Review : Pyar ke side effects

Rating : ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Genre : Romance
Year : 2006
Running time : 2 hrs and 11 minutes
Director : Saket Chaudhary
Cast : Rahul Bose, Mallika Sherawat, Jas Arora, Suchithra Pillai, Tarana Raja, Ranvir Shourie, Aamir Bashir

PYAR KE SIDE EFFECTS : A funny romantic yarn

A nice, differently told tale. Attempts to be arty-sharty with the asides and the characters speaking to the audience. And does it well too. Really what you would not expect of a Mallika Sherawat film. It’s not brash, loud-mouthy or showing excessive cleavage. It’s soft, sweet, with an under-lying love theme. Yes, there are scenes which I would call flights of fancy, but then all is fair in love and war, no?

What it’s about, is avoiding marriage. The topic seems like it’s transposed straight from Hollywood; I know India’s changing and whatnot, but are live-in couples yet the norm ? Live-in couples who shake in their boots thinking of impending marriage ? For Sid Bose (Rahul Bose) atleast, that’s true. For his girl-friend Trisha (Mallika), who’s proposed to him, it’s either the marriage mandap, or the highway. Sid takes the highway. And regrets it. Realizes he loves Trisha more than he thinks. And he is getting ready to woo her again, but finds that Trisha’s ex-suitor Vivek (Arora) is already ahead in the race.

The characters are interesting and quirky; the hero Sid is a DJ, and has a room-mate Nanoo (the fantastic Ranvir Shourie) who’s averse to bathing. Sid also has a strong-willed sister Shalini (Tarana Raja) who’s pregnant and her husband Kapil (Aamir Baashir) is not yet ready to be a father. The men (Sid, Kapil and Nanoo) bond by whining about life in general and not wanting to marry/ to be parents/ able to get laid respectively.

The heroine Trisha is unconventional – she’s taller than her boyfriend and makes more money than him. Plus she doesn’t adhere to the constraints of being a nice Punjabi “kudi” and has a habit of running away from her marriage ceremonies. Vivek Chaddha (Arora) is the hunk Trisha ran away from at the marriage mandap, but he’s still nuts about her. Very successful, the guy is multi-talented and annoyingly nice (shades of Owen Wilson in “Meet the parents”). Trisha’s Dad is sketched off of Jack Byrnes character in “Meet the Parents”. Not ex-CIA but close.

This is a happy-go-lucky film, you know it’s going to be all right ; the director’s just making us jump through the hoops to stretch the film length a bit. The film, besides having a very urban story, breezes by you. And I mean that nicely. It’s funny without being slap-sticky or trying too hard. You don’t have to have a high IQ to understand it. And it’s pleasant – no icky villains, or bloody gore or unnecessary violence. It’s all in the head, the pondering, the musing, the soul-searching.

This movie is truly a multiplex movie. It’s very yuppie and urban – I mean who else actually has the luxury of debating marriage ? Plus it’s newly modern in it’s sensibilities – like say “live-in” and don’t gasp. It’s also a lot of fun, and worth hoots of laughter.