Ae Dil Hai Mushkil

ADHM is a wonderful movie for "romantics", especially those who have gone through unrequited love. And if you are past mid-30s you may not relate to the places where love "flows" . Most songs are in set up in glitzy clubs from London to Vienna…

It is not "in your face" love story – sure it is shot with typical KJo brand of colorful rich upper class people – but it is definitely a love story of cerebral kind.

It is also not a classy or realistic one – nowhere like say "Lootera" or "The Lunchbox" – two good romantic movies which are on par with Hollywood classics like "Before Sunrise" series or "Eternal Sunshine".

It is more a commercial entertainer like "Silsila" or "JTHJ" but what is unique about ADHM is it only focuses on characters in love. Four people, in love and there is no distraction of parents or bothers or sister or other relatives. It is a remarkable achievement for a commercial Hindi movie to do away with unnecessary supporting cast which ails most of our Indian movies in guise of comedy or family relationship melodramas. Sure there are good supporting cast like Lisa Haydon but they do are intertwined appropriately with the story.

Unlike many Hollywood movies, our Hindi movies do not spend too much time on character development and sometime you don't connect, especially during initial moments of the movie. This movie slowly grows on you, if you watch it with open mind.

Unrequited love is a difficult subject to handle, yet most of us may have gone through it during our various phase of life. While, surprisingly KJo has handled this so maturely, credit is due more with actor's performances, particularly Ranbir.

Unfortunately but NOT surprisingly, the director lets us down in last 20 mins or so – wish our Indian Directors have the courage to end the movie when it HAS TO – most of the time trimming out last 20-30 mins will be an ideal solution. I have seen bad editing of not trimming toward end of many romantic movies - from Kabhie Kabhie days (last 10 mins of botched up climax) to Silsila, KANK and JTHJ – they frustrate the moviegoers towards the end and you give an otherwise good product worse rating. I would have rated this movie 8/10, if it has ended right after powerful title song so passionately sung by Ranbir, which evokes memories of "Sadda Haq".

If you are romantic at heart, like me, please go and watch it. Chances are, you will "get it" and appreciate it.

Even if you don't, it is worth trying. It is a good movie to watch for as performances (Ranbir, Anushka, Aishwarya), Songs (Buleya, ADHM, Channa), Dialogues and glitzy production design blend well to keep you entertained. And please try to walk out after title song is over – I regret not doing so.

I would like to say Amitabh Bachchan style "Ya Kia Ho Raha Hai" And to finish my comments after watching this movie, I would like to change the name of the movie to "Ae Film Dekna Hai Mushkal" It's totally disappointing. It's just waste of time. The casts are very good but the movie is totally opposite of what audience were expecting. The expectations from such a casts were too high but even that movie couldn't reach the minimum level of audience choice and expectations. The movie casts are really wasted in all aspects and casts should also reconcile themselves for that movie disasters by signing in and being part that movie.

Ae Dil Hai Mushkil (2016): This movie is one if the most hyped movies of 2016.Karan Johar,the master who invented clichéd Bollywood moments(except My Name is Khan) directed this movie after 4 years.His previous venture Student of the Year is overly clichéd dud.But Ae Dil Hai Mushkil created good buzz because of its brilliant trailer and music.Even the chemistry between Ranbir Kapoor and Aishwarya Rai is largely discussed.SO how is this Ae Dil Hai Mushkil??

Plot: A story about unrequited love - the shapes it takes, the ways it changes us and the exhilarating and often heartbreaking ride it takes us on. It is the journey of three characters, Ayan (Ranbir Kapoor), Alizeh (Anushka Sharma) and Saba (Aishwarya Rai Bachchan), as their lives intertwine and they navigate life, love and heartbreak.

Plus Points:

1)Performances: Everyone has acted so well especially Anushka Sharma. She stole the show with her brilliant acting skills. The chemistry between Ranbir and Anushka was what I loved the most.Ranbir Kapoor is super at being charming, but has developed a specialization in cluelessness, and both sides shine through in this winning, woeful performance.Aishwarya is stunningly gorgeous and gave decent performance.Fawad Khan is good.Lisa Hayden is irritating.

2)Music: Music is the major plus point of the movie.All the songs are brilliant and well placed. "Channa Mereya" "Ae Dil Hai Mushkil" "The Breakup Song" are my favorite tracks in the list.BGM also played a good part in few scenes.

3)First half: Though nothing much happens in first half except some crazy antics by Ranbir and Anushka,it is lot of fun because of their mind blowing chemistry.It has lot of hilarious and feel good moments.

Minus Points:

1)Second half Second half is overly clichéd and dragged a lot.The scenes between Aishwarya and Ranbir are stretched too long.

2)Climax: Here comes the most clichéd moment in the movie.They tried to give a tragic end but we are not at all surprised or moved by that cause.Even the bald head make up looked so fake.

So,Ae Dil Hai Mushkil is overly clichéd typical movie with brilliant performances from Anushka and Ranbir and best soundtracks of the year.

My rating 6.5/10

I watched this movie when when it was released in 10th or 11th grade, because of the big names - Ranbir, Karan Johar, Anushka and obviously SRK!

I didn't really liked it the movie then. I watched it skipping some parts of the movie as well!

But 27/11/21, I watched it again! And today I understood what really the movie is about. Today I understood the dialogues of the characters. Today I connected with the film.

I wasn't matured enough for this movie when I watched for the first time.

I found Ae Dil Hai Mushkil thoroughly disappointing. Nothing about this movie connected to me. In my opinion, Karan Johar's Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna was the worst. However, ADHM manages to top even that!

Ranbir Kapoor and Anushka Sharma spend the first half imitating characters from Johar's previous movies and movies from the 80s while the second half looks like a retelling of Ranbir's own Rockstar (what with Ranbir eventually becoming a singer and the terminal illness track of Anushka)! Just disappointing! I think anyone could have played the role of Aishwarya Rai-Bachchan's Saba. There was nothing spectacular about her performance. However, I think she lets her eyes do most of the talking which is why Johar picked her for the role. She has this incredible talent of emoting with her eyes without saying a word which most actresses of today fail to do. Even her shayaris had no depth whatsoever. Not to mention she struggles with the Urdu portions. I don't think her role was even necessary as she appears in a 15 minuteish role. Ditto for Fawad Khan whose presence in this movie created such a furor prior to its release! Fawad is wasted in a role with which he could have done wonders with. Fawad lets himself to be overshadowed by Ranbir in some of the scenes that they share.

Performance-wise, it's Ranbir and Anushka's film. They own every scene that they have. However, it's the script that lets them down that they find themselves imitating characters from various old Hindi films! It's Ranbir Kapoor who rises over an inane script, leaving his own stamp in each scene which could have fallen flat in a lesser actor's hands. But then he has experience from his own movie, Rockstar where he also played a similar role, playing a lovelorn boy to the hilt. Anushka Sharma is good but finds herself trapped in a role that was done-to-death before a billion times in Bollywood!

On a final note, ADHM is just a one-time watch for Karan Johar and Ranbir Kapoor's fans. I felt like Johar cheated us by creating suspense about the plot of the film before its release. There's nothing novel about the plot of ADHM!