Shandaar ( 2015 )

Main Casts
	Shahid Kapoor	...	Jagjinder Joginder
	Alia Bhatt	...	Alia
	Kumud Pant	...	Business Wedding Guest

Shaandaar gives you fair warning that this film is anything but fabulous, right from its first scene. The film begins with a shoddily-animated sequence and a listless voiceover by narrator Naseeruddin Shah. We learn that a little girl named Alia has been adopted by a gent called Bipin Arora, who has a goatee, an old beer bottle cap, a dominating dowager mummy and a catty wife. Apparently, no one ever understood why Bipin brought Alia home and raised her with such love and tenderness. Clearly, no one in Bahl and Parmar's imaginary world has seen Masoom.

On paper, Shaandaar is the story of two sisters. One is the adopted child, the pretty one who struggles to find acceptance and is an insomniac. The other is good at heart, tubby and being used by her mother and grandmother to secure a deal with a business partner because the Aroras are almost bankrupt. On screen, Shaandaar is Bahl's attempt at making a mashup of Frozen and almost every Rajshri Production film, but in Dharma Productions' packaging.

All the stock characters are there, including the grandmother. There's a picturesque location, an elaborate wedding, lots of senseless song sequences, a romance that's absurdly chaste and some ghastly animation (remember Main Prem Ki Diwani Hoon?). Since it's a Dharma Production, the wedding takes place in England for no ostensible reason, Bhatt is wearing clothes that show off her lissom figure, there's a gay 'chachu' who obviously has a limp wrist and is a stylist, and Karan Johar has a cameo.

The best parts of Shaandaar are in its trailer and if you do survive the full 145 minutes, you'll realise that the way the film has been written and directed, it's more a series of YouTube sketches than a proper story. Why are the Aroras marrying Eesha off in England when they're verging on bankruptcy? How is it that two business families agree to marrying off their marriageable members without doing a wee bit of research on the prospective in-laws?

Nothing adds up in Shaandaar and few of the characters have any sort of evolution. Alia is the wild child, Bipin is the kindly but weak-spirited daddy dearest. Jagjinder is the hardworking good guy. The only thing worse thanShaandaar's script is the editing, which makes the film a meandering, boring medley of forgettable songs, interspersed with some laboured comedy. The pace is slack and there's no tension in the film. Frequently, it feels like large chunks of the story were snipped to make space for fluffy, silly repartee that contributes to neither character nor plot. Then at one point, as though no one could bear it anymore, the story gets bundled into a rushed ending. The only thing worse than the editing is the unnecessary and amateurish CGI that plagues the entire film.

With all this against them, it's to the cast's credit that Shaandaar isn't unwatchable. Shahid Kapoor and Alia Bhatt look gorgeous and do their best to keep you entertained with their easy delivery and sharp dance moves. However, the two are entirely unconvincing as a couple, unless love in 21st century India is made up of chaste distances and inane chatter. Sanah Kapoor (Shahid's sister) makes her debut and is credible as the quieter sister, whose weight makes her the butt of many people's jokes. However, Sandhya of Dum Laga ke Haisha remains our favourite plus-sized heroine. Pankaj Kapoor spends most of his time on screen looking befuddled, which just about sums up what the audience feels too.

The last thing there is nothing Shandaar In it....

IMDB : 4.7/10

Source: Anonymous