Anurag Kashyap disappoints with a bizarre Gen Z love story

Almost Pyaar with DJ Mohabbat

Hindi (Netflix)

Director: Anurag Kashyap

Cast: Karan Mehta, Alaya F, Vicky Kaushal

Rating: 2/5

Anurag Kashyap’s latest film, ‘Almost Pyaar with DJ Mohabbat’ claims to be the exploration of intricate Generation Z romance. But it turns out to be messier than the usual stereotypical understanding of younger generations by their elders. However, what is surprising is how such a progressive filmmaker failed to portray a coherent, not-so-messy romantic tale of young couples from his daughter’s generation.

Is the generation really as complicated as it was made out to be in the film? Perhaps yes, but Kashyap has no answer here.

Two unrequited teen love stories take place parallelly in London and Himachal Pradesh. The couple is played by the same cast — Karan Mehta as Harmeet and Yaqub, and Alaya F as Ayesha and Amrita. Kashyap shows both couples as doppelgangers, and not directly related to their lookalikes.

This is perhaps to portray how, even in different setups, romance is hindered by the same intolerance and obstructions of social status, religion and inequality. Both love stories are woven together by another character called DJ Mohabbat —played by a dashing Vicky Kaushal— with his heaps of verses on modern ‘pyaar’, which actually deserves a separate podcast or a film.

Though the premise sounds well and good for a seasoned director to explore, everything that could go wrong has gone wrong for Kashyap. Even in Kashyap’s earlier average flicks, there would be some solid takeaways such as strong female characters, complementing music, tricky camera work etc.

But, ‘Almost Pyaar...’ is devoid of any major upshots. Unfortunately, the film does no service to harness the potential of the charming newcomers in the lead.

Kashyap’s treatment of the film with a bizarre, somewhat magical realism approach in a very realistic setup challenges the viewers’ comprehension. The filmmaker uses creative liberty very loosely in a story that unfolds in a rather contrived manner, as there is no depth to the characters and plausible explanations for the things they do.

Amit Trivedi collaborates with the filmmaker for the fourth time but the composer fails to create magic. The film’s soundtrack feels like only fillers which is in damage control mode. The deliberate usage of English words with Hindi lyrics to highlight modern-day language usage does not serve its purpose.

Aspiring to be versatile is expected from Kashyap but one hope it ends up in a coherent film next time.