Dilwale Review: Only for the pure Dil-waale out there

Dilwale: Only for the pure Dil-waale out there

Rating: 2/5.

Only when you are an admirer of Rohit Shetty’s movies, you should attempt to watch Dilwale. Juxtapose it with Singham, or may be, Chennai Express, it falls flat.

Scenic locations, flying cars, chase sequences set-up in Bulgaria, vintage car garage as the backdrop, colourful attires, you ask for anything that can be remotely gaudy, Dilwale offers shades of everything.

The only thing missing is a script and sense. As it turns out, that’s how it’s meant to be.

Nevertheless, Dilwale is for easy goers and if you have had apprehensions about quality of output of Rohit Shetty or have been cynical of recent movies of Shahrukh Khan, this one won’t come out any different.

The single reason DDLJ (’95) and KKHH (‘98) turned out to be blockbusters was the chemistry between Kajol and SRK. Two decades on, recreating the same magic in a romance based movie, would require a lot more than just the two of them.

As a result, Dilwale offers you a spectrum of masala threads: Varun Dhawan and Kriti Sanon with their underdeveloped and rather unconvincing love-story, Vinod Khanna and Kabir Bedi playing yesteryear kingpins with their sidekicks and then a contemporary, melodramatic, local don, King (Bomman Irani).

And along with these there are Johnny Lever and Sanjay Mishra, frantically fitted into the story with namesake introductions.

Even though the movie is about estranged lovers caught in family feud, nobody is even slightly lonely out here.

Raj (SRK), earlier Kali, is a gangster-turned-garage owner, has his 2 confidantes (Mukesh Tiwari and Pankaj Tripathi) to keep him company. His brother Veer (Varun Sharma) is surrounded by youngies (Varun Sharma, Chetna Pande, etc.) whose only interest is to go out with their girlfriends. Early on, Veer is also joined by Ishita (Kriti Sanon), as his love interest, in a clichéd fashion.

Bomman Irani (reminiscent of Don in Kabhi Haan Kabhi Naa), switches over to the dream world at the slightest opportunity and starts playing a virtual piano. He is also madly in love with the vintage car he inherited from his father.

Dilwale, doesn’t load it’s audience with intellectual understanding of its characters or the turnarounds of a situation. Even further, there is hardly any tormenting on the emotional front either.

While Veer is busy with his random acts of oblivion, Raj showers all his brotherly love on him by pardoning all his mistakes.

Bizarre dialogues like, “Aapka restaurant ka business hai lekin ismein take-away ya home-delivery nahin hai,”, are splashed all through.

It may take a while or may be forever to recall and understand the meaning of many similar dialogues as this one. The pace at which these ‘comic one-liners’ come about is frantic and hence comprehending all of them as they come is next to impossible. People in the audience laugh at whichever they understood. So, at any given juncture the auditorium has someone or the other laughing, thereby, assuring a base-level of liveliness in the auditorium.

The movie script doesn’t impose any preconditions on the audience; it similarly doesn’t push its characters into extreme situations or demanding performances either.

Varun Sharma, Kriti Sanon have not much to do in Dilwale primarily because they can’t hold the frame on their own. It’s Shahrukh Khan and Kajol who whenever together – happens not that often though – keep your eyes glued to the screen.

Each and every dialogue or gesture of SRK can be traced to an earlier movie of his. Dilwale is a walk in the park for him.

Two actors stand apart for their stellar performance. Kajol (as Meera) is one of them. She captures your attention and mesmerizes your imagination with her presence on the screen. Meera’s role lacks variety but she needs to conceal her true emotions from others around her. Kajol portrays Meera with simplicity.

The other actor, completely unexpected amongst the big names, is Sanjay Mishra, in the role of Oscar, a dealer in second-hand cars. His job is the toughest one: entertain you when Varun Dhawan, the youngies, Bomman Irani, etc. have failed to titillate you. He offers you bizarre tongue-twisting yet rhyming one-liners. Sajid-Farhad, the dialogue writers, excel in framing a few awesomely creative comical dialogues for Mishra.

Johnny Lever’s dialogues delivered in South Indian ascent can only be truly appreciated if you know a bit of similar pronunciations in any of the down-south languages. Each and every word he utters is with precision.

Barring the exception of the melodious Gerua song – shot in absolute picturesque locations with amazing camera work – the music of Dilwale, is unimpressive. Their short duration covers up for their coarseness and hence leaves your mood unharmed.

And lastly, when the credits roll, you find a mention of individual make-up artists for all the big names in the movie. Shahrukh looks young and charming, Kajol an absolute stunner, Kabir Bedi and Vinod Khanna are presentable and Johnny Lever looks unaged. An early-on mention in the credits is indeed a fitting acknowledgement to the grand achievement of the make-up artists.

Dilwale requires you to be a Dil-waala, as there is very little on the thought-provoking front. The brainy, Dimaag-waale, can give it a miss.