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| Pic Courtesy: https://bollywoodtown.in/ |
When I saw the Instagram post about the release of PARAM SUNDARI, a romance film, I was eager to see it on the big screen. Well, who can blame me as Bollywood seems to be starved of romantic films, what with the rising violence in the films released in the past few years.
I think the last really enjoyable movie I saw was Rocky Aur Rani Kii Prem Kahaani starring Alia Bhatt and Ranveer Singh, which was a little more than two years back.
Okay, getting back to Param Sundari, Venkat agreed to accompany me to the film on Thursday only to give me a mocking smile when he saw there were barely a dozen people in the multiplex theatre. He does not mind the violent films, but I have always refused to accompany him, at least most of the time. And now it was payback time, I suppose. I couldn’t blame him as the “romantic” film let me down very badly.
What is romance? Well, I am a romance novelist with about 60 books to my name in that genre, and while I might not be an expert, I profess to understand it way more than the screenwriter/storyteller of Param Sundari.
Romance is not only about the love between a man and a woman. It also needs to show what makes the protagonists a hero and a heroine, which is where this story fails.
Both Sidharth and Janhvi are pure eye candy and they can also act. The film is set in a small town in Kerala which has been beautifully portrayed along with their traditions and rituals.
But are these elements enough to justify the “romance” tag for this film? Or any other tag for that matter?
I THINK NOT!
Param is a “hero” who wants to work on his physical body (which is not bad at all as this is also important), but does not want to do a honest day's job. He is into running online businesses which fail again and again, much to his father’s anger and frustration. Well, I cannot really blame the father played by Sanjay Kapoor, though his screen presence and dialogue could not have been more irritating to the audience.
Sundari is a “heroine” who runs a home stay which had been left to her by her parents who had died in an accident. She goes against her aspirations of becoming a mohini attam dancer and is damn sad about it.
What would have made them both “hero” material was if they had become successful in their careers, making them true protagonists. This is called a “growth curve” in building the characters, especially the main ones.
And this is exactly where the writer, director and producer have failed in this film.
Who, especially in this millineum, wants to see a couple of failures fall in love and get married?
I rest my case.
VERDICT: It was a wonder I could sit in the theatre until the end.
RATING: ** Shaky
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