Leila - Laila. Not Leela. A Review

Leila , the latest Indian series on Netflix, borrows its name and storyline from Prayag Akbar's book. That is his real name right since birth. Pronounced Laila, ( as in the song Laila o Laila , Kaisi main Laila), the show carries the twin theme of a mother willing to do whatever it takes to find her lost daughter, besides a clear political agenda. The mother- daughter show ends up being a side show though.

The storytelling is compelling and keeps you interested.

This is clearly Huma Qureshi's show. Her character isn't the always morally right hero , but has been shown as someone with very human qualities and the faults that come along with that. She is a fine actor and is bold enough to take a role that doesn't carry make-up for most part, a risk not many actresses would take. She plays Shalini Pathak ( the show uses surnames to further its political propaganda quite effectively).  

Shalini Pathak is searching for her daughter Leila, born out of a marriage to a Muslim man. Leila has been taken away from her mother as Hindu-Muslim marriages are not allowed as per laws, that is , laws of the fictional land Aryavat where the story is set. You can possibly get a sense that armchair newspaper oped writers have shifted to writing fiction. Or maybe that was always the case. As it turns out, the author of the book is a former journalist.

The show has been shot in Delhi and Nehru Place and some other areas are identifiable.

Background music is on similar pattern to the one seen/heard in Sacred Games and does appear familiar and misfit at times. Use of silence is quite good though. 

The attention to detail is refreshing and hopefully shows like this will have an effect on the overall production quality in India. Since its a futuristic show, the gadgets , phone etc are like transparent glass slabs with projection capabilities. Even in scenes where the phones are barely noticeable, these consistencies have been maintained.

Certain scenes that exhibit class conflit is really something that should make people think. These scenes are very real, that has played out in front of possibly each one of our homes. If the shows grills in the fear of a pushback among elites and hence make them change,  the show would have done a decent job in its messaging.

Acting is good overall, except some irritating over the top hamming from certain actors speaking Sankritic Hindi. Being able to speak Sankritic Hindi is clearly the art that only the evil have. Unless, of course he has a taste for Faiz Ahmad Faiz. In that case, he is less evil, as the show would have you believe. 

When the book was released, it had received decent publicity ( perks of being born in an influential lineage). In an interview at that time that I had seen,  the author  was asked why he chose the name 'Leila', which can be pronounced both as Leela ( a Hindu name) or Laila( a Muslim name). The author answered that the name doesn't give away the religion and he wanted to play with that ambiguity in the readers mind, something he considered important for absorbing the theme of the book. The series makers have gone for Laila, clearly indicating from what prism they look at the book.(Link)  I haven't read the book, but the series is unambiguous about which community it wants to paint in a negative light ( there is one character for token balancing act, but not many will be fooled). Spoiler alert (select  the whitened text only if you want to read): in one scene, in which 'Paap' of women is read out, one of the 'Paap' is that women was asking for equal property right ( As per Indian laws , only the Hindu and Indian system of religions like Sikhism, Jainism and Buddhism allow equal property rights to women since 2005, In Islam, women share is only half of the man's share, Christian canonical law doesn't allow this equal rights wherever  they are followed in India, but as the saying goes, why let facts get in way of a good propaganda.) 

As a standalone show, it should to be judged on its own and it does good job of raising some valid questions while exaggerating some other ( nobody is blasting off Taj Mahal! Please.). But as a production house, Netflix India wont be able to escape the criticism on selective nature of its creative enquiry for long, if only a particular system is the subject of its critical assessment, while other systems are given a free pass despite being strictly guided by medieval revelations in a model world.