Dulhania Revisits !!

Badrinath Ki Dulhaniya (2017) 

So the Dulhaniya returns yet again , this time as a runaway bride all set to challenge age old patriarchal Indian traditions    

Badrinath Ki Dulhaniya is a feel good factor romantic comedy dealing with a serious social evil of the horrendous dowry system and gender discrimination. 

Director: Shashank Khaitan 

Cast: Varuṇ Dhawan and Alia Bhaṭṭ 

Set in the beautiful Jhaṅsi city the movie deals with a sweet love story involving a carefree rich boy Badrinath ( Dhawan) and a middle class ambitious girl Vaidehi (Bhaṭṭ). He dreams of marrying her whereas she aspires to fly high pursuing a career of an air hostess. The roller coaster romance that begins in Jhaṅsi soon reaches Mumbai and finally blooms in Singapore. And finally all is well that ends well. 

With Karaṇ Johar backing the film its expected to be an predictable love story , inspite of an heavy dose of feminism and gender equality slogans the story drags like a chewing gum. Nearly 20 minutes of the storyline could have been easily trimmed to make it more compact and easy to digest. Director Khaitan is impressive in his story telling but gets little support from the editor and dialogue writers. 

Music by Amaal Mallik and host of other music directors is passable , the Tamma Tamma rehash version is quite a treat to listen to though. 

Varuṇ Dhawan plays his part well and has worked very hard on his dialect. Alia Bhatt yet again plays her " I'm so Jhalli that you must love me" kind role, she desperately needs an image makeover. Sahil Vaid is the most impressive and has a better chemistry with Dhawan than Bhaṭṭ on screen. Rituraj Sharma , Swanand Kirkire, Yash Sinha, Aakanksha Singh are serviceable but Gauhar Khan as a Singaporean Police Chief looks miscast and horribly bored. Sweta Basu Prasad displays marvellous charm and finesse with her sensitive and soft spoken act. 

There is absolutely no doubt the producers have tried to cash in on the Feminism Brigade but that is just not enough to carry an entire movie , in most of the sequences the actions initiated by Bhaṭṭ just do not make sense and audience ends up sympathising with Dhawan instead of her. Apparently the slow and steady success graph adapted by Sweta Basu Prasad's character seems more relatable than the fast and furious career growth shown by Bhatt's Vaidehi. 

 The feel good scenes shot in Singapore are delightful and kind of stay on. The only saving grace is the clean and enjoyable humour used in the movie, the Mata Ki Chowki featuring Aparshakti Khurana is a laugh riot, another scene involving Khurana with Bhatt's sister is memorable and hilarious. Brownie points ṭo Dhawan for raising the bar high with his inimitable penchant for comedy in Badrinath ki Dulhaniya. 

Overall the movie Badrinath ki Dulhaniya is a feel good romcom with forgettable music but brilliant comedy by the lead actor and supporting cast members, and it is certainly not an easy task to deal with societal evils like Dowry and Gender discrimination with situational comedy.