Hum Tum

INTRODUCTION

I do not watch many hindi films. As you can see from my reviews, I rarely write about hindi films. I watchec Hum Tum this week. The movie is a straight adaptation of the popular Hollywood version ?When Harry Met Sally?, sans comic values and Big O depiction.

Why are men different from women? Why does men act too inconsiderate and women too emotional? What lies between this universal paradox? If you take the classic book by John Gray, there are quite a lot of psychological disparity between men and women. (The distance between Venus and Mars is millions of miles, to say the least. :-) )

Yash Raj films added the typical bollywoodish masala and familial values in this film with the typical garnishing of foreign locales, posh lifestyle of the characters and songs. This movie is aimed for the NRI fans as well as the Metro center filmgoers.I felt that the movie was bit longish but entertaining to the most part. Yash Chopra has always focused on grandeur entertainment with a lot of masala values. You see couple of things as main focus in the films produced under his banner. Familial melodrama and primarily Romance.

While there are comical and spoofy reviews about this film. When I saw the movie for second time for writing a review (Thanks to DVD), I could focus on few finer points. I shall present to you in the form of a review

HUMTUM ? PLOT

Karan (Saif Ali Khan), is a playboy with a very lax attitude towards girls. He considers them as objects of pleasure to the core. He travels to New York to complete his studies. He meets Rhea (Rani Mukherjee), who goes to study fashion designing too. Being a playboy himself, he tries to woo Rhea and when the moment arises, he kisses her. He get a slappy reply from Rhea. They keep on meeting amidst chaos and Rhea gets married to Sameer(Abhishek Bachchan). Karan has the task of wedding planner, the profession his mom has. In the meanwhile, you are told about the rift between Karan?s parents Rishi Kapoor and Rati. The struggle of Kiron Kher as a widow is also shown in a rather subdued manner. Sameer dies in an accident. Karan meets Rhea when she tries to live away in solitude at Paris. Rest of the story revolves around a matured love theme between Karan and Rhea. Finally all is well and they live happily after.

HUMTUM ? ANALYSIS

Hum Tum is a nice film with a lot of finer moments. It is indeed a bollywood film to the core. While the original WHMS was primarily a comedy film, this is more like a drama. You have your mix of familial melodrama. You also have your own dose of romantic tug-of-war so famous in the Yash Raj Films camp. I sincerely felt that the movie was a little too longish, albeit being short. Finally we have a big banner film that does not have a story staring after 3 hours!. I guess they were least bothered about clichéd criticism focusing on length and paisa vasool factors.

Not many of the Hollywood remakes have done better in bollywood. Only the most famous ones and somewhat steamy ones have done exceptionally well in the past. Hum Tum is certainly one of the welcome remakes sans gimmicks. It does not have any sleazy scenes like the other bollywood remakes. It is quite evident that Indian audience may not like the ?Big-O Faking? in WHMS and well left out. It comes at the cost of lacking comedy. The movie gets very serious within the first half an hour and it is only drama since then. Having comical moments would have certainly helped the film a lot better. While the cartoon strip is supposed to be doing the same, they do not have laugh-your-hearts-out kind of humor.

This is one of the reason why men may not like this film as much as women do. This is the same reason why there are so many hit serials on TV that men despise and women love. Men do not like emotional soaps as much as women. I am pretty much sure that this film will be a bigger hit amongst women than men. Personally I felt it was a bit slow movie sans a lot of masala. If you take any Yash Raj film, you may see a similarity in the emotional rollercoaster. DDLJ was a superhit mainly due to a lot of mushy romance amongst a familial drama. It was a proper mix of all masala that the majority of the filmgoers love. Hum Tum does not come even close to DDLJ in commercial values. It may be due to the lack of many characters in the film (like HAHK) and wafer-thin story line.

I feel following are the finer points of the film

♣ Saif Ali Khan and Rani Mukherjee have given nice performances. Rani fits the role perfectly and her acting is superb. Rani has taken over the place her cousin held in bollywood once, I guess. Saif has matured a lot and it is showing in his roles.

♣ A lot of punchy dialogues and nice mushy touches to the film

♣ Good background music by Salim-Sulaiman

♣ Nice songs and music by Jatin-Lalit

♣ Comical Lyrics

♣ Exceptional cartoon animation in the movie. This is clearly one of the best in Indian filmdom, of late. Technically this is great. Though it may not be very comical, it still is nice. How it gets involved with the movie is another great factor too.

♣ Typical tour of Europe, like all Yash Raj films.

♣ Great picturization of Amsterdam, New York City (Central Park), Mumbai, Paris. A visual treat to the eyes

♣ Great acting by the supporting cast (with the exception of Isha Gopikar who is missing an item number)

♣ Nice development of love between the two. Though it was borrowed from the original WHMS, Hum Tum has nice Bollywood touch

♣ And nice direction by Kunal Kohli. He has his flaws as well.

CONS or That?s not goods

♠ Though it was 2 hours and 20 minutes, I felt the story was stretched

♠ Saif looks Older when he was young. He looks younger when he was supposed to be old. Finally he looks older when he was supposed to be old. The makeup is so bad that it shows on his character. You can see similar thing with Rani as well. Did they run out of money?

♠ Too posh locales that would not go well with most of the audiences.

♠ Lack of logic in few places. You see half an hour of film while they visit Amsterdam in 6 hours(!!). They have a transit visa to tour on a bus. They do anything but tour on a bus(!!)

♠ The reasoning for Rishi Kapoor running away from his wife and making-up is so thin and illogical

♠ The attachment shown between Rhea & Karan when Rhea is getting married is too filmy and defies logic

♠ Too less of comedy. The song ?Ladki Kyon Ladkon Jaisi? is funny and has some meaning too!. You don?t have much laughter there after except before the titles role out

CONCLUSION

Forgiving its shortcomings, Hum Tum is a nice film for timepass. It has nice music, songs, good camera work, classy art direction, nice costumes(!!), great animation with nice acting. This is mostly a film aimed at Mills & Boons loving ladies than at general audience. You do not get much from the film except some nice romance and touchy dialogues. You can watch it at your leisure.

HUM TUM is nice timepass. GO FOR IT

I hope you liked the review. Do comment as time permits.

KALIL

Harry: You were going to be a gymnast.

Harry: Right, that’s what I said.