Param Sundari

It’s never a good sign when I start thinking of colourful analogies and lines for the review while the film is still on. It’s a worse sign when I start reviewing the cinema hall in my head instead: the smell of popcorn is overwhelming, the seats are too leathery, the temperature is just right, the ushers are respectful, the toilets are too far, the trailers go on forever, the darkness is too dark. That’s how forgettable Param Sundari is. Everything except the screen comes into focus. The cross-cultural romantic comedy — where a generic Delhi hunk sets out to woo an occasionally Malayali girl — does the usual shtick of endless Bollywood and SRK references, recycled puns, borrowed charisma, and unoriginality disguised as hat tips. I did come up with an analogy, though. Watching the film is like walking through an upscale clothing store (“North-South collection”) in which shoppers pose in the mirror and google the latest fashion brands, Kerala Tourism ads and Chennai Express teasers play on loop on screens, and hoardings of airbrushed celebrities vow to improve our middle-class lives. In other words, it’s hard to tell a movie theatre from a mall.

In appearance, premise, and pretty-people-packaging, Param Sundari is perhaps the most Dharma Productions-iest looking film of the year — except it comes from Maddock Films. I stepped into the familiar, formulaic love story half-expecting a quintessentially Maddock “high-concept hook.” Surely it can’t be as simple as ‘Delhi boy travels to Kerala to fall in love with a Malayali girl’? Surely there must be a time-travel angle? Perhaps Janhvi Kapoor’s character is reincarnated? Sidharth Malhotra must be a ghost, right? Except nope, it’s exactly what it appears to be — a by-the-book, clash-of-cultures, fish-out-of-water love story. Param (a sauceless Sidharth Malhotra doing his best decaf Rocky Randhawa impression) is the spoiled, entitled son of a Delhi industrialist (the always-enjoyable Sanjay Kapoor). Param spends his time as a tech investor and wants to back an experimental new dating app that claims to go beyond the usual suspects and use a person’s “energy and frequency” to find their one true soulmate.

दिल्ली का पंजाबी लड़का परम सचदेव जा पहुंचा है केरल के एक गांव में वहां की लड़की सुंदरी को पटाने। उसे लगता है कि यही उसकी जीवन संगिनी बनेगी। धीरे-धीरे दोनों करीब आते हैं लेकिन वह लव-स्टोरी ही क्या जिसमें मुश्किलें और अड़चनें न हों और वे लवर ही क्या जो हर बाधा को पार न कर पाएं। दो अलग-अलग माहौल से आए लड़के-लड़की की प्रेम-कहानी देखना नया या अनोखा नहीं है। ऐसी कहानियों में दो जुदा संस्कृतियों, रीति-रिवाजों, परंपराओं आदि के पहले टकराने और फिर एकाकार होने की बातें दर्शकों को लुभाती हैं। ‘चैन्नई एक्सप्रैस’, ‘2 स्टेट्स’, ‘रॉकी और रानी की प्रेम कहानी’ जैसी फिल्मों में हम ये चीज़ें देख चुके हैं, आनंदित हो चुके हैं। लेकिन क्या ‘परम सुंदरी’ भी ऐसा कर पाने में कामयाब रही है? जवाब है-नहीं, बिल्कुल भी नहीं। पहला लक्षण-इस फिल्म को बनाने वालों की सोच स्पष्ट होती तो वे लोग अपनी बुनी हुई कहानी को एक कायदे का नाम ज़रूर देते। जान-बूझ कर लड़के का नाम परम और लड़की का सुंदरी रखा गया है ताकि ‘परम सुंदरी’ शीर्षक से दर्शकों को खींचा जा सके। चलिए, नाम में क्या रखा है, कहानी दमदार होनी चाहिए। यहां वह भी नहीं है। लड़का जिस वजह से केरल गया है, वह रोचक लगता है लेकिन जल्द ही वह कारण अपना असर छोड़ देता है। जिस तरह से इस कहानी को विस्तार देकर स्क्रिप्ट में बदला गया है, उससे इसका बनावटीपन साफ झलकता है। बनाने वालों ने इसे रॉम-कॉम यानी रोमांटिक-कॉमेडी का रूप देना चाहा है लेकिन सच तो यह है कि इस फिल्म में दिखाया गया रोमांस सिर्फ आंखों को भाता है, दिल को नहीं। रही कॉमेडी, तो वह न दिल को जंचती है, न दिमाग को, बल्कि उसे देख-सुन कर झल्लाहट ज़रूर होती है।

He is from the north, she is from the south, and amid cultural differences and language barriers, they fall in love. The tale of 2 states has been one of Indian cinema’s favourite themes. In recent years, there have been 2 States which were incidentally based on writer Chetan Bhagat’s life, and two years back, Rockky Aur Rani Ki Prem Kahaani-where a Punjabi hero wooed a Bengali girl with all his loud Punjabiyat. Maddock Film’s latest Param Sundari, helmed by director Tushar Joshi, falls in a similar bracket but gets stuck in an attempt to be woke. The film, starring Sidharth Malhotra as Param and Janhvi Kapoor as Sundari, attempts too many things in one go and thereby makes an utter chaos of the film. It is neither too funny, nor too unique – with dollops of predictability thrown in. So, whatever you had expected the film to be (read a middling affair) after watching the trailer, it matches all of them and then some more.

A pamphlet from the Kerala Tourism department will mention

• Elephants
• Kalaripayattu
• Boat races
• Coconut trees
• Lungis
• Banana leaf meals
• Mohini Attam

Why director Tushar Jalota needed co-writers Gaurav Mishra and Aarsh Vora to tell the story of billionaire baap ka beta Param Sachdev (Sidharth Malhotra) and Sundari (Janhvi Kapoor) is curious for it doesn’t go beyond the tourism pamphlets of the scenic state. Ah, yes, what the pamphlets miss and Jalota gets is that God’s own country is unwelcoming of guests, calls their shorts chaddis and insists on a lungi. It’s called fun, in Jalota language. In a shrinking world where barriers between the North and the South have come down, alongside tech talk like apps, AI and algorithms, Jalota flies the Punjabi munda to Kerala who gapes at its culture and its people like he’s in a different galaxy. Param has used a new app to find his soulmate and there she is doing the Mohini Attam in her home stay. Soon, Sundari must give him the mandatory dressing down on how Kerala is different from Tamil Nadu like he’s been living in a North Indian cave.