Ever played ‘Spot the
Difference’? There are two identical drawings and you have to really look hard
to …well…spot it. The Karan Johar produced “Kapoor & Sons” is that kind of
film where you have to spot the difference between the real and the fake. The
fake is so good that it looks real. And you know what, you don’t really care
because there is the director, Shakun Batra who is maneuvering the DOP’s camera
and the editor’s cuts so damn well that, every single sequence in the film is a
masterful choreography of family fights which entertain and engage but do not
disturb you.
So you have a mother-Sunita
(Ratna Pathak Shah) who is yelling some instructions at a plumber in the
bathroom and her husband—Harsh (Rajat Kapoor) who is yelling the opposite, a leaking
pipe bursts some more and then both are yelling at each other, while their two
handsome sons—a cool headed, achcha beta—Rahul
(Fawad Khan) and a hot headed good for nothing beta—Arjun (Sidharth Malhotra) try to calm the parents down. And
voila, before you know it, the two brothers are at throwing things at each other.
The sequence, of course ends with the plumber saying something funny and
scrambling away.
Showing a “real” scenario
like this itself is such a big deal in a Hindi commercial film and that too a
Karan Johar one where the rule of the thumb has been, “it’s all about loving
your family”. So it comes as a most welcome change that Johar finally gives us
a dysfunctional family where people don’t sing and dance but instead fight.
Okay, correction. People do sing and dance but on not Swiss Alps. They sing and
dance only in small gardens outside their bungalows. And when they fight, they
appear like a beautiful seamless choreography. Charming!
It’s like how we Indians love
family photos. After all, having a family and a large one at that, is one thing
every Indian can boast of. More so, in these Instagram times. The thing is that
Instagram gives us filter options to make our pictures look more flattering.
Kapoor & Sons does the opposite.
It takes a great looking family,
which looks rich but acts poor; which looks both happy and unhappy at the same
time. Just like Rishi Kapoor’s prosthetic makeup. As grandfather of the Kapoor
family, he is the grandfather of fake. Just like his ghastly makeup doesn’t
allow us to see his pain, the well-choreographed fights in the family don’t let
you see much reality yet involves you. The way Kapoor’s face makes you look at
his makeup and go ‘wow’ at first for the hard work involved and then you
finally start hating it for its very artificiality.
Back to the family photo. It
is quite a sweet idea that an entire film can revolve around one Mr Prosthetic Kapoor
who dreams of a happy family picture called Kapoor & Sons, since 1921.
So we have a dysfunctional family.
Albeit, in Johar’s trademark style of
bringing together an unreal world with two good looking men who are supposed to
be novelists. One—Rahul (Fawad Khan) works out of London and the other—Arjun
(Sidharth Malhotra) in U.S for some strange reason. They could very well be
ramp models, considering how little we see of their professional world. But
thankfully, we see them mostly in the charmingly refreshing setting of Coonoor
where Mr Prosthetic K resides with his son, Harsh and daughter-in-law, Sunita .
Director Shakun Batra, along
with co-writer, Ayesha Devitre Dhilon, brings in as much realism as possible,
the way he did in his fine debut- Ek Main
Aur Ek Tu and extracts surprisingly good performances from both Malhotra
and Khan who share great chemistry and sense of timing. But mind you, Malhotra
cries very delicately with a single tear in just one eye. The way Rani
Mukherjee did in Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna.
That’s the pretty, glossy, Johar stamp which one doesn’t mind really.
In Coonoor, we see that the
family is as dangerously together as a shaky house of cards valiantly trying to
stay balanced. Prosthetic K is expecting to die any minute and keeps faking his
death too. Ah, that F word again. But never mind.
The ever squabbling son and
wife are used to his antics and don’t take him seriously until one fine day he
does get a heart attack. Rahul and Arjun rush back home which is anything but
perfect. Arjun fights with Rahul because of a past misdeed, Sunita fights with
Harsh over one Mrs Anu and his lack of income, Rahul fights with everyone since
Arjun is the pyara beta and sometimes
you lose track of who is fighting with whom. There are times when the brothers
don’t fight and have fun bonding moments. The writing meets the challenge of
this now hot, now cold bros relationship, really well.
Family time over. Enters, an
even more charming cutesy girl, Tia (Alia Bhatt) in a lacy white top and white
shorts who loves poking fun at everyone. The dialogues and her interactions
with both the brothers are the best part of the film as they are as natural as
your daily chats. Nothing fake here. More fun.
As the film progresses, the
fights in the shaky household turn ugly on a particularly eventful day. One
would actually wonder what’s the fuss really about if it wasn’t for a masterly
and rapid intercutting of parallel scenes and performances—one inside a house
and the other in a garden. Interestingly, the situation’s gravity never really
hits you, right till the end despite every attempt at melodrama and a revelation
of secrets, especially one involving the brothers’ conflict. The ending appears
to have a forced impact to get you in the tearjerker mode. And well, it
succeeds, mostly.
Rajat Kapoor and Fawad Khan
shine the most in this overall performance packed drama, and brilliantly
choreographed family photo sequences by
Batra.
Kapoor & Sons does a fine job of balancing the feel good with the dark elements of a
very entertaining house of impressive cards played well by three hotties. So
what, if all involved fake it? It was fun while it lasted. Well done, Bro.
Thanks GG
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