I watched it twice before I was being able to make an opinion about it. Though I do have some negatives about the movie...over all it is a good value for money. First talking about the plus sides... 1. Amitabh Bachan was awesome...one of the best performances of his lifetime in a short role.... 2. Screenplay and script deserve high grade.. though the dialogues aren't as catchy as were of DDLJ, DTPH or Mohabbatein...the overall screen play and twists and turns made this movie a treat to watch...specially Samia finding Zara in India catches everyone by surprise... 3. Rani's performance is A class and will surely win her some awards this year.... 4. Hima Malini looked cool as well as did her part with perfection. 5. Choice of locations for Indian village life is remarkable. 6. Though music on the whole is just about above average, a couple of scores in Bhangra beat are catchy. 7. And last but certainly not the least... Shahrukh Khan once again walks through a role with utmost perfection. I don't know whether it was deliberate or incidental, but his casualness and under toned acting as a youth made his performance as a gray-haired guy more prominent. Needless to see he was really skillful portraying a middle age prisoner.
And now the minus side.. Well the only minus that I have with this movie is the projection of Pakistani society. Every time Pakistan was shown in the film it never looked like Pakistan. The director seems quite unfamiliar with Pakistan, her society, her customs, her wedding rituals, her surroundings..just about everything. And this to me was a real big minus...that bigger a minus that it overshadowed the pluses of the movie in first viewing. No politician in Pakistan contesting from Lahore wears shirwani in his house for sure..in fact in the entire national assemblies of last 3-4 decades, you will hardly find any sherwani except the nawab's of bahawalpur and late Nasarullah Khan. No one in Lahore uses the Lakhnao Delhi style of adab for greetings. Nor does the ladies of the class shown wear jewels like Kiron Kher. It looked more like Muslim Lucknow rather than Pakistan. And this highlights one more thing - "India and Pakistan are two different and distant societies who know very little about each other. by the virtue of history, they do have things in common, but on the whole they have turned into two different societies. Pakistani society is different than the society of Indian muslims, it's more modern and has her own set of customs. It has moved quite a lot from the pre partition commonalities between the two cultures. And this is where Yash jee got it all wrong."
But all in all, a real good movie, with a daring plot and good screenplay full of surprises.
And now the minus side.. Well the only minus that I have with this movie is the projection of Pakistani society. Every time Pakistan was shown in the film it never looked like Pakistan. The director seems quite unfamiliar with Pakistan, her society, her customs, her wedding rituals, her surroundings..just about everything. And this to me was a real big minus...that bigger a minus that it overshadowed the pluses of the movie in first viewing. No politician in Pakistan contesting from Lahore wears shirwani in his house for sure..in fact in the entire national assemblies of last 3-4 decades, you will hardly find any sherwani except the nawab's of bahawalpur and late Nasarullah Khan. No one in Lahore uses the Lakhnao Delhi style of adab for greetings. Nor does the ladies of the class shown wear jewels like Kiron Kher. It looked more like Muslim Lucknow rather than Pakistan. And this highlights one more thing - "India and Pakistan are two different and distant societies who know very little about each other. by the virtue of history, they do have things in common, but on the whole they have turned into two different societies. Pakistani society is different than the society of Indian muslims, it's more modern and has her own set of customs. It has moved quite a lot from the pre partition commonalities between the two cultures. And this is where Yash jee got it all wrong."
But all in all, a real good movie, with a daring plot and good screenplay full of surprises.