Lust Stories 3 review: Konkona-Radhika’s crackling chemistry & Vishal Bhardwaj’s bold role reversal steal the show

Lust Stories, right from the beginning, when the first part was released in 2020, raised eyebrows. Since then, several other similar films and series have come up on OTT- all exploring female sexual desires- some landed, some did not, but the charm of Lust Stories and subsequently of Lust Stories 2 has had a different effect on the audience. How many mainstream filmmakers have attempted to explore what women want and ultimately got it right? In Lust Stories 3, filmmakers Vikramaditya Motwane, Kiran Rao, Shakun Batra and Vishal Bhardwaj speak of Lust, an emotion that often brings out the best and worst in any human being.

What is Lust Stories 3 about?

Lust Stories 3 starts with a bang as Vikramaditya Motwane introduces Paddy (Radhika Apte) and Shona(Konkona Sen Sharma), two women in their 40s wanting reiginiate the sex lives in their marraige. They are office colleagues and neighbours and best friends. They watch Korean dramas together and would want their husbands, Hemant (Vijay Verma) and Debu (Abhishek Banerjee) to be more active in bed. A plan is hatched during a weekend trip with family to Khandala so that the women get what they want. Shona takes the lead even as Paddy reminds her that they are not in Korea but Kandivili. While the two friends finally act upon the plan, which involves their unsuspecting husbands, it doesn’t go the way it was envisioned for the two couples.

Kiran Rao’s story takes the viewers to a very busy spot in Mumbai where a pizza delivery guy (Gurfateh Pirzada) and a nail artist (Sana Thampi) hook up in the latter’s empty flat even as the man and his identical twin sell drugs at night on the sly. He thinks her house is a perfect alibi and hideout for the stash and cash, but things are not quite as simple as they seem.

Shakun Batra takes a theme that he is known to ace- familial complexities- in his film that features Ali Fazal and Radikka Madan as a divorcing couple. Love was at the centre of their relationship as they had built a life together but at present they are slowly trying to separate and be civil about it. But the wounds are deep and separating amicably is not so easy, as they find sex as a way to communicate amid all the fighting. “Is Lust the cure or the painkiller?” asks the therapist, only to expose the two and show them the mirror about what they are running away from.

The final film, by Vishal Bhardwaj, makes the female gaze the core theme of the plot. Real-life couple Aditi Rao Hydari and Siddharth play married couple Saira and Badru, settled in Hyderabad. Saira is a professor of literature, while her husband Badru is a homoeopathic doctor. They look like a much-in-love and lustful couple to the outside world, but Badru isn’t ever able to fully satisfy Saira in bed. What makes Bhardwaj’s film stand out as how the man is objectified in this story, with Saira writing an explicit novel on lust while imagining her husband as an object of desire. Siddharth, wrapped in a tiny white cloth, and sporting a mop on his head and a handlebar moustache, serenades his wife in her dreams, even as Badru in reality isn’t able to fully understand his wife’s needs. The plot twist comes when the two realise that they are a perfect match made in heaven, yearning the same things but just too shy to openly communicate.

What works and what does not

I am sold when any filmmaker is willing to write a story featuring Radhika Apte and Konkona Sen Sharma in it. The two women are fantastic, and the chemistry is hard to miss. Motwane’s segment, while talking of female desire, is comical in the beginning with a retrospective end and the actors deliver well. Sen Sharma and Apte together are a house on fire with perfect comic timing. But the men- Vijay Verma and Abhishek Banerjee- one slightly clueless and the other slightly sly-aren’t bad either. The four actors uplift a known story well- with comic timing and that dance on Marathi wrap- making their film the most fun of them all.

Fazal, who is riding high on Mirzapur: The Movie’s success, and Radhikka Madan share a great on-screen chemistry. But their story worked the least for me. It's a conversational drama where there is a lot of emotional baggage to offload for both the characters and a lot to take in for the viewers.

Rao’s film has relatively newer faces and a fresh pairing of Pirzada and Thampi who add the extra zing to their onscreen romance. Rao, of course, gives the film an interesting feminist spin, making the girl appear more in power and more in tune with what exactly she wants and at what time, leaving the men high and dry.

The most elaborate is Bhardwaj’s film that is dramatic, quirky and set in a backdrop that is slightly unfamiliar to us all. As the married couple whose communication takes a hit on bed, Aditi and Siddharth are fantastic. Kudos to the filmmaker and Siddharth for presenting the man as the sex object and flipping the narrative. Aditi and Siddharth share crackling chemistry and deliver to a slightly over-the-top screenplay, ably. Special mention for Gajraj Rao, who plays the empathic father-in-law to Aditi and adds the right amount of humour to the story.

The plot, though, harps on female desires a bit too much and gives a simplistic resolution to the plot.

Final Verdict

Lust Stories 3 caters to women more and wants the men to take note. While female desires remain the core theme of the anthology, it also talks of human emotions well and the complexities that come along with it. It may not shy away from talking about sexual desire, but it very obviously states how Indian society is still reluctant to talk about sex openly. In Lust Stories 2, sex is used for seeking revenge, communicating, taking control of things, having fun, and even for redemption.

Lust Stories 3 is now streaming on Netflix.