Always Kabhi Kabhi Hindi Movie
High-School rom-coms have never really made their mark in Hindi film industry. There have been many attempts in the past to tap this genre but they've all tasted dirt. Now the Badshah of Bollywood Shah Rukh Khan tries his hands with a youth based film Always Kabhi Kabhi. It remains to be seen whether with the backing of King Khan this film strikes gold or not.
AKK is the story of four friends Sam (Ali Fazal), Nandini (Zoa Morani), Aishwarya (Giselle Monteiro) and Tariq (Satyajeet Dubey) who study in St. Marks School. Sam is an uber cool, naughty boy who believes only in shortcuts in life. He falls head over heels in love with the blue eyed babe of School Ash and tries to win her through the play of Romeo and Juliet. Tariq better known as Einstein is best friends with Sam and holds a soft spot for Nandini also called Nandy Bull, a total deviant who lets out the angst of her parent's neglect by non-conforming. How in the last year of their school do they experience the true worth of friendship, love and face situations that question their young minds is what follows through a series of dramatic incidents.
Always Kabhi Kabhi deals with the young minds and could've been very relatable to the youth if it projected the lives of teenagers, their inquisitiveness, their first love, first crush, school bunking, extracurricular activities etc. However, what it ends up being is a mix of 3 Idiots and Faltu. Debutante director Roshan Abbas tries to tap the virgin genre of High-school rom-coms where there hasn't been a film that's made its mark but doesn't quite manage to pull it off. There are many glitches in the story and screenplay. The team of screenplay writers Ishita Moitra, Roshan Abbas, Ranjit Raina all put together also fail in making AKK an interesting watch.
The first half is fast but slacks in the second. The penultimate moment of the film where the school kids try expressing their issues to their parents through the play is handled very amateurishly. The biggest goof-up in Always Kabhi Kabhi is that it starts with a flashback that doesn't quite come to the present. Though there are some endearing moments but they are very few and far in between. There's excessive in-film branding much to the agony of the audience who actually get to see ads within the film itself.
What really makes the film bearable is the engaging performance of talented newcomers. Ali Fazal is very confident for a newcomer and puts up a good performance. Zoa Morani looks beautiful and shows great potential. Satyajeet Dubey is extremely cute and very lovable in his part. Giselle however, needs to brush up her acting. Her dubbing in the film too is inaccurate. Renowned characters like Satish Shah, Navneet Nishan, Lilette Dubey, Vijay Raaz and Manoj Joshi get wasted courtesy a faulty script. Music by Pritam, Ashish Rego and Shree D is uninspiring.
Over all, Always Kabhi Kabhi has nothing new to offer. The only thing to watch out for is the acting by the newcomers.
