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THE LARGEST CIRCULATED ENGLISH DAILY IN SOUTH INDIA CHENNAI I TUESDAY 18 I FEBRUARY 2020 THE LARGEST CIRCULATED ENGLISH DAILY IN SOUTH INDIA CHENNAI I TUESDAY 18 I FEBRUARY 2020 MOVIES DECCAN CHRONICLE | TUESDAY | 18 FEBRUARY 2020 | CHENNAI pg 2 OUR CRITIC’S RATING Outstanding ★★★★★ | Great ★★★★ | Good ★★★ | Okay ★★ | Poor ★ | Truly Terrible TT Roger Ebert’s Kal, Imtiaz Ali’s films were irritating, Great Movies Aaj it is insufferable SUPARNA SHARMA If you were planning a suffering her dizzy gestures and Kal, Veer and Leena had a thing chatter for a while, she actually Kal, a girl in a blue skirt and a — whenever they met, she would Love Aaj Kal movie for your Valentine’s started grating on my nerves. boy in khaki pants. suddenly, quickly kiss him. (U/A) 141 min date, I’d say cleaning Kartik Aaryan and Aarushi Aaj, a girl in shorts and a boy Aaj, Zoe and Raghu make out and CAST: Kartik Aaryan, Sara Ali public latrines in Sharma barely have dialogue, in with questionable hygiene. then she lies on top of him. Khan, Aarushi Sharma, Randeep the service of kal and aaj, and yet they try to Kal, he had issues, complexes. Hooda, Simone Singh Swachhchh Bharat hold the film with some attempt at Kal, girl asking boy why he’s Aaj, she has issues, complexes. acting. But neither love nor their DIRECTOR: Imtiaz Ali would be more fun than chasing her. RATING: ★ acting can save this meandering, Aaj, girl asking boy why he did- Kal, Veer hurt Leena, but hurt watching Love Aaj Kal. dull banality. n’t sleep with her. himself as well. Aaj, Zoe hurts Raghu, but hurts hough I enjoyed Jab We Met, THE PHANTOM Kal, boy says, “Okay, I will stop herself as well. Now imagine that the girl who and liked Highway to some OF THE OPERA chasing you”. Imtiaz Ali doesn’t want to grow up comes to listen to cafe-wale uncle, Textent, I have never been a Released in 1925 Aaj, boy says, “You are special”. al, parson, tarson, narson, in and will keep making the same walks in and out hyperventilating, fan of Imtiaz Ali and his world- Review written fact for barson, Imtiaz Ali film over and over, and then again. like, all of the time. view. But now, after Love Aaj Kal, I on December 19, Kal, girl responded, “Did I ask Khas been making the same Leena of kal barely talks. But have developed deep contempt for 2004 you not to chase me?” film, over and over — Jab We Met Kal, Imtiaz Ali knew how to Zoe of 2020 more than makes up his baby doll heroines who act out Aaj, girl says, “Whateverrrr”. (2007), Love Aaj Kal (2009), write and had at least a semblance for that Leena, and all the Leenas and throw tantrums all the time, t has always been a question whether The Rockstar (2011), Cocktail (2010), of a story. born and brought up in the three and his indulgent, moronic film- Phantom of the Opera (1925) is a great film, or Kal, boy is Veer (Kartik Aaryan), Highway (2014), Tamasha (2015), Aaj, he has lost that skill as well, decades between them. making. only a great spectacle. Carl Sandburg, one of girl is Leena (Aarushi Sharma) in Jab Harry Met Sejal (2017). and instead of a story has only Zoe’s character is created out of Somewhere in the middle of Love Ithe original reviewers, underwent a change of Udaipur, circa 1990 Aaj, he has made the same film, expository dialogue. Imtiaz Ali’s issues and complexes Aaj Kal sits a stand-up comic rou- heart between his first Chicago Daily News review Aaj, boy is Raghu (Kartik again. about women and love. Thus, she tine by one Justice Chaudhary (he waited for the Phantom’s unmasking “terribly Aaryan), girl is Zoe (Sara Ali ove Aaj Kal 2020 has no story has a huffy demeanour, throws who says that because the male fascinated, aching with suspense”) and a reconsid- Khan) in Delhi 2020 Kal, parson, tarson, narson, his whatsoever and so most of tantrums, has only exaggerated, members of cattle at his home are eration written a month later (“strictly among the heroes and heroines found them- Lthe time is spent talking petulant responses and speaks all not into monogamy and don’t wear novelties of the season”). It was not, he added on Kal, Leena was a student in a selves through love, else they felt about love, how love feels, what the time while gesturing frantical- any clothes, he too has decided to the level of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari or Greed, convent school. lost-lost, sad-sad. love does, instead of showing it to ly. Yet, the instructions to the cam- discard both, monogamy and mentioning two of the greatest films of all time. Aaj, Zoe has career plans of run- Aaj, his hero and heroine find us. eraman were to crouch in front of clothes. He was right about that, and could have added the ning an event management compa- themselves through love, and with- Imagine a road trip movie where her and stare up with a grin and a If you figure what that was greatest of all silent horror films, Murnau’s n y. out it they feel lost-lost, sad-sad. instead of an actual road trip, the throbbing heart, like a duffer in about, do drop a line. Nosferatu (1922), whose vampire may have influ- lead pair take turns to sit with an love. Else, please implore the mighty enced Lon Chaney’s performance as the Phantom. Kal, Veer was studying to be a Kal, parson, tarson, narson, uncle at a coffee shop while he tells At one point, after we return producers of Bollywood who will But as an exercise in lurid sensationalism, strain- doctor. Imtiaz Ali’s films were about the them about a road trip he once from a flashback to aaj, Zoe says to pour in money for yet another ing against technical limitations in its eagerness to Aaj, Raghu is a computer pro- redemptive power of love. went on. But, rather than talk cafe uncle, “Life, haan!” banal bakwas, to sponsor some overwhelm, the first of the many Phantom films grammer. Aaj, his film is about the redemp- about interesting, fun stuff, the The banality is just staggering. therapy sessions for Imtiaz Ali and has a creepy, undeniable power. tive power of love. story he narrates goes like this: “I Zoe’s character is so idiotic that help him grow up a little. And if The story is simply told — too simply, perhaps, so Kal, Leena did kathak. checked out a car, then I took it for she has a hissy fit before taking all they feel that ship has sailed, then that all of the adaptations, including the famous Aaj, Zoe does zumba. Kal, his heroines were child- a spin. It got a flat, I changed tyre. life-altering decisions, all of which the therapy could at least help him Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, have been much babes. Again there was a puncture. are based entirely on what some- create female characters that don’t ado about relatively little. In the cellars of the Paris Kal, Leena wore salwar-kameez Aaj, his heroine is a child-babe, Mileage wasn’t good. The gear one else has said or experienced. that have the IQ, emotions and Opera House lives a disfigured masked man who with dupatta. one at least. stick was wobbly, the wipers were mannerisms of eight-year-old becomes obsessed with the young singer Christine. Aaj, Zoe wears small, trendy not moving smoothly. When I put sually, Randeep Hooda is girls. He commands the management to give her leading clothes and high heels. Kal, Imtiaz Ali was besotted with the window down, the breeze was good, but in Love Aaj Kal he Imtiaz Ali has a very uneasy rela- roles, and when they refuse, he exacts a terrible boys and girls with tiny IQs. nice, but her hair got tangled. She Uis inept and quite unbear- tionship with grown women and revenge, causing a great chandelier to crash down Kal, Leena stood in balcony steal- Aaj, he is still obsessed with a was not happy.” able. Sara Ali Khan is not just bad, that is visible in the way he has on the audience. ing furtive glances. boys and girls with tiny IQs. she is terrible, as if she has created the character of Zoe’s Christine’s lover, a pallid nonentity, is little com- Aaj, Zoe has tequila shots in a regressed as an actor mother, who has an opinion on petition for her fascination with the Phantom, until pub. Kal, I thought since Kedarnath like. Played by Simone Singh, this she realises with horror that the creature wants her Imtiaz Ali would (2018). mommy wears her hair and to dwell in his mad subterranean world. She Kal, Leena had a plait and was grow up after After expression like Mrs Addam from unmasks him, is repelled by his hideous disfigure- very scared of her mother. having made Addams Family and may have well ment, flees to the surface and her lover, and is fol- Aaj, Zoe’s hair is streaked and the same film arrived to the sets of Love Aaj Kal lowed by a Phantom seeking violent revenge. There she shouts at her mother. over and on a broom with a black conical is no room for psychological subtlety here. ove r. hat. It is the idea of the Phantom, really, that fasci- aj, a love guru, a philoso- Aaj, it nates us: the idea of a cruelly mistreated man going pher-guide (Randeep Hooda) is clear ove Aaj Kal isn’t just an mad in self-imposed exile in the very cellars, dun- Aruns Mazi (past), a coffee that annoying, irritating film, it geons and torture chambers where he was, appar- shop cum co-working space that Lalso moves at a glacial pace.