Cast: Asha Bhosle, Padmini Kolhapure and Ram Kapoor

Director: Mahesh Kodiyal

Rating: 2/5

A stunning relationship between a mother and daughter

Legendary singer Asha Bhosle's debut film has already arrived. The film 'Mai' is a predictable story of how an old citizen has to live life after he/she has performed all the duties and responsibilities of life and how they need to be taken care of by their kids.

While most of such sagas are built on a father/son relationship, like 'Avataar' and 'Baghban', this one comes with the novelty factor as the story here is built around the beautiful mother/daughter relationship. Padmini Kolhapure as Madhu plays daughter to Ashaji referred to as 'Mai' in the film. This one starts off when Mai's only son Munna abandons her after he bags a job in the U.S.A. Her younger daughters hesitate to take the responsibility but the elder daughter Madhu takes the matter of her mother's future in her own hands.

But her own family disagrees with Madhu's decision to take care of Mai. Her husband Subhash (Ram Kapoor) is not very happy with her decision to keep Mai at their place. At the same time she is going through a rough patch in her professional life as well. She eventually has to let go of her job just to make sure that Mai is better taken care of. Her ailing health and age keeps Madhu at home and this all together makes the story high on emotions. Mai is shown suffering from Alzheimer's and the chances of her survival blurs with each passing day. Eventually the film ends on a sad note when Mai has a painful death on the hospital bed.

Though the film's story is repetitive and old age, the film might successfully touch your heart with its high-on-emotions narrations. Also the fact that it has Asha Bhosle in the lead role adds to the novelty factor of the film. It also touches a high, as it revolves around the less-concentrated-on relationship of a mother and daughter. Some of the scenes are brilliantly executed and they leave an awesome impact on the audiences. The film apart from showing the plight of parents tries to showcase that a girl child is never a curse as the boy for whom we always prays for, has no time to take care of their parents and eventually it is the girl who takes over the family's care.

Though this is the first time that the 80-year-old legendary singer Asha Bhosle has ever acted, she will leave you with wet eyes with her realistic act. Performance by Padmini Kolhapure as a daughter is splendid and she leaves you impressed. Ram Kapoor is at his usual best and gives a stellar performance. Director Mahesh Kodiyal could've done better with the narration but fails to keep a hold on the story which does appear dragged at times. The film's main USP is its star cast as the film can be merely watched for the performances in it.

Music by Nitin R. Shankar too doesn't boasts of any great number. The album is average.

Watch out for Ashaji's debut and decent performances by Padmini and Ram Kapoor.