Where the book’s title is inspired by a line from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar – where the nobleman Cassius says to Brutus: “The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, / But in ourselves, that we are underlings.” The Hindi feature film, Dil Bechara, itself is an adaptation of the Book – The Fault In Our Stars written by John Green. With Mukesh Chhabra as the Director and Sushant Singh Rajput and Sanjana Sanghi as the lead cast. You got that right! Where this happens to be Sanjana as well as Mukesh’s Debut and it also just ended up becoming Sushant’s last film ever.
Where both the book and the American Film adaptation received some serious critical praise as well as commercial success. The film Dil Bechara definitely has some strong acting by the Memorable Characters of Manny played by Sushant and Kizie played by the debutant Sanjana, who meet at a support group for cancer patients where Kizie has thyroid cancer and Manny is a patient recovering from osteosarcoma.
As we go forward with the film we see how they both help each other live life even though it’s with one foot in the grave. Since Dil Bechara is from Kizzie’s perspective, it’s mostly a narrative style film set initially in Jamshedpur, where Kizie Basu is just trying to live the normal teen life but with all the medicines and the forever tag on oxygen cylinder, her life is anything but normal.
And then dances in Manny / Immanuel Rajkumar Junior with the sexiest title track ever – “Dil Bechara, friendzone ka mara” and the cutest taunts – starting with the first one that he flips out while flirting with Kizie the minute he meets her! “Main serial Killer, Tum serial kisser. Kya jodi hai na?” All the one-liners shot out by Sushant will crack you up and will also have you wiping your tears.
The plot and characters have been tweaked and localized in the most beautiful manner and this is what really forms the rest of the plot. Speaking of characters let’s not forget to mention the dear bestie of the couple – JP played by Sahil Vaid is worth the mention as he caught on the dialect absolutely perfect. He brings a different light to every shot he’s appeared in even though his lights were out through the entire film for he plays the Blind Buddy.
What else is Hot?
Yes, it truly hurts to watch Sushant Singh Rajput as the ideal Chocolate Boy as he portrays this charming and amazingly infectious boy who puts a smile to our face but also makes us weep, mann hii mann mein. This Manny makes you laugh, cry, swoon – all at the same time. It was extremely difficult to type up this review without being a tad bit biased and reminding you all about the Man we lost – such an amazing actor.
Manny’s words,
“Janam kab lena hai aur marna kab hai yeh hum decide nahi kar sakte, lekin kaise jeena hai woh toh hum decide kar sakte hai”
will keep blasting in your ears even after the movie ends just as every single song played which only adds to the beauty and is not interference because they’re created by none other than AR Rahman who as always, has done an applause-worthy job.
Speaking about applauding, let us quickly jump back to our dear Debutant and Narrator of the film Sanjana Sanghi – nobody could have played a better Kizie. Her chemistry with Sushant was “Seri” and as someone playing the lead in a movie for the first time, she played the character to the T. Even though she has shown us her talents before also in films like ‘Rockstar‘ and ‘Fukrey Returns’, but this one is totally a different ball game and she has totally nailed it!
On the topic of debuts, Mukesh Chhabra did an excellent job as a director and you could see that in every frame. The cinematography is brilliant thus giving one more reason to make this heartwarmingly pleasing film ‘Dil Bechara’ a Must Watch.
For all the John Green and Hazel – Gus lovers, while you might be tempted to draw comparisons between the Hollywood film and this, you will just not be able to. Since ‘Dil Bechara’ is localized, both the films end up becoming completely different movies that have their own feel and are just about characters who live in similar worlds.
Verdict
What’s Not to like? Absolutely nothing. It’s just this audience wishes that the journey of this movie also went on “Forever” because while watching Dil Bechara you are constantly hit with the unavoidable pinch that just like in the movie we lose Manny, even Sushant is with us no more, but if this has to remain as his last movie to the world, it is a Seri one.
Written by – Siddhi C.Shekhar
Dil Bechara is streaming on Disney+ Hotstar.
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