The After Hours Review: 'Zindagi Tere Naam'

Film: Zindagi Tere Naam
Director: Ashuu Trikha
Cast: Mithun Chakraborthy, Ranjeeta, Aseem Ali Khan, Priyanka Mehta, Ashish Sharma
Rating: *

Behind every great love is a great story, reads the tagline of the film. Sure, especially when the story happens to be a straight lift from one of the best-read romantic novels Nicholas Sparks’ The Notebook. In fact, as an ode to the original, Mithun is even shown holding a diary with The Notebook clearly imprinted on the cover. However, the filmmakers don’t seem to realise that not every great love story makes for a great film.

Hollywood’s already made a film on it and Ajay Devgn’s U, Me aur Hum was much inspired by the book too. But anyways, it’s futile to compare them at any level. For those who haven’t read the book or seen the film, this one is bound to provide some entertainment, but the kind that you’d derive from watching the sidey films of the early 90s.

The film follows two parallel tracks of stories, as Mithun reads out a story to Ranjeeta, about Anjali (Priyanka) and Siddharth (Aseem). Siddharth is a middle-class simple boy living with his dad in a picturesque hill-station, who makes a living by chopping wood for his father who in turn makes violins.

The comic track in the movie is provided through dialogues about the hero understanding the difference between a ‘ladki’ and a ‘lakdi’. Anyway this hero bumps into the super-rich Anjali who’s there to vacation with her parents. He falls in love and ‘literally’ into a river to get her to agree to be friends with him. Don’t laugh, alright! The heroine does fall for the age-old road-side Romeo trick and after attending one item song where Dia Mirza is actually looking in desperate need of (1) choreographer (2) make-up man (3) work-outs, the two are a couple. But of course, the vamp of a mother parts the two and while the hero sets off to build his dream house, the heroine finds love elsewhere.

Mithun and Ranjeeta are easily the saving grace of the film, especially Mithun. One actually looks forward to seeing more of the two. But wish they could lend their expertise to the newbies as well, who seem to have suffered terribly at the hands of the director. The sincere efforts made by Aseem and Priyanka fail to rise to the level where it could be appreciated. The poor production, shoddy camera work, thanda dialogues topped lavishly with super cheesy songs don’t help either. Watch it on a day when you are not exactly in an upbeat mood and the film can easily be the best excuse to vent it all out.