Humpty Sharma ki Dulhania

Humpty Sharma ki Dulhaniya is many things but not a ‘tribute’ to DDLJ and neither a remake of that classic. The problem with making a remake of a classic is, you can never do it right. You can never make people who love original fall in love with your ‘updated’ version. But thanks to the Lord, Shashank Khaitan wasn’t trying to do so.

Stay Calm and let the director use tried
and tested formulas of DDLJ

We have free spirited, eccentric Kavya (Alia Bhatt) and street-smart, passionate Humpty (Varun Dhawan) who falls in love when Kavya goes to Delhi to buy herself a “Designer wala Lehenga” (yep, that's the 2014 version of Kajol going for European tour). 

It has a feeble first half and many sequences which are just not good. Sample this: Humpty's two out of work friends gives him lacs to purchase "Designer wala Lehenga" for Alia. And to top this, Humpty's father too withdraws his emergency savings for Alia's "Designer wala Lehenga".

There’s also some ingredient to make you remember DDLJ, but that’s when the plot thickens.

The second half is little more engaging, dramatic and still has some space for funny sequences. This time the Amrish Puri of the story i.e. Mr. Singh (a brilliant Ashutosh Rana) isn’t a fool to not realize what Humpty is up to. And that’s where we really see the original imprints of our director who also happens to be screen writer.

*Spoiler Alert* Mr. Singh asks Humpty to find a single flaw in the boy (Siddharth Shukla) he has selected for Kavya, and he will marry her daughter to him.

Enters Angad Bedi (Siddharth Shukla), the guy with flawless and charmful attitude, that everyone falls in love with (except ofcourse Kavya).

And this is where story really takes off with some really humorous sequences by Varun Dhawan and two of his friends Poplu (Sahil Vaid) and Shontu (Gaurav Pandey).

The climax is pretty lame and could have been done better. There are lots of loose ends and movie ends abruptly. It feels like cameraman ran out of reel and they had to just end it.

The music was nothing to write about and certainly pretty average for a Dharma Productions movie.

As for performances, both Varun and Alia looked good here, provided that you don’t compare those two to SRK and Kajol at any point during the movie. Varun is slowly and surely coming good, but it is Alia who surprise me with each movie. As dumb as she is perceived (and most probably she is) to be, she is in top form. She is most likely to replace likes of Deepika, Kareena, Priyanka Chopra (although I doubt if Priyanka is more threat to herself rather than anyone else).

Also the chemistry is enjoyable and not clichéd. You can see that they have known each other for long and have worked with each other.

The real heroes of the movie

No it doesn't end on platform and yep it should have!

But it is the supporting cast that you should really look forward to. The duo of Sahil Vaid and Gaurav Pandey as Varun Dhawan’s friends steals the show. And it was so good to see Ashutosh Rana after so long. Why isn’t he doing more movies? He didn’t try to be Amrish Puri, because, no one can but he did made his character strong yet enjoyable.

Sidharth Shukla has a good but not a memorable debut. He was underplayed and the character was one dimensional.

But as they say, all’s well that ends well, and this movie didn’t end with a strong climax.

5/10 – 1 for Alia-Varun chemistry, 2 for supporting casts and 2 for some good dialogues and some original writing from Shashank Khaitan even if it suffers from hangover of DDLJ. None for songs.

Lekar Hum Deewana Dil

There are some films which looks bad in their advertisements, which lack big stars but you still think that this might turn out to be a good movie after all. ‘Lekar Hum Deewana Dil’ is not one of those.

You'll be riding away faster than these two
after watching this movie

We have dumb Dino (Armaan Jain) and crazy Karishma (Diksha Sheth) who are college-mates and might be in love. Ofcourse they don’t know this but their whole ‘college’ does. A clarification: ‘College’ in these movies means a bunch of side actors who roam around the main couple. So when Karishma is being set up by her father to get married to a boy of his choice, she decides that she will have a drink with one of the most wreckless guy (Dino) in her life and make plans for her life. And in this sojourn she realizes she loves Dino. And a song later even Dino realizes same thing and they elope. And that all happens in first 15 minutes. After that it’s a boring sequence of what not to do when you elope.

After a frustrating hour into movie, reality settles in, they realize that they are not made for each other and therefore part ways and file for divorce. I don’t even need to write how they fall back in love and land us in the most obvious climax of Hindi films.

This is not a dumb movie; it’s a movie for dumb people.

This is what happens when brainless kids with money try to make it on their own. There weren’t many funny scenes. And it was borderline insanity displayed by these two actors. There was no chemistry between actors.

Armaan Jain got this movie due to his Kapoor family links, there is no denying. But atleast he could have tried to do something of this endangered art called ‘Acting’. He has one of the most villainous smile for a hero. And even the actress says so in one of the scenes.

A word on Diksha Sheth: irritating. In fact, she is so irritating that you realize why Ritesh Deshmukh had to wield screw driver in Ek Villain, a week after that movie!

Ritesh Deshmukh after watching Diksha Sheth's antics.

I see a problem arising in movie industry which is easily giving first chance to girls who are soothing to eyes but not much to script. It not only destroys their career in one go but also diminishes their chances of alternate career. But more on that later.

In fact, the best part (relatively) in terms of acting was the parents and brother of Dino. I would have liked to see more of Dino’s brother than his own failed on-off no-chemistry love story.

The only good thing about movie is A R Rahman's music, but then also, not all songs. Evidently, greatness surrounded by mediocrity can drown it.

Next Ranbir Kapoor- in words of Karishma Kapoor

The plot takes this movie to places, but not the ones it needed to go. What’s with naxalite angle in all of this? The director sets out to become Imtiaz Ali by making something like Socha Na Tha (most underrated Imtiaz Ali movie), but he neither has the finesse, nor the screenplay.

Although it had a tribute in the end for eloped lovers, the movie itself is a proof on why it is not a good idea. The movie manages to contradict itself, in just 2 hours!

This movie was advertised as Rom-Com but neither the romance works nor the comedy exists, except for a few forced chuckles. It has loads of foolishness and tons of stupidity.

So when in one scene the actor says they have been in 4 years of college together and currently are in 3^rd year BA, I am not surprised.

2/10- 1 for A R Rahman's two good songs and 1 for supporting actors who were honest in their limited presence.