A tad long ode to love
Jab Tak Hai Jaan
Hindi (U/A)
Cast: Shah Rukh Khan, Katrina Kaif, Anushka Sharma
Director: Yash Chopra
Two women, two accidents, six songs and a case of amnesia... And then good sense prevails upon Katrina Kaif who makes peace with God so that Jab Tak Hai Jaan can wind up. That’s three full hours of Chopra-esque romance where the hero falls in love in London and comes back to Ladakh to brood.
Yash Chopra’s swansong may be the perfect piece that exemplifies his style of craft — love stories that withstand the test of caste, borders and time (here, a decade). But the tale keeps stretching on a plot that is thinner than the chiffon its ladies wear. And that’s when your already-thinning patience declares war on mush. The lover in you might want to stay back and watch the postcard-pretty proceedings. After all, it’s a Yash Chopra product where there is no room for the bad and the ugly.
In the meantime, Kaif also barters with God for favours granted — giving up chocolates, fur etc. Wish she stuck to those harmless vows. Instead, she goes for a life-changing deal with “sir Jesus” that sends Khan packing to Kashmir and adds another hour to the movie. It takes a certain Neetu Singh in a vineyard to bring the straying story back on track.
Back in India, our erstwhile waiter metamorphoses into an army Major who defuses bombs without any safety gear. And “the man who cannot die” makes perfect fodder for documentary-maker Anushka Sharma. The self-declared supergirl is hunting for a job with Discovery Channel so that she can travel the world and have sex with people of all accents. Well, her agenda of a footloose life goes almost like that.
Anushka peps up the film though she goes overboard at times (which is anyday better than a Katrina in tears, who looks ethereally beautiful, but emotes poor).
Shah Rukh romances well, but he can’t pass off as a 28-year-old again.
Unending romance, yes, but it could have done well to end on time as well.
