Shudh Desi Romance: You can cut out the Shudh and Desi Part

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Came out of the cinema hall confused, dazed, stifled and little stretched, trying to decipher which part of India did we see through the eyes of the fabled Director, of Band Bajaa and Baraat fame. Infact, after this movie I make a promise to myself, not to do a mad rush in the name of the Director (more so after his/her first movie was a runaway hit or a nice decent movie to watch) and then thoroughly feel let down. This has happened to me at least thrice or probably four times or could be more.
Shudh Desi Romance, fumbles from the start itself, where the boy (Sushant as Raghu or is it Raghuram) in question is off to marry  the girl (Vaani Kapoor as Tara) in  a non-descript town in Rajasthan. Along  side him travelling is the party spoiler, Gayatri (Parineeti Chopra), his so called elder sister (hmmm!). In a highly testosterone charged atmosphere Gayatri subconsciously plays a spoil sport and is the reason (was it the kiss or the conversation or the simple charm) for the boy to run away from his marriage. But, why should he run away from the marriage after he all he had liked the girl (Tara) in his first outing, when, as they say in shudh language, "jab rishta pakka karne ki baat thi". The desolate girl is left behind with her cold drink and our lead protagonist and anatagonist  pop up in Jaipur to meet and greet and fall head over heels again. We know Gayatri now is a teacher at a coaching class (brief mention of Kota coaching too somewhere) and our hero is tourist guide (shown in poor taste conning American tourists). What follows next, till the time two decide to get married, is a series of highly charged (libido at it it’s best) set of sequence (read rom com) which looks undefined and does not seem to relate to the plot any which way (too much smoking and kissing, wish they could have had put up a statutory warning at the bottom of the screen alongside the smoking warning about mindless “kissing” too). They decide to get married and lo and behold, the girl now runs away!
Yuppy! it is interval and then you think what will happen next? Post interval, (don’t ask me) the same girl is back from whom the boy in question had run away. And then it starts all over again...And then I think you better watch the movie to get further confused and exasperated. All in the name of Shudh Desi Romance, so much for Shudh and Desi and Romance.
What stands out? Nobody, except Rishi Kapoor. I think he has now become the friend, philosopher and guide to everyone (Saif, Aamir,…) in the industry. But his role stands out, and my word what a second innings he is having in Bollywood (since his last days of pullover and white trouser with girls half his age). I think he has been a treat to watch in every film, Hum Tum, Do Dooni Chaar, Fanaa, Agneepath…the list is endless. Mr. Bachchchan-some lessons here, probably (however, to each his own). Two songs do stand out, the title song and Tere Mere Beech Mein (a brilliant Sunidhi and Mohit Chauhan). Sushant was good, and gave him ample scope to display his talent and he did justice, even though there were moments where there was more of it expected (for instance the scene in which he prepares the Paratha and enquires for Daahi or Achaar and suddenly the conversation turns to a grimmer side, I think the paratha there could have played a great role, pity it went to the sidelines). But he was spontaneous and never was out of character. Pareeniti was good (but there was/is a feeling, hope she does not get type-caste) and we are yet to see a lot of her. Vaani is testing water I guess...But, what about the immensely talented, Rajesh Sharma, pity we could not get enough of him.
What does not stand out? The plot as a whole, the setting- which India are we talking off? Not too sure. Perhaps we seem to be getting in trapped into a perceptual bias about youth and their thinking, it is understandable that there is a lot of perplexity and sense of skepticism with today's youth, but the young India is more confident and possibly for them marriage can wait, unlike this film, where the watering hole looks like marriage. The pace of the film- languished for long and suddenly takes off and then has a very tame ending. There was so much riding with Maneesh Sharma, Jaydeep Sahni (Chake De, Khosla Ka Ghosla, Rocket Singh…), YRF, but it all sinks at the end.
A let down and thinking what to do, a stiff Vodka to get off it, watch Zanjeer-the new version (no way) to dilute the after effects or simply doze off through the rest of the weekend, I have a better idea, watch Julia Robert’s Runaway Bride (say what?)... 

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