Student Of The Year - Movie Review:

directed by Karan Johar, starring Sidhdharth Malhotra, Varun Dhavan, Alia Bhatt & Rishi Kapoor

an open letter to Uday Chopra....

Dear Uday Chopra,

You might be surprised why I am writing the letter to you for SOTY instead of Karan Johar or Varun or Sidharth or Alia. It’s just I remembered you a lot while watching the movie. We would discuss the reason later but right now let’s discuss the movie.

When the first poster of the movie was declared way back a year or so ago, many of the fans including me were surprised about Karan’s decision for starting such project after making critically much acclaimed MNIK. The poster didn’t have any big name on it. But thankfully, it looked fresh and we expected KKHH kinda magic from the film, though our expectations were never much high. When the teaser  came out, it looked average kinda movie which had nothing new in store except the fresh pair. It didn’t excite us much, the only reason to see the movie was directorial credit of Karan Johar.

The film came, collected good word of mouth, went a hit as it was a low budget film compared to Karan’s other films. I wasn’t able to watch it as it didn’t release at my center and I was quite busy in our other idiot’s marriage function planning that couldn’t watch it elsewhere too. Finally watched it and found it ‘not bad’.

The movie is about a rich-popular-sporty-wannabe-rockstar boyfriend, a simple-high society-caring girlfriend, a middle class-ambitious-wanna be business tycoon-sporty-good looking-new entrant (offcourse who eventually falls for the girl and vice versa) and an over hyped-with strange rools-created by dean- traditional(since last 25 years or so)-competition-Student of the Year. Felt like JJWS? eh! It’s not.. it has the love triangle.. oh was that in JJWS too.. sorry man. Wait.. it has ameer-gareeb situation. Leave it..it was in JJWS too.. yeah.. there is a difference.. the ameeer-gareeb competitors are friends.. now that’s good. And yeah, KJo has tried to concentrated on that too apart from the glossy love story.

Your friend, KJo, has one quality. He can concentrate on many different topics in the single film going on parallel without creating havoc. Be it, the friendship – romance – college life – dean-coach gay romance – geek middle class fatty sudo track – sports – buttering middle class no iq jeet track – true friend turns rival shanaya’s friend track – preparation of SOTY track – the father track and many more. Kudos for that…

Performances of Varun Dhavan, Sidhdharth Malhotra and Alia Bhatt are decent. Not that good, not that bad also. Boman Irani’s son Kayoze marks a super debut as Sudo. Sahil Anand as Jeet is fantastic. Mansi Raachh as Shanaya’s friend is decent. Ronit Roy is compatible. It is Rishi Kapoor who wins hearts. Now here I reveal, why I remembered you, Mr. chopra.  You have been disrespected, thrown boulders for nonacting and everything always, as you are a star director son, and YRF has tried a lot to make you successful and we have heard after D:3, you are retiring as an actor. When I watched the movie, the statutory warning voice (I think it’s of Sidhdharth Malhotra) seemed like your voice, and that’s why through out the movie I thought about your career. You are nowhere less talented actor compared to the lead duo in SOTY. And you would have fit in any of the role if the movie might have made 10 years earlier. But it was you who got bad mouthed reviews coz you are a star director son. Anyways, it’s nothing in our hand, but it’s in your hand for sure, you can be here and do some good roles (they may be supporting ones) if you want, as we would want that. Many of the bad actors (e.g. Tushshar Kapoor) are still surviving in the industry, why cant you?

Anyways, getting back to the film, it starts well, ends well, passes the time well, makes you feel good quite well, but has nothing to be remembered.

2.95 cheers for the film out of 5.

Regards,
the 70mm idiot Rancho - Hardik Raychanda

P.S. - Music by vishal-shekhar is decent but not memorable. Dialogues are good but actors cant carry them well as they are needed.