Movie Review – Meri Pyaari Bindu by Suhel Johar

Meri Pyaari Bindu Is An Out Of Sync Love Story That Is Uninteresting And Disengaging.

With some innovative and interesting trailers, YRF managed to build up a decent pre release hype with their promotion of Meri Pyaari Bindu. But all that hype has proved to be a misnomer since the film is nowhere near to what it promised through its trailers. Very clearly, Meri Pyaari Bindu does not manage to win you over as a complete package.

Abhimanyu aka Bubla Roy (Ayushmann Khurrana) is a popular author who writes sleazy novels which is all about horror, thrills and women. He has to his credit novellas like "Chudail Ki Choli", "Dracula's Lover" and "Das Cabin", among many more. While his career seems to be going great guns, there is something which makes him restless as he faces a writer’s block following a major heartbreak. While his publisher pesters him to come up with a new book, Abhi realizes it’s finally time to turn to a genre that he has been running away from, a romantic novel. A call from his parents faking their divorce brings him back to his hometown Kolkata- a place which holds bitter-sweet memories of Bindu (Parineeti Chopra). Bindu is a unlikable, untrustworthy, selfish, vain, opportunist, sweet-talking Abhimanyu into catering to her needs all the time. The memories of her are so overwhelming that Abhi decides to pen down his own love story as ‘Meri Pyaari Bindu’.

We get a peek into their relationship through the mix-tapes of their favourite songs. The duo are as different as chalk and cheese and yet they share a bond that’s so special that they’re almost irreplaceable in each other’s lives. However, when two people seek different things and at times when two people end up being in the right place at the wrong time things do not work. And the same happens with Abhimanyu and Bindu. There are flashbacks about Abhi and Bindu and then we cut to the present day where Abhimanyu is writing about her, while listening to old songs. They come together, drift apart, come together and…. well it’s all so jumbled up.

The movie takes almost 25 minutes to establish its base and the entire first half is in a flashback. By the second half, you’re too bored to bother about the messed up leads and are eagerly waiting for the film to end. Clearly the story lacks the punch and so does the narrative. There’s not one high point in the film. The comedy attached to the adult writer’s character is too obvious and predictable. The time frame of the film lacks logic. For example: considering that Abhimanyu and Bindu were five when they met and even though the former was a smart child he only graduates at the age of 24. And then is through with his post graduation a little too quickly to bag a job. The style in the 90s is another thing that the makers got all wrong. While the radio, tape recorder and cassettes that were a part of the 80’s and 90’s the characters styling in the film is very millennial.

Another major drawback is the lack of chemistry between Ayushmann and Parineeti. They just couldn’t create any magic. The weak script with little purpose or relevance doesn’t offer much to get a clarity about the two leads. The so-called childhood pals hardly know much about each other beyond a compilation of chartbusters, one that is exposed every time Meri Pyaari Bindu abruptly reveals one's ambition and another's domestic cravings. Her struggle is unreal and unintentionally comical. The film is bland and lacks the masala that is attached with most Bollywood commercial films of this genre.

The last 15 minutes is the time when the film gets all its intentions and emotions right, but it’s way too late. The only good thing about the film is the music in the film. For retro music lovers, there’s Kishore Kumar, Lata Mangeshkar and Bappi Lahiri while Sachin-Jigar’s original music too works well for this film.

The retro music and Sachin-Jigar’s soothing music go down well in the film. While it is the 70s and 80s music that you enjoy the most, tracks like Afeemi and Maana Ke Hum Yaar weave magic too.

Debutant director Akshay Roy’s work at best can be described as below average. He fails to make you enjoy Abhimanyu’s love or connect with Bindu’s indecisive nature. The film’s cinematography by Tushar Ray is good.  He perfectly captures the old charm of Kolkata and the breeziness of Mumbai through his lens. Suprotim Sengupta's writing is flawed and ineffective. Editing by Shweta Venkat   should have been a lot more sharper.

Performancewise, both Ayushmann Khurrana and Parineeti Chopra have repeated themselves which may not be bad but certainly not a good thing to say about them. It’s time they added more shades to their repertoire. Chopra is given too many makeovers in this film. She is constantly on a fashion parade with her dresses speaking more than her character. Similarly for Khurrana, his boy-next-door image has little to hold your attention and his chemistry with Parineeti doesn’t work either.

Aparajita Adhya  as Abhimanyu’s mother is the most impressive performer in the film.

On the whole, Meri Pyaari Bindu is a messed up rom-com that moves at a sluggish pace and tedious to watch.