Saturday, February 08, 2014
Hasee Toh Phasee
Thoda Rom Thoda Com
Vinil Mathew brings in refreshingly different
characters in his love triangle, Hasee Toh Phasee (faintly
offensive title), and stops there. One girl is an independent spirited
scientist (wow, a girl with brains in a Hindi film!), the other is a model who
is not a typical bimbette, and the guy is a sweet and caring loser in the age
of the lout. But they are thrown into a cauldron of relatives, rituals,
and minor conflicts in a film that can’t decide whether it wants to be a modern
urban story or an old-fashioned soap opera.
Meeta (Parineeti Chopra) is the black sheep of
her Gujarati family; she stole money for her ‘project’ and ran away on the day
of the wedding of one of her four sisters. She also met Nikhil (Sidharth
Malhotra) on her way out, when he was just about falling for her other sister
Karishma (Adah Sharma).
Seven years later when Nikhil and Karishma are
getting married, she returns with a huge backpack and a collection of facial
tics that are meant to endear her to the audience. Unfortunately, she comes
across and annoying and needlessly eccentric, so that poor Nikhil, already
labouring under the demands of Karishma, is burdened with the batty sister (the
plot somewhat inspired by Rachel Getting Married).
Around them, with the wedding mayhem, are his
army of Punjabi relatives, her army of Gujarati relatives, a shrieky uncle and
not many ideas to take the story forward.
Parineeti Chopra is perhaps the only actress
among the current crop, who could go grungy with such confidence, but why does
the director make her pull faces to establish her disturbed state of
mind? Still, she works towards making Meeta a credible character, even
when the clichés come rolling in towards the end. Sidharth Malhotra consistent
charm saves Nikhil from turning into a wimp. Manoj Joshi puts in a
pleasing cameo as the girls’ patient father.
There’s some rom and very little com in the
film; on the positive side, there are quite a few light and engaging moments,
but just not enough to make this one the undisputed winner it could have been
with Karan Johar and Anurag Kashyap as producers—a perfect marriage of romance
and reality.
Labels: Cinemaah
