Movie Review: Baar Baar Dekho

Movie Review: ‘Baar Baar Dekho’

Rating: 3/5

Director: Nitya Mehra

Cast: Siddharth Malhotra, Katrina Kaif, Sarika, Ram Kapur, Rajit Kapoor

Baar Baar Dekho Trailer

bbdNitya Mehra debuts as a director with Baar Baar Dekho. Her direction is fresh but definitely has hints of Karan Johar style larger than life storytelling.

The film takes off with the soothing number Kho Gaye Hum Kahan and is a montage of Jai and Diya’s relationship as childhood sweethearts. The colorful setting for Jai and Diya’s wedding looks eclectic and to top it all the fun Punjabi number Nach De Ne Saare.  While the film revolves around the concept of time travel, our clock seems to slow down as a viewer in the first half.

Baar Baar Dekho is an extremely good looking film with fine production values. When you have Sidharth and Katrina as your leads your poster could look like a page out of a high fashion magazine! These two look really good together and film makers should cast them in the future (with no time travel) and give them better scripts. Nitya keeps the premise easy and light in the first half, we get to see Jai and Diya up close and understand their values and notions about life. Jai’s ambitious personality and career driven hunger for success is diagonally opposite to Diya’s want to find joy and happiness in simple and small things.

Nitya does a good job of creating some really beautiful moments between these two. The dialogues aren’t heavy or melodramatic, they sound like what two grownup adults would be saying while having an argument or making up. I liked Sidharth’s character more than Katrina’s only because there was ample scope for him to do more. There is immense maturity in his performance and he’s come to know his craft better. Sidharth has an old school charm and is able to use that well to play Jai. Katrina looks like a million bucks and her scenes in the second half where we see them as a married couple with kids are good. The music is already a success and the songs especially ‘Khair Mangdi‘ and ‘Sau Aasman’ fit well into the storyline.

Sidharth Malhotra looks contrived as Jai and it can easily be said that for most of the time he has a perplexed expression. Nonetheless, he has a great screen presence and many girls will be drooling over his looks.

Katrina Kaif looks ravishing with her hot bod. Her acting is not upto the mark. She is weakest in the emotional scenes. I’d say even her killer abs act better than her!

Ram Kapoor plays Katrina’s dad and his character is fun. He does a good job.

The prosthetics used to age the characters as the film progresses are below the mark and Katrina hardly comes close to looking like a mother of two kids, let alone act like one.

Mehra rushes in the second half bits where Jai is trying to figure out the purpose of his time travel and what is it that he has to fix. Rajit Kapoor’s spirit guide like character is not explored much and I feel it could have brought another fold to this story.

Jai and Diya’s honeymoon is shot beautifully in Thailand. The cinematography for Sau Aasmaan is quite pleasing.

Baar Baar Dekho is an unique concept that fails to keep you interested because of its weak execution.  A fresh pairing of good looking actors, good music and a commercial love story is the mainstay.This is a time travel journey you might want to fast forward!