Rashmi (Kiara Advani) is married to Asif (Akshay Kumar) a small businessman who sells tiles and granite. Their inter-religious marriage has alienated Rashmi from her family, especially from her father (Rajesh Sharma). Asif is an atheist who works to eradicate superstition from society in his spare time. He doesn't believe in the existence of ghosts and in the initial few minutes we see him exposing a false godman.

Raghava Lawrence's Hindi remake of his hugely successful Tamil movie Kanchana was previously titled Laxmmi Bomb. The numerologically optimised title irked the Karni Sena, the vigilante Rajput group whose ability to influence movie titles is more powerful than anything that happens in Lawrence's Bollywood debut. The moral of this story: sack the numerologist who tells you that extra vowels will usher in luck.

Asif (Akshay Kumar) & Rashmi (Kiara Advani) are a happily married couple but with a predictable caveat. Rashmi's parents didn't accept them because of their conservative thinking restricted them from accepting a Muslim son-in-law. Somehow on their 25th wedding anniversary, Rashmi's mother Ratna (Ayesha Raza Mishra) convinces her husband Sachin (Rajesh Sharma) for having their daughter present at a party.

It is one thing to be recognized on a piece of paper and an entirely different one to be accepted into the real world. The column of the third gender might have been included in the election forms, as reminded by the original Laxmi (a fantastic Sharad Kelkar) in the film, but in the society's eyes, that column is still a taboo. The message that the makers of Laxmii intended to give is clear-acceptance and love for transgenders.

Raghava Lawrence's money-spinning horror comedy franchise Muni gets a bigger and glossier facelift with Laxmii (previously titled Laxmi or Laxmii Bomb - their way of spelling not mine. But that Karni Sena, overwhelmed by its previous Padmavati Padmavat success, got this one too changed, bolo abhi...) anyways.

Just when you thought life can't be more ridiculous in the remaining days of 2020, Akshay Kumar smashes our senses with his new supernatural flick Laxmii, previously titled Laxmmi Bomb. It also gives Sadak 2 an outside chance to redeem itself as the second worst film of the year. It's a complete mockery of the audience's intelligence and a big blow to Disney+ Hotstar's chances to stand in the way of other major Indian OTT players.

However, what did catch my attention - and I admit, I was surprised too - was Akshay Kumar's decision to not just back the project [LAXMII], but also reprise the pivotal role enacted by Raghava Lawrence in the original. Just when you thought that Akshay would attempt a hardcore masala film, the decision to green light LAXMII came as a welcome move.

Somewhere deep inside the mess that's Laxmii, is the kernel of a solid idea: to give us the story of a transgender person, with empathy and sympathy. But this Akshay Kumar-starrer is a two-hour clutch-your-head, can-I-really-be-watching-this nonsense, from beginning to end.