To love or not : The Tribune India

Join Whatsapp Channel

Movie Review — Ae Dil Hai Mushkil

To love or not

It’s a familiar landscape—jet owning hero, raees heroine, plush settings and a plot that takes you from one beautiful country to another.

To love or not

A still from Ae Dil Hai Mushkil



Nonika Singh

It’s a familiar landscape—jet owning hero, raees heroine, plush settings and a plot that takes you from one beautiful country to another. And the emotional ground is no different either. Love vs friendship—Karan Johar’s time-old ruse is put to use here too. But what worked like magic in Kuch 

Kuch Hota Hai in its 2.0 version is more déjà vu here. Ayan (Ranbir Kapoor) loves Aleeze (Anushka Sharma). She too does and together they have some rocking time and vicariously we too have some fun moments. So what’s the catch? For her it’s platonic love. If that is not cause enough for conflict there is an ex-boyfriend Ali (Fawad Khan) and a future girl-friend Saba (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan). In between are some wonderful original songs, especially Channa mereya and the title track and a whole lot that pay a tribute to yesteryear’s chartbusters. Indeed, this ode to heartbreak, as Johar puts it, is more like one to Bollywood. 

Besides incorporating SRK’S iconic dialogue ‘naam to suna hoga’, the Badshah of Bollywood is right there to light up the screen as only he can in a bit part and walks away with the most original dialogue on one-sided love. The most cheesy one  belongs to Aishwarya, who calls herself a shayara, writes poetry and listens to Farida Khanum. Holding a British passport, she lives in Vienna, dresses up like a diva and looks like an ethereal goddess too. Sadly she makes her entry only in the second half and is let down by a script that does no justice to her beauty or emotive skills. As 

for Fawad Khan, Raj Thackeray ji please watch the movie if only to know aapka bawal bematlab tha. The good-looking import from Pakistan actually gets a short shrift here and even his diehard fans are unlikely to root for him in the film. For the film essentially and intrinsically belongs to Ranbir and Anushka alone. While she gets into the groove by and by, Ranbir is spot on from the word go. Never mind that he is reprising many of his previous roles. Some of the dialogues seem even straight from Rockstar. Only unlike Rockstar, ADHM has no heartbreaking moments. Despite all the philosophizing and a twist a la Kal Ho Na Ho, there is nothing that will make your heart ache. 

Where Johar deserves credit is that though ideally familiarity should breed contempt, he makes the old wine pleasing enough with a contemporary fix. In this day and age, sex is not taboo. Nor is it here, rather scenes between Ranbir and Ash are sensuous, handled sophisticatedly. But then you can only expect class from KJO. Yes, like all his films this one is no revelation either.

Behind the unprecedented hype over ek tarfa pyar, all it says is that love means different things to different people and true love needn’t be consummated. But don’t you dare delude yourself that this is a modern day love ballad. In fact, this isn’t even a trademark two-hankie film of Johar. Now, whether that is good thing or bad depends entirely upon how you like your love stories to be served.

All we can reveal is the mush here may not leave you teary-eyed but nor would it make you tear you hair in desperation. Since you are already in the festive mood, go ahead and indulge yourself even if that partially means indulging Johar and clan. 

Hey, before you get caught in our rambling, here is the assurance—the film is watchable fare, not the least because of its high energy music, breathtaking locales and fine performances, not to miss the sassy Lisa Haydon. 

Top News

Supreme Court asks Centre to respond within 3 weeks to pleas seeking stay of CAA

Supreme Court asks Centre to respond to petitions seeking stay on implementation of CAA

A bench headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud posted the m...

Raj Thackeray meets Home Minister Amit Shah ‘to keep Uddhav Thackeray factor’ at bay

Raj Thackeray meets Home Minister Amit Shah ‘to keep Uddhav Thackeray factor’ at bay

If the alliance is sealed, the MNS may be given one seat to ...

House set on fire by angry relatives after daughter-in-law hangs herself, elderly couple burn to death

House set on fire by angry relatives after daughter-in-law hangs herself, elderly couple burn to death

During a fight, some people, reportedly belonging to the wom...


Cities

View All