Cast: Sonakshi Sinha, Badshah, Varun Sharma

Directed By: Shilpi Dasgupta

Films like Vicky Donor and Shubh Mangal Savdhan dealt with issues based on sex and were a huge success. It is because with an interesting concept it had an engaging screenplay. And Khandaani Shafakhana lacks in it.

The film is about a small-town girl Baby Bedi (Sonakshi Sinha) who is the only bread-winner in her family who struggles in life. And one day she gets a chance to solve the issue by selling her Uncle, Unani hakims sex clinic which is near the real estate area. But the only condition is before selling the clinic she has to work there for six months.

The twist is that the clinic is in a small town of Punjab where uttering the word 'sex' is a taboo. The premise is quite interesting but it is let down by a weak screenplay. The film is slow, lazy and extremely tiring.

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Writer Gautam Mehra created scenes where people are trying to be comfortable with a conversation on sex, but somewhere he himself doesn't seem at ease with it. For the most part of the film, the characters just beat around the bush. The film takes more than the first half to complete the first act of the screenplay.

However, the saving grace of Khandaani Shafakhana is its actors. Director Shilpi Dasgupta provides Sonakshi with a meaty role, which allows her to deliver. Baby Bedi might be the actress finest roles after giving multiple flops. Baby's lazy, hopeless brother Bhooshit Bedi, played by Varun Sharma, keep the film afloat.

Varun manages to snatch some laughs from the audience, delivering some good jokes in an otherwise bland film. But this actor has become stereotyped by the industry giving him the same goofy, dumb-witted roles. Varun isn't utilized much in Khandaani Shafakhana. His limited screen time leaves you asking for more.

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Badshah plays the role of a popular rapper, Gabru Ghaatak in the film, pretty similar to his real-life persona. Donning swanky glares, gold chains, and bright outfits, it gets difficult to separate Badshah the rapper from his character. Kulbhushan Kharbanda plays Baby's Mamaji, who mostly appears in the flashback scenes. 

Apart from these actors, the makers have roped in Annu Kapoor to play the role of a lawyer in a brief role who has the charge of handing over Mamaji's property, his sex clinic, to Baby. In the process, he tries to explain to her the importance of the sex clinic and how rich the heirloom is. Annu's role in the film isn't much different from that of Dr. Chaddha in Vicky Donor.

Khandaani Shafakhana is another example that proves that Bollywood is thinking out of the box. But the subject alone isn't enough, the key is to present it in an engaging manner, with a dose of entertainment. But the film turned out to be the laziest version of Vicky Donor.