Imran Khan made a charming debut in Jaane Tu… Ya Jaane Na, but little did we know then that that was all he could do. (Watching him try to stretch in films like Matru Ki Bijlee Ka Mandola and Once Upon Ay Time In Mumbai Dobaara!, I’m reminded of what the critic Leonard Maltin said about Patrick Swayze’s performance in Ghost, that he “runs the gamut of expressions from A to B.”) But what he can do turns out to be enough in Punit Malhotra’s Gori Tere Pyaar Mein, where he plays a Tam-Brahm named Sriram. (Like a true-blue South Indian, he doesn’t shave his chest hair.) The crux of any rom-com is how “opposite” the leads are, and Malhotra lands on a fresh and interesting premise. Sriram is a hedonist, and Diya (Kareena Kapoor Khan) is a bleeding-heart social worker. The film doesn’t judge Sriram, neither does it extol Diya. He sands her edges. He realises (as does the film) that she can be a pill to be around, and only someone as laid back as him can manage this.
For a while, Gori Tere Pyaar Mein is innocuous entertainment. In the film’s best scene, Sriram wonders aloud about their future, as they are so different, and this isn’t just a line – it results in harsh exchanges, prickly truths, drastic consequences. Sriram may be a flake, but at least he’s honest about who he is, unlike Diya, who helps others and then retreats to a life of air-conditioned luxury. This wouldn’t be problem if she weren’t so filled with a sense of her own superiority. Stung by his words, Diya heads to a village in Gujarat to do good. (Even here, she finds that her principles aren’t enough; she needs his street smarts too.) He goes after her, and when he lands up in that village, he begins to sing O Mitwa, the song from Lagaan, which is presumably the closest he’s gotten to the non-shining India. And the film falls apart.
Part of the problem is the shift from rom-com to drama, with a villain (Anupam Kher) opposed to developmental work in the village. Suddenly, there’s a little too much real life for a film as silly as this one (and at nearly two-and-a-half hours, it is too much). Malhotra‘s stabs at symbolism are embarrassing. The bridge between Diya and Sriram is represented as a real bridge over troubled waters, a rickety one that needs to be made concrete. And don’t you know… Sriram happens to be an architect, never mind that he hasn’t spent a day putting his learning to practice. We don’t go to rom-coms expecting cold logic, but even as a heart-tugger Gori Tere Pyaar Mein doesn’t quite cut it. But there are two unexpected moments, one where Sriram looks at Diya (who’s older) and notices a strand of white in her hair, and the second during a song sequence, which features fleshy, makeup-free, ordinary-looking extras from the village. In the normal world, this counts for nothing, but in the Karan Johar universe (he’s the producer), it’s practically The Grapes of Wrath.
Copyright ©2013 Baradwaj Rangan. This article may not be reproduced in its entirety without permission. A link to this URL, instead, would be appreciated.
Baradwaj Rangan 
Jai
November 27, 2013
BR Sir–this line “”In the normal world, this counts for nothing, but in the Karan Johar universe (he’s the producer), it’s practically The Grapes of Wrath.””
I am yet to stop grinning after reading this. My better half forced me into watching SOTY, I am still reeling from the overdose of young adults pretending to be college students, while strutting around like supermodels…So perhaps, this is, indeed, KJo’s ‘realistic cinema’ moment 😉
So who makes the more unreal Tam Brahm…Imran in this movie, or Prithviraj in Kannamoochi Yenada? (The latter irritated me no end…)
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sriramv
November 27, 2013
How dare he name him as Sriram? Great review.
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Arjun
November 27, 2013
BR: Where is the film set and how convincing is Imran Khan’s portrayal of a Tam brahm? Is it any different from the stereotypical depiction we have come to expect from Bolly and Kolly?
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MANK
November 27, 2013
Karan Johar and Grapes of Wrath in the same sentence and Kareena Kapoor’s grey hair as well..Never hoped to live to see that 😉
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JPhilip
November 27, 2013
(Jai:)I am no fan of the ivory tower that Kjo inhabits,but shouldn’t we in some way laud him for his segment in Bombay Talkies(not that it extolled a form of sexuality but that he represented that life with a certain amount of sincerity and ‘realism’).
Yes ,I am yet to recover from SOTY too 😉 and found Imran in OATIM loathsome.I saw an interview of his where -in response to a question-he expressed that that role wasn’t ill suited to him ,but that the film failed because it didn’t release in enough screens!That’s deluded self belief ….
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Jai
November 27, 2013
Jphilip–Yeah, I heard that KJo’s segment in Bombay Talkies was great. Haven’t yet caught up with it though, hope to do so soon.
Incidentally, I much preferred his KANK (a more ‘messy’, non fluffy movie, for all that it had flaws) as compared to the super glossy, irritatingly showy K3G and SOTY.
Cheers…
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MANK
November 27, 2013
@JPHILIP:film failed because it didn’t release in enough screens!That’s deluded self belief
Ha Ha! Yeah i saw that interview too. Pray on what he is going to blame the failure of this film, Background dancers not having makeup or Kareena looking much older than him(some truth in that 😉 ) or megastar 😉 sunny deol flexing his 3.5 kg biceps in the movie released opposite to this.Some words for the other self denialist, Kareena Kapoor as well who opted out of Ram Leela to get into this one .She has been going around saying that she is the only actress who’s kind enough to gives roles to other actresses. Hope she continues to do that 😉
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Jitaditya
November 28, 2013
I never liked the K Jo segment in BT because I just could not see how is that story a tribute to 100 years of Bolly… until recently they did not even talk about these issues… how does a gay story represent Bollywood?
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Abhirup.
November 29, 2013
Jitaditya, I think there’s a four-pronged answer to your question.
1) Karan Johar’s segment in ‘Bombay Talkies’ isn’t entirely divorced from the issue of cinema and how it influences people. Gayatri (Rani Mukerjee) and Avinash (Saquib Saleem) work for a Bollywood gossip magazine, and Dev (Randeep Hooda) opens up to Avinash–somewhat, at least–when he comes to know that they share a fondness for old film music. However implicitly/indirectly, Bollywood, thus, does play a role in bringing the three characters together.
2) Mr. Rangan has offered a very interesting take on the structure of ‘Bombay Talkies’ in the opening paragraph of his review of the film. Here it goes: “The quartet of shorts that make up ‘Bombay Talkies’ train a zoom lens on cinema, starting on the outside and slowly drawing us in. In the first story, cinema is on the periphery, visible only as a contributor to the gossip-magazine industry and in a Hindi film music collector’s posters and albums. In the second, a character from beyond a cordon steps into the charmed circle– he becomes a participant in cinema, an extra. The third story draws us in even closer, to the experience of being a star – if not in the cinema on the screens, then certainly in the cinema of one’s dreams. And the final story depicts the efforts to come in contact with a star outside the cinema hall, in his home. You could make a solid case that cinema, today, is the opium of the masses, a new kind of religion, and this final short deposits us in the sanctum sanctorum of a Bombay god. At least in this country, you cannot get any closer to cinema.”
If this is how the four directors approached the project, if they indeed wanted to go from the periphery to the sanctum sanctorum, then Johar’s story is a very good place to begin the film with. With its minimum focus on anything explicitly ‘filmi’, but cluing us in nevertheless to how aspects of cinema (in this case, music) can draw people together, it paves the way for the three other shorts, which take us deeper into the world of films.
3) Homosexuality may not be staple Bollywood issue, but love triangles certainly are. Johar’s story is also essentially a love triangle, isn’t it? In that sense, we could say, as Mr. Rangan has, too, that here Johar pays a tribute to that cherished Indian film convention, one that he himself has used in some of his earlier movies–only, he does it with a gay twist.
4) Finally, while it’s true that only recently has Bollywood started addressing the issues of alternative sexuality and that the number of films made on the subject can be counted off the fingers of one hand, maybe that is precisely the reason why ‘Bombay Talkies’ begins with a story about homosexuals and the discrimination and difficulties they face. Maybe it was the ‘Bombay Talkies’ team’s way of saying, “These are the issues we have been ignoring for a hundred years. It’s time to break the silence.”
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brangan
November 29, 2013
Jai: So who makes the more unreal Tam Brahm…Imran in this movie, or Prithviraj in Kannamoochi Yenada?
I’d say Imran makes the better Tam Brahm simply because the film makes no bones to present him as one. Regarding his looks, his father even says that he may have been switched as a baby in the hospital. (Though this isn’t technically necessary, as there are a lot of very fair Tamilians.) And he’s shown to be very different from his family, attitude-wise too — likes meat, etc. So we aren’t made to suffer him speaking Tamil or trying to be Tamil.
Arjun: For me the big LOL moment was when they showed a family of Tam Brahms dancing to “appidi podu” at an engagement ceremony. One part of me howled in protest, but then I thought… well, why not! It’s better than the other stereotype — all of them sitting down cross-legged and putting thalam to Brocheva or some such thing 😀
Jai: Yeah, I too feel KANK — flaws and all — is his best film and that it got a raw deal simply because he made it. Wrote about it here.
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Patlabor
November 30, 2013
Which The Grapes of Wrath? Steinbeck’s or Ford’s? 🙂
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Jai
November 30, 2013
@ Jitaditya–I haven’t yet seen the movie, but it seems to me Abhirup’s reply to your query is a very comprehensive and valid one. The 3rd and 4th points of his reply, especially, made a lot of sense to me (I need to see the film, to fully appreciate points 1 & 2).
Would like to add another point–There have been several Bollywood films dealing with social truths, which may be ‘inconvenient’ to many people. Films depicting caste atrocities & class prejudices, for example. Or sexual harassment/ exploitation of women.
In a sense, KJo’s segment deals with a similar social truth, which perhaps, some people would like to ‘wish away’ or not acknowledge. So that is where it ties in with a tribute to Bollywood–albeit a pretty bold one, from a director who typically sticks to inanely saccharine candyfloss.
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