Baar Baar Dekho (2016) Review!!!

Synopsis – What would you do if you could see the future of your relationship? This film follows a roller coaster ride with Jai and Diya as they ride the ups and down of their relationship through the test of time.

My Take – In a time when Bollywood films seem to more on the derivative side, this Dharma Production (Karan Johar) & Excel Entertainment (Ritesh Sidhwani & Farhan Akhtar) film comes us a breath of fresh air. While the casual audience still seems quite satisfied with ‘Bhai Ke Doley Dekho’ type of films, this Nitya Mehra is actually a very good attempt towards making something different, a romantic film with a time travel twist. Generally, time travel films are tricky. It is a concept that needs to be executed with a certain level of finesse. The idea that a character can oscillate back and forth between two time periods provides ample scope to build up a dramatic narrative, but the flip side is that if it isn’t executed well it might end up being a disaster. Nitya Mehra’s film isn’t the disaster people are making it out to be, yes it dangerously treads on loose plot lines and illogical premises, but luckily for us it has its heart in the right place. This film attempts to decode the questions that most lovers face sooner or later in their relationship — where will it go a few years down the road? In comparison to the films released this year, this film is quite possibly one of the few polished, technically proficient works out there. If you are interested in watching something really different this is the film for you, in case you are not, then you rather sit down and watch the single screens public reaction to this film online (who as expected did not understand the film).

The story follows two childhood friends Jai (Sidharth Malhotra) and Diya (Katrina Kaif) who are about to get married but are locked up in a dilemma because Jai wants to focus more on his professional life and career. He doesn’t want to lose the most cherished offer of pursuing his research on Vedic mathematics in the prestigious universities like Harvard and Cambridge. And he gets more perplexed and finds himself on the crossroads whether to say yes or no to Diya when he receives one such offer from his most liked university and that too a few days before his marriage. Shattered by Jai’s reluctance to get married, Diya walks out of her newly bought fully furnished apartment by her rich father Mr. Kapoor (Ram Kapoor) leaving behind Jai to deal with his dilemma. A drunken Jai wakes up to find himself in a different time zone that is ten days after his marriage in Thailand celebrating his honeymoon with Diya. The moment Jai goes to sleep, the clock moves ahead by days, months and years. What happens to Jai and Diya with the passing timeline and time leap? How do their lives change? What all choices Jai make in his life and how his choices impact his relationship with Diya and also with his and her families? Whether Jai gets a second chance in his life to choose a different set of actions than his previous ones? Is Jai able to fix things? How Jai goes through self-actualization process? The first half sort of struggles to put a cohesive premise meandering into excellent songs and good looking locales in the process compromising on a solid story line. Jai develops cold feet just before his marriage and therein begins the time travel journey. We watch Diya and Jai jump across their ages from their 20s’ to 40’s to their 60’s. The transition isn’t smooth and Jai is as perplexed with what’s happening around him as much as us! Despite the technicalities the idea is simple – if you had a chance to live an entire day in your future would you then change your present and do things differently or would you succumb to destiny and let it takes its course? Despite the irregular first half, each frame is drop dead gorgeous and well toned with the emotional connect. The key scenes; the wedding sequence, the time travel or the funeral end up providing subtle but lasting impacts. While the second half, swings up the flavor by adding more compassion to the characters & their proceedings. Like Adam Sandler in Click, the film this one bears some resemblance to— Jai attempts to alter his destiny by changing his behavior: making more time for his kids, being a more attentive husband. Whether or not you find the film resonant might depend on whether you buy the idea that a life’s course can be altered by a dramatic change in attitude on one important day, or whether it’s the accumulation of years of hurt or joy that ultimately decides our trajectories. Although this is her debut as a Director in Hindi Film Industry, Nitya Mehra has worked as an assistant director on films like Life of Pi and The Reluctant Fundamentalist. Here, she reiterates one of the biggest philosophies of life i.e. to learn to live in present. We, human beings, have a tendency to either cling to past or future; either we find ourselves stuck in the past or we get worried about the uncertainties of the future. And amidst all these, we forget the most basic thing, i.e. to appreciate the present, not to take our present for granted. We also ignore to value what we have in our present, be it our relationships / family, be it small moments of joy, laughter etc. And by the time, we realize that we have left our people, our happiness far behind, we long for another opportunity to undo certain actions of ours of the past. But the truth is, life does not give one a second chance to rewind in the past and change the actions and choices made. Then, what remains with us is a sense of regret and loss. The film also showcases how important it is to balance personal and professional lives. Bearing the brunt of his ‘going to sleep and waking up in a new time period’ routine, is his absolutely stunning wife Dia Kapoor, who’s the ‘driver’ in their relationship. She’s too clingy, he’s too disinterested and busy with his calculations to notice her unconditional love for him.

The film unravels what lies ahead for these childhood sweethearts. What would you fix if you could travel back in time? The thought is interesting and the message, beautiful – life isn’t a series of calculated events so seize the moment. True happiness lies in the smallest of things. Unfortunately, this message is age-old, and when you actually think about it the premise isn’t incredibly original; yet, wherever it lacks in these qualities, the film makes up in sincerity and execution. For instance, in sequences set in 2018, 2034, and 2046, Sharmishtha Roy and Fali Unwalla‘s production design takes cues from Minority Report (2002) and imagines a believable future where transparent-screened devices are voice- and gesture-controlled. It isn’t something we haven’t seen before, but unfortunately, the bar for slick production design and competent CGI in Bollywood is so low that this film is something of a revelation. In other technical departments, the film scores high. Master cinematographer Ravi K Chandran ensures that it ends up being one of the best looking Hindi films of the year, while the music composed by Amaal Mallik, Arko, Badshah, Jasleen Royal and Bilal Saeed is excellent. Sure, there is the occasional tendency to overcompensate and take itself too seriously. Comedian Rohan Joshi and current ‘it’ actress Sayani Gupta appear as Raj and Chitra, a couple who seem to be Jai’s only real friends, but the film squanders the opportunity to do justice to the former’s comic timing and the latter’s range by giving them one-note characters. As a result, this is a film with plenty of comic situations, co-written by a comedian, and starring another but, surprisingly, very few genuinely chuckle-worthy moments. There is, however, an overall consistency to the film that heralds the arrival of an interesting new filmmaker in Mehra. Most mainstream Bollywood films are tonally all over the place, with disparate romantic, dramatic, and comedic tracks. What I appreciated about the film however, was its willingness to commit wholeheartedly to its premise without getting tempted to add more melodrama than is necessary, although it is co-produced by Karan Johar, the king of typical family dramas. But he also presented this year’s cool Kapoor & Sons, so by that standard this film is cool enough. Also, the other producers, Farhan Akhtar and Ritesh Sidhwani are known to produce uber cool films. At one point, I was afraid that a ‘love is all you need’ message was what the film was hurtling towards; however, the resolution, like every good mathematical solution, tries its best to balance all variables. Here one can see how the script goes out of its way to accommodate its extremely good-looking lead duo’s shortcomings. As a result, they are pushed to deliver what could be called career-best performances. Sidharth Malhotra excels as Jai. Malhotra is in every frame, and he exploits the author-backed role to the fullest. He emotes effortlessly and convincingly portrays his dilemmas, making us believe, in his character. He has, indeed, come a long way from his amateur performances in Student of the Year and Hasee Toh Phasee. It’s only taken 13 years but Katrina Kaif has finally delivered something resembling a credible, sustained performance. She’s still an impossibly studied actor, unable to relax or save a bad line the way Kangana Ranaut or Alia Bhatt might. Yet, her feeling for Diya—who keeps putting her dreams on hold until she no longer can—is so palpable that it’s touching. The chemistry between Sid and Kat is stupendous, and certainly, after this film, would love to see them together again. They do exude a certain kind of freshness which can be tapped more on the reel. In supporting roles, Ram Kapoor, Rajit Kapur, Sarika, Taaha Shah Badusha, Sayani Gupta and Rohan Joshi are good. On the whole, ‘Baar Baar Dekho’ is a unique film which despite its minor flaws is a visually stunning, musically enchanting, well packaged non-conventional fare with grounded and earnest performances. A welcome change from the usual Bollywood norm!