I Love You Daa
Grade: This movie put the rating scale to shame.
Instead of starting on my tirade against this movie, let me start off saying that I love cricket. I just love the game. Call me sappy but watching India play against any country evokes the dormant patriotism in me—the team, IMO, carries on its shoulders the nation’s pride for the duration of a game. I love the team. Right from watching the 1983 World Cup final on video and cheering Kapil Dev’s splendid catch to talking about Azhar’s exploits at Eden Garden against poor Klusener, I unabashedly admit to being crazzzzzzzy about the team and the game. How excited I was before watching this movie. Two of my favorites—Simran and cricket! How indignant I was at the end of the movie. You have to see this mess to believe it but you better keep your cricket bat out of the way lest you should break your TV set during/after the movie.
The movie’s start is hilarious…in an unintentional way. PrakashRaj is the captain of the Indian cricket team. And it seems we are all excited about the India-Pakistan World Cup final. While practicing at the nets, a person who hates PrakashRaj bowls at him. The cricket ball contains a bomb. And when he bowls at PrakashRaj, the bomb explodes the moment the ball hits PrakashRaj’s bat! I wish this were a comedy!!
Raju Sundaram is supposed to be the captain of the Ranji team. But he always plays outside his apartment like the way my friends and I, while in the 8th grade, used to play at a place in Mylapore bowling under-arm. He falls in love with Simran…and lo and behold, Simran falls in love with him. Love is not just blind. It is also ‘dumb’ (pun intended).
A kid in the apartment complex commits suicide because India lost a match against Australia. Well, the sight of a dead body is supposed to be touching. But if this were even remotely realistic, then my friends and I should’ve been ghosts a long time back, for the kind of passion we have, for the game and for the number of times we’ve felt let down by the team. Back to the movie—so seeing this kid, Raju Sundaram’s (the hero!) father Janakaraj burns his bat, which had the autograph of Sachin! Next day, Simran goes to Bombay in the 8:00 flight or something and returns around noon to give Raju Sundaram another bat with the autograph of…you guessed it—Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar!! Funny, isn’t it? I thought so too but I am sure the director didn’t intend it.
More to come…Ramesh Kanna (Raju’s brother) falls in love with Simran! Then, Simran falls out of love with Raju Sundaram!! Raju Sundaram is selected to play for the Indian team. That is fine but it is just that their practice session wasn’t too dissimilar to the kind of preparation that I do with my team while playing against Harish’s team at the Adayar Cricket Ground. How I wish there were an Indian team where all players dance to Bharadwaj’s tunes on a cricket ground…literally! It happens in this movie. Hilarious, isn’t it? I really, sincerely, absolutely wish PKS were as funny as this!!
The picturization of the India-Pakistan cricket match fits so well with the rest of the movie. Perfectly entertaining in all the wrong ways! I was busy cutting my nails, cleaning my apartment and even ironing my clothes while watching this—so much for engrossing viewing. The last over was so thrilling! 20 runs needed…6 balls to go. Raju is batting. I really wish India’s batting were as good as his and more importantly, Pakistan’s bowling to be as bad as this! Raju smashes the bowler for six, four, six...tension…boom…six…or something like that…but you get the idea! In a virtuoso parallel sequence, an avid fan prays to Pillaiyaar that he would break one coconut for every run scored and…you guessed it again—he breaks 6 coconuts for a sixer and four coconuts for a four. Amazing! Somehow my friends and I never prayed so sincerely for India to do well. If this would really work in such a miraculous way, I would buy a “thennan thoappu” (sorry, I don’t know the English word for thennanthoappu!) before every cricket match.
In the end, India beats Pakistan. Raju loses his heart to Simran…and, I lost my temper…don’t worry I didn’t break anything. I just typed out this review insteadJ