I went to see this movie to a good old Cinema Theater (and not a multiplex) and thank god I did!!! I am sure we all have great expectations from this film and its director, though I was a bit skeptical because of the total lack of chemistry between Saif & Deepika even in the Ads shown during the T20 world cup. So, I went to Chandan cinema with my usual pack of hooligans and when the film started - the first 15,20 minutes of the film were kind of confusing. Nobody in the whole theater never quiet understood what was going on. A bizarre sequence of uninteresting events clubbed together to show the growth of the relationship between Saif and Deepika. But then, finally the movie started to make more sense.
The movie is about these 2 modern individuals staying in London who are more practical than emotional. To them their relationship cannot come between their ambition. True. I could relate to that completely. Then, there is an age old romantic (Rishi Kapoor) who makes Saif realize, that love happens only Once and one should not let “the One” get away without a fight. “So long and so clichéd!” And then you see a parallel story of a younger Rishi Kapoor (played by Saif) and an Anonymous actress called Harleen in the film. (Even though she looks Picture Perfect – she has 2 left feet and doesnt even know the “A” of acting – to that extent good she has strangely been left out of the credits.)
The problem with the film is that it goes from the uber cool new, to the mildly predictable romance, to the super clichéd melodrama. Yes, the lingo and the dialogues do have a freshness to them but too much of anything can be harmful. Unfortunately, the film is too heavily dependent on dialogue. There is so much dialogue in the film that it gets irritating at times. It seems to be preachy at times and you wish the movie would just move on. I must say some of the exchanges are brilliantly witty, though too few and far between.
If you have a script so heavily dependent on dialogue then you need interesting people to deliver them and unfortunately Rishi Kapoor is the only one that could sleepwalk through it in this department. He has an effortless class that the other actors lack. Saif is good in some scenes and awesome in a few, though his charm alone can’t help you enjoy the barrage of dialogues (Somebody please check his underpants please. The way he dances, it seems they were completely starched!!). The one that fails miserably in the acting department is Deepika. She is trying so hard in the film to act that its apparent in every scene. Somebody please put her through a course, else such a pretty face would be lost. When there is so much weight on “one to one” dialogue, it is bound to fail if one of the participants is so poor and if the protagonists lack chemistry.
The music of this film is enjoyable to the extent of 2 songs – Twist and Aahun Aahun (which unfortunately comes with the end credits). Others are just excuses to stretch this tiresome experience.
Imtiaz seems inspired by the song from Phir bhi Dil hai Hindustani – “Nayi Packet main bechey – tumko cheez puraani”. The film keeps reminding you of films like “Hum Tum”, “Dil Chahta Hai” and “Dilwale Dulhaniya Ley Jayengay”. A song shot supposedly in San Francisco seems to be totally inspired by “Tanhayi”. Some of the shots of Saif are identical to the ones of Aamir in DCH. Being such a talented director, you expect much more from Imtiaz. But I guess the law of averages has caught up with him. After a cute “Socha Na Tha” and the charming “Jab We Met” comes the confused “Love Aaj Kal”.
This movie gave us Hooligans the perfect opportunity to howl, laugh at emotional scenes and sqeeze double meanings out of innocuous dialogue ( Generally reserved for SRK films :) ). To that extent it was fun. Plus the audience in a good old theater beats the boring ones in a multiplex hands down.
Rating – 4.5 / 10
3 comments:
well said...it was a confused caper...though i feel the movie was good till the interval due to Saif & Rishi Kapoor (barring the first 15 minutes which fortunately i missed thanks to the mumbai traffic)
After the interval, Imtiaz had too many thoughts in mind while writing the dialogue heavy script...He feared that if Deepika goes with Saif before her marriage then the story would be similar to DDLJ/DCH or even Jab We Met & host of other hindi films...Special mention of Saif's brilliant performance in that marriage scene where he goes beserk for his love for Deepika. How can Deepika inspite of knowing that she loves Saif and vice versa, she goes ahead to marry Rahul Khanna. And within two days she wants to leave his husband. And Rahul's reaction is so subdued. Badly written by Imtiaz. Infact, one can easily feel the fatigue in the script towards the end.
The central theme in all the 3 films of Imtiaz is the same. Only presented in different ways. Imtiaz was lucky with the screen play in Jab We Met even though the story wasnt gr8. However, this time the screenplay sucks..Rishi Kapoor & Saif are the 2 saving grace..Watch atleast for them. Plus one can laugh on Deepika's acting as well.
Time for Imtiaz to think something original and not present the old stuff with the different stars..
Damn..missed the hooliganism ;)
yeah i totally agree that the staring was soooo very confusing..none of us could figure out what was going on...but then it settled down well...specially after Rishi Kapoor's entry...the old era love story was cute enough but u r soo rite that "Harleen" had no clue what acting or dancing is all abt n to think of it a song was dedicate to her dance!...but thankfully she wasnt given much dialouges or else the pretty jus "ankhon ankhon main pyaar" wala thing would hav gone berseck...Saif was good...i liked him specially as a Surd..:)..Deepika proved again that she is jus a pretty..music was good..n yeah it was dejavu with DCH tanhayi with saif overdoing the being depressed thing..baaki it was a tp film..one time see for sure..n haan u r getting too stingy with ur marks now a days bro...it deserves atleast 6/10 yaar..specially after watching Kambhhatk ishq..nething would look good!!!
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