No One Killed Jessica

No One Killed Jessica

Stars: Rani Mukherjee, Vidya Balan

Directed by: Rajkumar Gupta

Released: January 7, 2011

No One Killed Jessica was a film that I was greatly anticipating. I had heard of Jessica Lal’s murder long before I sat down to watch the film and was touched – and of course saddened – by her story. The trailer was top notch and promised meaningful quotes, powerful scenes and tears. Well, that isn’t exactly what happened.

On a late night in 1999, bar maid and aspiring model and actress Jessica Lal refuses to give a rowdy man a drink after she and her fellow bar tender have quite serving alcohol for the night. She swears that she will not give it to him, not even for 1000 rupees. Angry, the man pulls out a gun and shoots her dead on the spot. Jessica’s older sister Sabrina (Balan) is heartbroken, but is assured that there will be justice for her bubbly baby sis. There were over 300 people at the party, many of them witnesses to the crime itself. It seems like it would be an easy, open and shut case right? Wrong.

The key witness, Jessica’s bar tender friend, saw what happened first hand but eventually proves not to be very helpful in the prosecutions’ case. Sabrina is outraged when she finds out that the killer is the son of a powerful man in India, and that her sister’s murderer is getting away from justice because of the power of bribing. She does her best to fight for her sister – she talks to witnesses, spreads the word, but none of them prove to be fruitful. She and her family begin to fall apart under the pressure of their grief and their mission for justice.

Meera (Mukherjee), is a news reporter full of attitude. Don’t cross her, don’t make her angry – or you’ll pay. When she first hears of the story, she doesn’t think twice. As everyone else assumed, she thought it would be an open and shut murder case, hardly worth her time. But when she catches wind of how the trial was a bust, she becomes more interested in this case. With her help, she is able to shine light on the error of the courts and give Sabrina the relief and peace she had wanted for so long.

Despite the amazing trailer that I mentioned earlier, the film really lacked luster. It wasn’t as fast passed and meaningful as I had imagined and I soon found myself sticking with it for the entire time for Jessica’s memory and Rani’s performance. Rani, despite being shown to be second banana to Vidya, was the heart and soul of this film. She was playing a character that was different from any other avatar I’ve seen of hers before, and she was perfect at it. I now want her to be a brash bitch in more movies. Perhaps because this mirrors my personality in some ways, or at least the person I wish I could be, but for me, she was the true hero of the story. Vidya was a grey mouse, through and through. I went to this movie wanting to see how she was as an actress because at this time I was not her fan. This movie proved to me that I hated her (thankfully that would change when I watched Parineeta). She had nothing to do and when she did, it was awkward and boring.

No One Killed Jessica was easy enough to get through, but I think I would have liked it better had I not had such high expectations for a ground shaking, mind changing film. If you decide to skip the film, please at least take a look at Dilli, the fantastic song that was really responsible for the heart racing excitement of the trailer and promotions.

Rating: 6/10