There are good films and there are bad films … and then there is Dil Juunglee, which is so bad that it nullifies the good work by other filmmakers. Starring the usually careful Taapsee Pannu and the once-promising Saqib Saleem, this Aleya Sen directorial project deserves a place in the list of those films that couldn’t even complete a week due to its weak plot, silly execution and mismatched lead pair that has just one thing in common – irritating the audience.

The film revolves around the adventures of a group of friends led by Sumit (Saqib Saleem) and Koroli (Taapsee Pannu) who decide to elope one fine night; after their car meets with an accident and they find out that they aren’t compatible with each other, they decide to call it quits in time. Seven years later, they meet in different circumstances and decide to stay with their current partners only to find out that their old love is stronger than their new love (whatever that is!).

The film follows the pattern of films made in the 70s – the boy’s mother rejects the girl due to her being Manglik but agrees to have her as her bahu ahead of the climax; Saqib’s wannabe Bollywood actor can be based on himself since he is still a wannabe despite his sister Huma Qureshi making it big; Taapsee should quit doing such films since it damages her reputation and the faith of those who have seen her in Pink; and why were Nidhi Singh and Srishti Shrivastava trying to act stupid when it was evident that they weren’t faking it? Then there was Koroli’s fiancée played by Santosh Barmola who may have played a billionaire but was in reality no different than an average Joe since he doubted her wife-to-be for going around the city with her childhood friend. Duh!

There is absolutely nothing that you can take back from the film except feeling angry on the Gazab Ka Din remix that was unnecessary and unlistenable. Most of the sequences in the film seem to have been devised after the locations were finalized because they seemed half-baked and half-heartedly done. Saqib Saleem needs to take some acting classes or go behind the camera if he wants to stay in Bollywood otherwise many better actors will go past him in the race to stardom. This is the kind of film one would have expected from a newbie director but such a product coming from India gives hope to filmmakers in Pakistan. There still exists a level where the makers in Bollywood and Pakistan can compete and that is what we call mediocrity.