Film: Love Aaj Kal
Star Cast: Saif Ali Khan, Deepika Padukone, Neetu Singh, Rishi Kapoor, Rahul Khanna, Vir Das, Giselle Monteiro and Florence Brudenell Bruce
Director: Imtiaz Ali
Producer: Dinesh Vijan, Saif Ali Khan
Music: Pritam
Rating: 3/5
After Socha Na Tha and Jab We Met, Imtiaz Ali is back on its wafer-thin plot of Love Aaj Kal that rests completely on a story of love that was before and the situation that is now. A restful and refreshing watch, the film boosts itself up in its dialogues, acting and music. Commitment, long distance relationships and stress issues of today’s generation and the one 30 years back are softly touched by the director making the movie actually talk the recent talks.
Beginning with a break-p and descending down towards the old-world and then again moving up towards today’s world the movie is kept simple and straight. Love Aaj Kal moves around Jai (Saif Ali Khan) who does not understand the gist and meaning of love and his girlfriend Meera (Deepika Padukone) who believes in choosing her career over love. After a communal breakup, Jai comes across old Veer (Rishi Kapoor) who narrates his love story bestowing an acme of out-of-date romance to Jai. The narration flows in between different timelines that can get a bit confusing if you start watching the movie from somewhere in the middle. Saif, as a Sardar, travels 1000 miles down just to catch a glimpse of his love, who moves to Calcutta along with her family. The simple romance between Veer and Harleen is told very nicely and there is a true allure as we see a charming new girl, Harleen Kaur (Giselle Monteiro), standing inside her balcony and trying to drink liquor tea, the one Rishi likes in the film, and gulping it down her neck haltingly, as if it were a poison.
Casting Saif Ali Khan as young timed Rishi Kapoor has worked well throughout the film. Debutante Giselle Monteiro has fantastically managed to verbalize her parts through her expressions, Deepika Padukone looks really good throughout and has surprised the audiences with her natural performance, Saif Ali Khan is in with his old head charming role that is full of clever cracks and mannerisms and Rishi Kapoor is out of doubt fantastic as a spontaneously romantic Sardar. The director has used brilliant non-linear edit patterns that draw parallel lines in between the two stories. The conversations between Saif Ali Khan and Rishi Kapoor are to remind you about your conversations with your dad when he was in for an advice about settling down in life.
Well, the love story 30 years back does not tell any new thing and the one moving on right now is shown as a plain girl and boy story who drift apart then meet up then again drift part and finally meet up. Pritam’s music has kept the movie in its refreshing and easy pace and the director uses stylish one-liners and realistic situations to make the audiences stay on their chair. The first half makes you giggle but in the second one the laughs tend to dry out and the movie appears to be dragged in. Emotions are quite unfussy and also the smooth flow of the movie tends to get a bit slower unlike Jab We Met where the dramatic and comic portions are well separated.
Though not perfect it is truly the one not be missed!!!
