Gori Tere Pyaar Mein is the kind of movie you walk into knowing what’s going to happen from the promos alone: the urban boy (Imran Khan) is supposed to get married to one girl (Shraddha Kapoor), but ends up chasing another (Kareena Kapoor) to a village where she is determined to bring about change. I don’t even need to tell you how the story shapes up from here on out, because if you’ve seen even a handful of Bollywood romcoms, you already have a fair idea.
In a film where the plot is clear-cut, what matters is how much it manages to keep the audience entertained. But does Gori Tere Pyaar Mein succeed on that front?
How much you’ll like Gori Tere Pyaar Mein is dependent on how much you’re willing to suspend disbelief for a film. Imran Khan plays the most non-South Indian South Indian there is, which is explained away with a half-baked “he was swapped at birth” joke. Kareena Kapoor looks glamorous even when she’s supposedly roughing it out at a village – she’s still fully made-up and not one strand of hair flies out of place. There are a lot of things that don’t exactly make sense in the film, but if you’re willing to ignore those, you should be sufficiently entertained – at least for the first half.
The pre-interval portion is made up of some fun moments (I laughed out loud at Imran’s “salesman pitch”) and two great songs (Dhat Teri Ki, Tooh). Even though it’s fairly clear which direction the story is taking, it’s engaging and you don’t mind having fun and just enjoying it for what it is. The second half, though, goes downhill: here, the story centres around building a bridge in this village and it becomes – there’s no other way to put it – boring. Predictably, there are several obstacles that come in the way of this bridge being built, and they’re all dealt with in a cliched Bollywood manner (at one point, the villagers unite in a very Lagaan way to fix things themselves). Halfway through the post-interval portion, you’re almost willing to go in there and help build the damn bridge yourself, just so that we can all go home.
The performances are decent, though nothing to write home about. Imran Khan plays a character that’s almost an extension of his I Hate Luv Storys one. He’s used to doing this, so it comes off naturally; he’s believable as the brat. Kareena looks gorgeous, and delivers another rendition of the “feisty Punjabi girl” character that she’s loved for. Shraddha Kapoor has a short role, but she does well and looks beautiful. Anupam Kher is great, as always.
Verdict:
For what it is, Gori Tere Pyaar Mein is watchable, especially if you’re a fan of the romcom genre. You won’t be missing much if you decide to skip it, though.