Saswat Mohan Dash

A hindi musical worthy of a theatre watch after such a long time! I went in with extremely muted expectations and was very pleasantly surprised. Music is definitely the strongest part of this experience - it ties the entire story and emotional angle together and is very aptly placed/made. The cast is amazing and do decent justice to their roles. Plotlines are okay - if you think about them more than 5mins you will find holes but it doesn't become too apparent while watching because you're part of this whole experience of music and visuals. Visually this is similar to Jagga Jasoos and Ludo, maybe the Anurag Basu effect in itself. First half is stronger than the second half. Overall a thoroughly enjoyable watch!

TLDR; decent movie, visually stunning. BAD, VERY BAD dialogues and cringey acting. All the hype has led to high expectation, and the movie is unable to deliver on them. I want to preface this by saying that I'm not part of the bycott group, or an anti Bollywood thing. I was extremely hopeful regarding this movie, and expected a lot (these high expectations were the problem, I guess). This could have been a huge turning point in Indian cinema. That said, the movie is....eh The VFX team has outdone itself. I saw it in IMAX, and visually the film is outstanding. Details have been taken care of and it is indeed beautiful. VFX aside as well, sets are colourful, and the newly married couple look great (a tad too great in some places also, how can you have noticeable makeup on in the middle of a battle scene) Going past the visual elements is where the problems begin. The story feels well thought out, and is simple enough to follow. But this simplicity also means that you can see the turns and twists coming from a mile away. It became excesdingly obvious after a point and too predictable. Easily the WORST part of the whole experience is the acting and dialogues. It feels like an unpaid intern was tasked with the dialogues. They're worse than a David Dhawan movie and I'm not even exaggerating. Ranbir and Alia have somehow forgotten how to act, and even veterans like [spoiler] have botched the delivery due to bad writing. As an overall package, it was a decent experience. My expectations were probably high and it couldn't deliver. But I feel it could've been way way better. Here's hoping Part 2 is good enough!

The direction, sound design, and cinematography is amazing to say the least. The panning shots of the mountains are simply breathtaking and will make you fall in love with the location. Sara Ali Khan's performance as a debutante is really commendable. Her expressions of being mischievous, to being serious, to bawling out loudly were on point. And ofcourse Sushant is his usual charming self that we all love. The plotline is a bit clichéd, but yet enjoyable. Songs are placed beautifully throughout the movie in the right moments. The tragedy part has been shown very accurately as well, and CGI is almost unnoticeable. Dialogues could have been stronger, that's the only part I saw lacking. Censors have muted out parts stupidly for whatever reason. Otherwise, an amazing watch overall. It's a short movie by normal standards, and is engrossing till the end. Har Har Mahadev!