Sharmaji Namkeen

B.V. Nanda's *Sharmaji Namkeen* arrives as a quietly purposeful film about reinvention and masculinity in middle age—territory that Hindi cinema has largely left unexplored. Paresh Rawal delivers a restrained, lived-in performance as a man grappling with obsolescence, and while the character could have been written with sharper edges, there's genuine warmth in watching him discover agency through an unexpected avenue. The film resists melodrama in favor of small moments: the awkwardness of entering a space coded feminine, the gradual shedding of ego, the subtle pride in mastering a craft. Functionally, it follows the contours of films like *Badhaai Ho*, where a parent's unconventional choice threatens family equilibrium, though here the stakes are more introspective and the tone considerably gentler—almost to a fault.

Where *Sharmaji Namkeen* falters is in its narrative construction and the underutilization of its supporting cast. The boutique owner subplot, introduced with some promise, never develops into anything substantive; she remains more apparatus than character, a romantic possibility that the film half-heartedly entertains before abandoning. The political angle similarly feels grafted on, as if the screenplay couldn't quite commit to being a intimate domestic drama. Director Hitesh Bhatia doesn't push against the material's safe edges—there's no real tension between the father and his sons about changing gender roles, no examination of why a woman's space validates