Love Aaj Kal

It is a mish mash of recent movies and nothing else. I am surprised that critics at esteemed dailies like Times of India instead of trashing it have given 4 Star ratings !!!!

Mix Hum Tum, KANK, Bachna Ae Haseeno and Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na in little measures and you get this movie - wow - so simple to make a movie these days. The movies today are mainly made for the confused NRIs.....and this is yet another attempt at the same. But even Hollywood sensibilities have not eroded so much; if a bride has to run away she does that before marriage not after it.

The son of a star Indian cricketer and the daughter of an Indian badminton star - Saif and Deepika are good and watchable together. But I think in the first few scenes the Brit Saif does not look too good, his real age shows on the screen. In fact the restrained Saif (Veer Singh) from 1965 is more expressive without talking too much whereas the Brit Saif of the 2009 is, at most times, too talkative and irritating. Deepika looks hot in a few scenes and has given some good emoting scenes also - she has done the best that her role had in the lost story line. The new comer Gisele Monterio (as Harleen - The love interest of Veer Singh) looks good and refreshing. Good to see a lot of real old-time actors from Delhi Doordarshan in small blink and you miss roles as Harleen's family. A great actor like Zutshi has been wasted in a tiny role as Harleen's Sikh father.

But the highlight is the great Rishi Kapoor who as almost the narrator of the story compares Love today with that yesterday. And of course if love is meant and shown to be mad, crazy and forever then the real hero of the film is the good looking Rahul Kapoor who predictably has to be the most mature and stoic.

Director has tried to cash in on good locales from the British country side and beautiful scape of San Francisco. But if the intention was to show that love is different in today's time and it has become more practical then the climax has been messed up. It is very very Bollywoody predictable; except that the last shot of the narrative brings a smile seeing a very special screen appearance from a very endearing personality of the Indian Silver screen from about 30 years ago.

Overall this is a shame from the maker of his great first movie Jab We Met.

Rating : * * * * *