Yashraj Films gets most of it right with `Band Baaja Baraat’, a film which toplines two ordinary characters played by a couple of actors who can make you believe in their ordinariness : two-film old Anushka Sharma is a dab hand at doing the girl next door; and you can’t get more average than newcomer Ranveer Singh.
The actors are a good fit for their characters, DU spare Bittoo Sharma and Dilli girl Shruti Kakkar. A spare in Delhi University lingo is someone who has no idea what to do with his life. Bittoo knows only that he doesn’t want to go back to his sugarcane `bijness’ run by his father and forefathers. What he wants is to become partners with Shruti ( whom he calls Shurti in authentic Dilliwala accent) who in turn wants to become India’s best wedding planner.
A big part of the delight of ‘Band Baaja Baraat’ is the writing which imparts nice little touches to its characters, making them real as opposed to outlined caricatures. The supporting cast is fine. The families of Bittoo and Shruti are played by actors we haven’t seen before. Smart move. So are the brides and grooms who are married off in the course of the film, all of whom who want their weddings to be planned by the duo based in a slummy DDA market in Pashchim Vihar : their company `Shaadi Mubarak’ starts out from Shruti’s `mohalla’ in ultra-middle class Janakpuri and breaches the ultra-luxe gates of Sainik Farms. ‘ Band Baaja Baraat’ navigates surely and smartly through its turf, slipping up when it gets its leads plumb in front of India Gate : I am waiting for the day when there will be a Delhi movie minus such tired markers as India Gate and Red Fort and Qutb Minar.
There are more slips in the second half, where a silly conflict is created between the two which stretches the film for no reason. Till Bittoo and Shruti are heckling each other with high ‘tu-tu-main-main’ verve, all the better to get cosy with, it’s all peppy and fun. Post interval, the film tries for mush,and dips, extricating itself only right at the end.
But both Sharma and Singh, the near pitch-perfect surprise packet of the film, make you smile. Enough reason for a visit.
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