From the trailer, Tamasha seems like a typical Bollywood room-com. Ved Sahni leads a boring Corporate life, forced into Engineering by his parents and stuck working under a Boss he hates but has to suck up to, meets Tara Maheshwari on an exotic island who makes him realize that this is not who he is, realizes his long lost childhood affinity for story-telling, leaves everything and finally does what his heart wants and yes gets the girl. And on the surface, the movie is just that. But Imtiaz Ali doesn’t make movies with just one surface, that’s not the style of his genius. Tamasha is much more than that.
There is a little bit of Ved in almost all of us. Ved’s father is somewhat our father. Some of us went to our fathers and expressed a desire to not pursue Engineering(or Law, Medicine, Commerce or whatever else your poison is) but rather follow our heart and do what makes it sing. And then we were given a rendition of almost every parent’s speech in such a situation. No it’s not "Ja Simran ja, jee le apni zindagi." but one that was on the lines of "Responsibility, Social Security, scope vs. no scope, value of money and all that jazz." Convinced or rather forced by this we went on to prepare for whatever Competitive exam we had to ace and a part of’The rat race’. How many of us would be Dancers, Actors, Designers, Writers, Teachers, Chefs and what not if it wasn’t for that race?
The film is made up of moments. On a whole, it may not seem like a perfect film but there are perfect moments. The way they spend their holiday in Corsica, France makes you want to leave your life and go to an island for a long holiday, where you can be whoever you want, where you can wear whatever you want and just dance on the streets. And dip your face in clear water, that’s very important.