Fresh talent, did someone say? Feast your eyes on a bevy of super-talented newcomers in writer-producer Luv Ranjan’s charming, sexy, urbane, witty rom-com that gets it right most of the way.
The fresh and semi-fresh acting talent on display in this sparkling concoction is its primary asset. The beautifully aligned plot about a college reunion gets its alluring fillip from the fertile pollination of cross-plot and purpose.
A lot of the creative energy in Pehla Pyaar… is conversational. The youngsters talk, drink , flirt, and f…k like newcomers. I loved the sharp writing and the defiant eschewal of all coyness in the courtship game.
Debutant director Anuj Saini negotiates the courtship games confidently. There are no errr and ahem embarrassing pauses even when the characters find their innerwear getting into a budge. And yes, the fact that one of the trio of buddies at the centre of the plot is a girl,is a refreshing tilt of the topi to asexual buddy-dom.
Luv Ranjanites will immediately recognize some of his favourite gender-war tropes popping up in the plot. The timid gender-repressed Gautam (played by the super-talented Sparsh Walia, last seen in Farhan Akhtar’s 120 Bahadur) is a direct descendent of Kartik Aaryan in Luv Ranjan’s Pyaar Ka Punchnaama. And his tyrannical girlfriend Gehna (Alisha Chopra) reminds us, rudely, of the domineering girlfriends played by Nushrratt Bharuccha in Punchnaama and Sonu Ki Titu Ki Sweety.
Of course, the film and its makers will be accused of misogyny. What I like about Luv Ranjan’s cinema is, when it comes to man-woman relationships and their inner stink, he doesn’t gives a flying buttock (duck) about isms and labels.
We all know women like Gehna who squeeze the breath out of the Gautams of the world. So more power to the bright savvy love-merchants of Hindi cinema. Most of them strategize the kisses, fights, love-making so awkwardly positioned, they feel like a travesty of the rom-com genre.
Not this one! Not this time. I came away from Pehla Pyaar Doosri Baar hugely charmed, not because it has anything new to say about contemporary courtship quirks (it doesn’t) but because it treats the tried and tested territory without tripping on triteness.
The actors have a whole lot of fun with their lived-in, live-in, characters. Kunal Vaid as Vedant who won’t give up on love even when she is engaged elsewhere(DDLJ gets spikey), Sparsh Walia as the bullied boyfriend Gautam and Sargun Kaur Luthra (quite a discovery!) as their female buddy , lead the cast with a rare endearing selfconfidence.
More power to these fresh-faced actors, they are an antidote to the tired superstars who continue to behave as though they are 23 when they are pushing 60. Here is the Dil Chahta Hai of the current times. Dewdrop fresh,talcum gentle, rockhard solid and reliably relatable, and yes let’s not forget the likeable song and dance numbers, Pehla Pyaar Doosri Baar is THE rom-com of the year, it delivers the punch of Punchnaama and the vigour and vitality of Friends.
Yes, Dil chahta hai, bring it on.
