Movie Review - Bareilly Ki Barfi by Suhel Johar

Bareilly Ki Barfi Is A Rom-Com With Less Romance And More Comedy!

Bareilly Ki Barfi is a rom-com. A cute little love story with a love triangle twist thrown in. A watchable film if you are a fan of romantic comedies that are placed in the context of a small town with all its unique appeal, charm, and quirks. As a film it clicks all the right boxes. You have the peppy girl whose parents have the usual quirks that you might find in people from this part of the world. There are a couple of boys, each of whom is shown to be good enough to win the girl.

Bareilly Ki Barfi starts off with Javed Akhtar's voice. The voiceover introduces all the principle characters in the film and also takes us through the rest of the film. The film is about a Bareilly based vivacious girl Bitti Mishra (Kriti Sanon) and her life. Despite being a girl, her father Narottam Mishra (Pankaj Tripathi) and mother Sushila Mishra (Seema Pahwa) have raised her up as a son. A small town Brahmin girl Bitti loves to watch English films, comes home late at night, enjoys an occasional drink, and loves to smoke a cigarette, eat non-veg and break dance on the terrace. Within her there are all the qualities that the society considers as sub-divine. For this reason, she has been rejected twice by prospective grooms. Bitti, who works in the Department of Electricity's complaint department, is looking for such a boy for marriage, who does not ask her whether she is a virgin and is ready to accept her as she is. When her mother blames her for her rejection she decides to flee from the house. At the station she buys a book 'Bareilly Ki Barfi' and after reading it in the train she returns. She identifies herself with the principle character in the book and feels that the writer Pritam Vidrohi (Rajkummar Rao) has actually based that character on her life. She wants to meet him and the process of finding the writer starts with the book seller at the station who directs her to the publisher of the book Chirag Dubey (Ayushmann Khurrana).

When Chirag gets to know about Bitti’s love for the book’s writer, he promises to help her out and fabricates a story about Pritam Vidrohi. But the actual writer of the book is Chirag who did not want to use his name as the author to protect the identity of the real girl on whose life the book was based on. Both Chirag and Pritam are friends and with Pritam’s arrival, the story turns into a love triangle. The ensuing story is full of light moments, fun and of course a sweet happy ending.

The first thing that comes across as most impressive is the dialogues. Nitesh Tiwari and Shreyas Jain have added the perfect UP ka tadka. The dialogues, though simple and as fluid as the everyday chatter add the perfect touch of humour. To add effect, dialects are like icing on the cake.

We have some fantastic one liners too but the problem with one liners is that at times you create entire scenes just so that you can accommodate them. This can come as forced and risk disappointing the audiences and as a film Bareilly Ki Barfi runs that risk as well. The dialogues may be impressive but the same cannot be said about the plot though. While trying to create that love triangle twist, the writers overlooked some inconsistencies. At times, the momentum tends to fall flat because of this. This is why also at times it might seem to you that the film may be stretching just that little bit extra.

Bareilly Ki Barfi’s weakest point is that its story is very predictable. The viewer can easily understand what is going to happen in the next scene. So maybe it could have been written better and also edited better. Despite a predictable plot the fact that most of the film does not look forced is largely because of the superb work put in by the cast of the film.

Bareilly Ki Barfi is Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari’s second outing as a director after Nil Battey Sannata and although her work in this film is not as impressive as it was in her debut film she does a decent job. She is letdown here by a predictable script written by her husband Nitesh Tiwari in association with Shreyas Jain. The writers do well in fleshing out the characters but lag in terms of story telling. Cinematography by Gavemic U. Ary is good while editing by Chandrashekhar Prajapati is just about okay and could have been better. Music by Tanishk Bagchi and Arko Pravo Mukherjee is decent. Tu Nazm Nazm Sa Hai and Sweety Tera Drama are the best of the lot. Choreographers Bosco-Caesar have picturised Sweety Tera Drama like only they could have done. Unarguably, they must be the best choreographers in business in Bollywood today.       

On the acting front whether it is the main cast or the support cast everybody has performed with enthusiasm.  Rajkummar Rao leads the way with his outstanding performance and is a delight to watch as usual. Ayushmann Khurrana is good in his character that has grey shades. Kriti Sanon is convincing in her role and justifies her selection for the role. Pankaj Tripathi, who in spite of looking too young to play the girl’s dad plays it with an aplomb. Seema Pahwa is superb.  Rohit Choudhary and Swati Semwal lend adequate support.

On the whole, if you like rom-coms you will not regret tasting this Bareilly Ki Barfi.