Dil Bechara – Movie Review

A GENDER GAUGE & A GENERAL COMMENT ON MUKESH CHHABRA’S DIL BECHARA WHICH PREMIERED ON DISNEY+HOTSTAR ON 24 JULY 2020

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Story
Screenplay
Dialogues
Direction
Music
Production Values
Performances

In a nut-shell:

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Cast: Sushant Singh Rajput and Sanjana Sanghi

Directors: Mukesh Chhabra

Producer: Fox Star Studios

Disclaimer

Lehren.com is proud that critic Bharathi S Pradhan is an advisory member of the CBFC. Her reviews, however, are personal and do not reflect the views of the Censor Board in any way.

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The poignancy of the situation. The charm of the hero.

Given the tragic circumstances around which Sushant Singh Rajput’s last film has dropped on Disney+Hotstar, it’s tough to go beyond these two words, ‘poignant’ and ‘charm’.

Right there is the first stumble as a spark of chemistry and a credible build-up to a grand romance were required for hearts to weep over their doomed relationship.

Kizie’s intense desire to meet the missing musician behind her favourite song ‘I’m yours’ which becomes Manny’s one-point mission in life, takes them to Paris. Once again, an average composition like ‘Main tumhara’ doesn’t explain her obsessive craze for the number nor do the tepidly written scenes justify why she’d want to make that life-threatening trip.

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Like the American original, while the spotlight is on Kizie’s condition, a twist of fate puts Manny and not her on cancer’s fatal list. But the all-round emotional disconnect continues.

Unfortunately, with the understandable gush of sentimentality engulfing the small screen on this occasion, the tears are for the real life tragedy of Sushant Singh Rajput and not really for Manny.

As an actor with an undeniable screen charm, it is moving that this is his farewell performance. With a reasonable presence, Sanjana Sanghi as Kizie is more support cast material than a magnetic leading lady.

 GENDER IMBALANCE

Is it supposed to be roguish charm? The hero-woos-heroine scenes are outdated with Manny following Kizie around on the road and dropping dialogues about her name sounding like a serial kisser in his very first conversation with her.

While Kizie’s father watches National Geographic, her mother is yesterday’s housewife eternally getting food ready for everybody without anybody lifting a finger to help her. There’s even a scene where Kizie, Manny and daddy are well into their meal while she serves them all and joins in at the tail end of the dinner. All attempts at humour over the mother’s cooking, her worry over the virginity of her dying daughter and her getting into a twist over the mating habits of lionesses on a TV show, fall flat. And she’s one of those who goes, “Aw, what’ll I do in Paris?”

It’s gender representation of the 1960s in 2020.   

OFF-SCREEN TRAGEDY SEEPS IN Dil Bechara - Movie Review