What is this supposed to signify about him? “Hey, Mahi, I know nothing turns chicks on more than popular genre fiction.” Before she arrives, he places a James Patterson novel on a bedside table. In one scene, a slimy co-star invites Mahi back to his hotel room, hoping to seduce her. There are two scenes from Heroine that will stick with me because I’m not sure how to explain them, both involving reading material.

The dance number “Halkat Jawani” is entertaining, too. The good elements of Heroine are limited to Goswami’s awesome cleavage and multiple shirtless shots of Hooda and Rampal. When not in emotional roller coaster mode, the film is too “ inside baseball.” I’m interested in the film industry, and even I couldn’t care less about scenes in which Mahi discusses changes to the marketing budget with her production team. The moral of the story seems to be, “Don’t become an actor.” It’s hard to connect with a character in such a helpless position. She’s a character with no control over her destiny.

The problem is that, no matter what she does, Mahi is always wrong. I don’t fault her, because I think it’s what Bhandarkar wanted. Kapoor’s performance is all over the place. Mahi cries a lot through the melodramatic course of her career, angrily smoking cigarette after cigarette, as if they are responsible for her personal and professional troubles. The indie film debacle results in a night of drunken lesbianism with a co-star (played by Shahana Goswami). The couple breaks up, Mahi abuses pills, goes through a PR makeover, dates an athlete (played by Randeep Hooda), and does an indie film to gain some acting chops. Mahi’s personal life is on the fritz, too, as her married actor boyfriend, Aryan, dawdles on his way to divorce court.

Kapoor plays Mahi, a superstar actress whose position at the top of the Bollywood hierarchy is threatened by newcomers willing to bribe entertainment journalists with shopping vacations. Emotional switches are flipped on a dime, accompanied by dramatic musical cues that are unnecessary because Kapoor’s instantaneous turns from happy to sobbing, shaking fury make it impossible to misinterpret Bhandarkar’s intent. Heroine is so overwrought and lacking in subtlety that it’s impossible to take seriously. During a completely serious moment late in the film, Arjun Rampal’s character, Aryan, tells Kareena Kapoor’s Mahi tenderly, “You look beautiful.” The audience laughed. Let me illustrate the failure of director Madhur Bhandarkar’s Heroine with an anecdote from the showing I attended.

Heroine full movie hindi 2012