Plot Summary – Brothers Arjun and Rahul return home to visit their ailing grandfather. Amidst numerous ongoing family problems, emotions get intensified when a girl causes a rift between the two.

★★★★★  

Watched 18 Dec 2024

I am so hesitant to term something a masterpiece these days cause as I watch more and more cinema, my threshold for what counts as one keeps increasing. What makes a masterpiece for me? Personally, I value a good script over most things. If the script is bad then however good the other parts are, I can’t get over it. This film might have one of the best scripts I’ve ever seen in an Indian film. It so intricately tangles the web of family drama in a way that I’ve so rarely seen captured in Indian cinema. Batra wrote something that is Shakespearean and modern at the same time and manages to slowly raise the temperature throughout the film so that you’re never comfortable but never doubt the plausibility of the events.

Often directors will shy away from the use of technology in their films and set it in the past to make the conflict more believable and decrease the conveniences that characters have. This film uses technology so intelligently throughout the film and knows when not to use it as well. More than anything what Batra masters is tension. He masterfully increases the tension and defuses it at key moments so that the audience’s expectations are always subverted. There are some reveals in this film that truly had me gasping but never strained credulity. That’s what makes this such a brilliantly executed script.

However, a script alone does not a film make. You can see that a Hollywood veteran cinematographer helmed this one by how beautifully perfect the shots are. They never distract from the plot but they always know what to focus on in a scene. The score by Sameer Uddin is also brilliant and adds to the atmosphere of the film. The acting is what elevates this from great to perfect though. I am so upset that Indo-Pak tensions got too bad to allow Fawad Khan to take more Bollywood roles cause he is a bullet-train of charisma, charm and angst throughout this film. I was blown away and devastated by his performance which is definitely an easy one to play. He has to thread the needle between being loveable and serious and deceptive all while being charming and emotive. It’s a sensational performance. Siddharth Malhotra, Rishi Kapoor, Ratna Pathak Shah, and Rajat Kapoor are also all so perfectly cast and calibrated in this film. Alia Bhatt was the other standout for me though. She manages to carry so much pain while always appearing bubbly and likeable. I don’t think I’ve seen a bad performance from her thus far.

I think this film has a lot to say. It’s not meant to be watched with your mind turned off. It’s heavy, and it has such a strong sense of perspective throughout the film. Batra manages to tackle generational trauma, the struggle of the artist, intellectual property law, bad business practices, infidelity, what your legacy is, conservatism and plethora of other topics so deftly that you never feel like the film is preaching to you. I think this is one of the most subversive mainstream Bollywood films I’ve seen. Cause it is so loving and so accepting of its characters despite their flaws. Just like family. In one watch, this has already become an all-time favorite for me. Highly, highly recommend!