Chetan Bhagat has over time become the JK Rowling of Bollywood. He may not be as creative, influencing an entire new wave of fantasy in the post-modern readers, but he has definitely polished the ‘Shining India’ theme for the modern readers and viewers. 3 Idiots saw a boy from a not-so-well-known background chasing smaller, but significant things in life instead of cramming up text books and eventually making his own empire out of it. Kai Po Che! on the other hand, was more direct and in sync with the ground realities of modern day capitalist India. It was a story of three friends and how their paths in life cross each other and social responsibilities make them question their relationship. The only friend who succeeds in achieving his dream is an entrepreneur, who always took calculated risks in life. The one who gets killed always took decisions rather impulsively (such as paying special attention to coaching a Muslim child).
This synchronisation of Bhagat’s narratives with a new spin on ‘Shining India’ gives film-makers enough room for creating an equally dramatic and inspirational experience. That is the reason why Bhagat should have restricted himself to writing books that ended up being adapted by film-makers and not writing books for the purpose of adaptation by film-makers. 2 States is a clear example of the latter and a major misfire from both Bhagat and the director Abhishek Varman.
The story begins with Krish (Arjun Kapoor), a Punjabi boy arguing with his friend Ananya (Alia Bhatt) who is a Tamil girl from Chennai about small matters such as the quality of food. From friends they become lovers and share the bed with each other — but that obviously has been edited out of the print that is running in Pakistani cinemas. To the misfortune of the film-maker, the intimate scenes are so abruptly edited by the censor board that it’ll take you sometime to figure out why the film seems so rushed and pointless in the first half hour.
Story moves on, but of course the arguments between the two leads remain, which in the larger picture represent the conflict between the Tamil culture and the Punjabi culture. However, right when it seems that the cultural conflict is essentially the hindrance between their marriage and also presumably the plot of the film, we find out that fathers from both the families also have psychological problems. All of this adds up to a rather stretched second half after a relatively engaging start to the story, which also had the most loosely performed song of the year Locha-e-Ulfat.
That does not overshadow the cultural conflict, which is established by a few very good one-liners such as when the Punjabi mom whines over the fact that her future daughter-in-law finished both of her juice packs.
However, the disappointing part of the film is that all such excitement and highs and lows are generated by the side characters, so much so, that it often seems that it’s only the families of the couple who are interested in putting up a show and not the couple itself.
Despite repeated attempts by Alia Bhatt to generate some sort of chemistry with Kapoor, boredom oozed out of every single frame that they shared together. Bhatt was consistently trying to infuse some sort of a reaction from Kapoor, who on the other hand remained timid and restricted throughout the narrative, which also proved to be the film’s fatal flaw.
The script was mediocre with its set of clichés such as the drunkard father, but even that could have been saved by a relatively talented male lead. Kapoor’s monotony is the film’s weakest link; after all he gets more screen time than Alia Bhatt and fails to make any use of it, apart from mimicking the not- very-talented Abhishek Bachan on several occasions.
Abhishek Verman needs to choose his actors wisely and Bhagat needs to think less like an extension of Bollywood and more like a novelist.
Verdict: 2 States is just a mediocre script that could have been saved by solid performances from the leads. It is a sort of film that is not worth buying a cinema ticket for, but rather, watch it to kill time, when it runs on cable.
Rating: 1.5/5
Published in The Express Tribune, April 23rd, 2014.
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