Next Enti movie review: Kunal Kohli’s muddled writing makes watching this film a labourious exercise

Kunal Kohli’s Next Enti is not a film. It’s a maze where the walls are built with loud speakers of its characters talking to each other. The sigh of relief that you feel right after you get out of the maze is perhaps the best thing about the film. The icing on the cake is the silence that you feel in your ears. Trust me, after watching Next Enti, you can actually hear silence. You begin to appreciate it even more. Maybe for that reason alone, you should watch Next Enti, because this is a shining example of what a verbose film, which is based on muddled writing, can do to you. The best part about Next Enti is that you won’t remember anything right after watching it. And chances are that you’ll lose track of what’s happening on screen, and what the characters are fighting over even when the scene is unfolding in some corner of England. The colours are muted, and just when you are about to bask in the glory of how beautiful a scenic location looks, someone begins talking in the frame. [caption id=“attachment_5682651” align=“alignnone” width=“825”]  Tamannaah and Sundeep Kishan in a still from Next Enti. YouTube[/caption] Kunal Kohli’s writing has the same annoying after effect of a tuning fork that’s thrusted into your ears. The problem isn’t with how ‘talkative’ everyone is, but it’s more about what the film wants to say and how much it wants to say within two hours of its runtime. You could instead watch the entire Game Of Thrones series thrice by the time Next Enti comes to an end and still not get bored. This film takes a cue from Hum Tum, which had a funny take on how man and women differ in thought. But here, it’s anything but funny. Through a series of long takes and never-ending conversations, Kunal Kohli explains the psyche of modern young women and men, and how they expect different things from their partners. Tammy (Tamannaah) is realistic about her life and wants someone who would love her for who she is, and not just because she’s attractive; Sanju (Sundeep Kishan) is upset that his relationship with Tammy hasn’t reached next level even after six months; Krish (Navdeep) is heartbroken when Tammy gets cold feet despite knowing about his past. Next Enti is a story about Tammy and his relationships with men in her life. She loves her father (played with grace by Sharath Babu) and his relationship advice is sternly etched in her mind. Unfortunately, the men in her life don’t get it. And there lies the problem. For a film which is so simple about it wants to say, Kunal Kohli turns Next Enti into a pulp that is really hard to digest. Forget about digesting, you can’t even gulp it properly. The conversations sound like permutations and combinations of what could happen in a relationship, and why people get so judgmental when someone says they are not ready yet. This could truly have been a timely film in the #MeToo era, especially when there has been so much discussion and debate about consent and boundaries in a relationship. But no. Next Enti is just too confused about what it wants to say and how it wants to say. To sit through a film, spanning two hours, where people talk, without an iota of interest, is like having to do a bear crawl on your first outing to the gym. If it doesn’t exhaust you in the end, you definitely have a shot at winning any marathon in the world. More than empathising with Tammy, Sanju, and Krish, you begin to feel sorry for Tamannaah, Sundeep Kishan, and Navdeep. No actor deserves to be in a film which turns into a punishment for the audience. The only redeeming factor of Next Enti is the soundtrack by music director Leon James. And it would have been lot better If only someone told Kunal Kohli that songs shouldn’t be treated like he treated the conversations in the film. The biggest lessen that Next Enti teaches you is that if you are an aspiring writer, then, make sure you watch this film and when you write your first script, delete at least half of the dialogues. If not, your script too could turn out to be Next Enti and you should be scared if you are ever in such a situation. Two big thumbs down for this film. Like the song in the film goes, when I look back at this film, all I can think of is ‘Oh No Never!’