum? This is not empowerment. Except laxmi all characters seem hopeless, unwise and stupid.

Women don't need to act like irresponsible men to get empowered. Let's create shows where both men and women are expected to act wisely and responsibly. Just don't try to portray cheating, stupidity, taking drugs as empowerment. If men do it, it's wrong. If women do it, it's wrong.

The characters i most hated was of the ayesha. She is like a leech. Who survive on others and take advantage of others. Most annoying. Overall series was slow n boring.

The storyline of this series is good , specially the acting is superb. This story is about struggle of a womans and how to overcome thair problems.