This is the season for boys to grow into men on Hindi film screens. We just saw Saif Ali Khan doing it across continents in Love Aaj Kal. Now Ranbir Kapoor's Siddharth Mehra is doing in debutant Ayan Mukerji's Wake Up Sid in the lovely rain-soaked city of Mumbai (shot at its prettiest best by Anil Mehta). It's a process worth watching. The boy is rich, lazy and utterly spoilt. When his new friend, Aisha Banerjee (Konkona Sen Sharma) asks him what he does, he says he spends his father's money. When she asks him what he will do after college, he says he will continue to spend his father's money. His father is Anupam Kher, is restrained Punjabi dad mode, the owner of a company that makes flower showers, which are installed in homes belonging to the Birlas and the bhajiwalas. His mother is Supriya Pathak, unschooled but totally devoted to her ipod-addicted and PSP-fixated son. He loves them, but not as much as he loves their credit card, the Porsche they've promised him, and the Chotu they've provided him to draw his curtains and bring his breakfast. Aisha, like all girls in Bollywood these days, is smart, self sufficient and focused. She wants to be a writer and has picked Mumbai Beat, a Time Out-ish magazine to start work at. She's fresh from Kolkata and soon sets up her own little home where Sid crashes out when he leaves home in a huff after flunking his college final exam.
She's also older, at 27, almost seven years senior to young Sid. Given that it's a Karan Johar movie, it's surprising that the marriage word is not mentioned even once-it even figured quite prominently in Dostana. And ah, yes, there's not a single dhol or chorus in sight. Instead there are lots of background songs which serve to establish Sid's state of mind. It's all about Sid. About his learning to make a fried egg, about him learning to clean his room, about him learning to wash not only his clothes but those of his roommate Aisha. Konkona of course can play this role in her sleep. She's been a working journalist in Page 3 and a newbie in Mumbai in Luck by Chance, and has played various aspects of the independent working woman in several other films. Ranbir Kapoor has played a self-absorbed jerk before in his short career, Bachna Ae Haseeno, but here he's allowed to tamp down on his obvious charms (which includes flashing his impressive chest-only briefly girls, sorry) and really underplay his confused boy about town. He does it well, bringing a freshness to the role. There are the obligatory friends too, including the best friend who's been with him since nursery and the overweight girl who shows him the light. In fact, the girls in the movie exist only so that they can show Sid the true path, including Kashmira Shah who plays the sultry neighbour Sonia, who teaches him how to make the aforementioned perfect fried egg.
So the boy who refused to grow up and tried to pay at a roadside kabab joint with his credit card learns to give his first salary cheque to his dad. The boy who would reject his mother's homecooked food to a Domino's pizza ordered in learns to cook pasta and the boy who couldn't last a week in his father's company learns to become a photographer. It's a film that Mummyjis and Daddyjis struggling with spoilt brat boys will identify with and hope their children will learn from. And the aforementioned boys and their dates will laugh at.
Only problem is, why does Rahul Khanna have to keep acting as the spare wheel in every relationship? When will someone please give him a movie all to himself. He deserves it, I think, from all the sighs in the hall when he came onto the screen as the jazz-loving, dreamy-eyed, perfectly handsome editor in chief whom Konkona has a crush on.
So wake up, and go watch Sid and Aisha's sweet little prem kahani. It's not as perfect as the decor in Sid and Aisha's home but it's pretty. Ad yes, the boy gets the girl, a career and his parents too (with their credit card) in the perfect little summation of our consumerist-driven lives.
PS : The T-shirts of Ranbir in "Wake Up Sid" are to die for.. such kool collection.
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