LSD 2 (Love, Sex Aur Dhoka 2), directed by Dibakar Banerjee, is a spiritual sequel to the 2010 film of the same name. The common factor between these films is that the narrative is divided into three segments, telling us interlinked stories of different people.
In LSD (2010) the ‘Love,’ ‘Sex’ and ‘Dhoka’ segments were titled Superhit Pyaar, Paap Ki Dukkaan and Badnaam Shohorat. The prequel was made using spy cameras, handy cams, security cameras, and an underwater camera, which gave a final output. These interlinked stories dealt with honour killings, an MMS scandal and a sting operation with a non-linear narrative. LSD 2 has a similar non-linear structure with a modern touch.
The non-linear narrative (written by the director along with the writers of Eeb Allay Ooo! (Prateek Vats and Shubham ) in Banerjee’s LSD sequel delves into friendship, love, self-discovery and complexities in modern relationships in the digital era. The film is more Gen-Z oriented, which also shows us the dark side of social media and living a dual life in an increasingly virtual reality.
The segments in Love, Sex Aur Dhoka 2 are titled “Like,” “Share,” and “Download.” The stories are interlinked and the key incidents of another story affecting the protagonist in each segment can be noticed.
The first one (Like) revolves around Noor (played by Paritosh Tiwari), a trans contestant on a reality show called ‘Truth ya nach’ (which resembles the sets of Big Boss and Nach Baliye). The judges are Anu Malik playing Prem Desi, Tusshar Kapoor as Tusshar, Sophie Choudhary as Sophie (all in cameos) and Mouni Roy as anchor and show coordinator Soni. The narrative is about Noor doing her best to win the show by increasing the likes, which depends on how much reality is unravelled and how long she is on camera.
In the next segment (Share), damage control manager Lovina Singh (Swastika Mukherjee) has to save her company’s reputation as a sexually equivocal Metro Railway Station employee, Kulu (Bonita Rajpurohit) is terribly assaulted. All the social work and the care-for-the-employee ends when a reality check is thrown at us as Lovina says “Get that thing out of my station tonight.” There is a death of a child in the same school where Lovina’s son goes to.
The incident is carried to the last segment (Download). Here, an 18-year-old Shuham Narang’s (Abhinav Singh) aka ‘Gama Pappi’(his virtual name) life revolves in a virtual world where his subscribers help him roll out money. Soon things turn upside down when virtual reality hits him back literally making him strip himself naked in front of the camera. Later, we are taken into a world of virtual reality.
Unlike its predecessor, LSD 2 loses the touch of the level of visual rawness as there are no spy cameras or any security cameras where the visual quality is blurry which seem as if we are watching someone’s stolen sex tape. But, the shooting techniques are similar and no camera angle or movement is left while filming this movie. The handheld camera movements are at their best. And, so are the sharp cuts by the editor (Naman Arora).
LSD 2 is bold and sharp with the technicalities. So is terrific music by Sneha Khanwalkar and lyrics by the director himself. This dark film is not for the soft-hearted people and not for the ones who plan to watch this film with their families.
LSD 2 is now available at your nearby theatres.
