Bawaal Review : A poignant tale of romance in the shadows of war

Story: A young couple going through a rough patch in their marriage embarks on a journey to Europe to explore World War II sites. Will they mend their relationship amidst the historically-charged backdrop?

Review: You know what to expect from a romantic travel movie—postcard-perfect sites, adventure, and the lead pair falling in love on the escapade. Director Nitesh Tiwari’s Bawaal offers all this against the backdrop of World War II. Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari attempts to weave a story on love and coming-of-age while trying to teach life lessons.

Ajay Dixit, aka Ajju (Varun Dhawan), is a hotshot middle school teacher from Lucknow who has faked his way through life and is about keeping up appearances. He marries a full-of-life and bright girl, Nisha (Janhvi Kapoor), because a trophy wife would be good for his image. But he witnesses something on their wedding day that convinces him Nisha might tarnish his perfect image. So, Ajay bars her from stepping out of the house and mistreats her at home. An incident at his school leads to his suspension with pending disciplinary action. To evade this, he decides to deflect everyone’s attention and complete his history syllabus on World War II by conducting classes from the sites of the holocaust in Europe. Since his parents fund the trip, Nisha joins him, too. The rest of the movie is about how they relive the war victims’ pain and agony and, in the process, delve into their weaknesses, failings and truths of life.

The movie’s build-up is sluggish, and it spends too much time overexplaining Ajay’s fabricated image and how he mistreats Nisha. Some tracks are long-drawn and lose the punch after a point—like a Gujarati family constantly passing packets of dry snacks to each other on the plane or when Ajay erroneously ends up at an opera instead of a museum.

Though the premise probably seemed interesting on paper to the makers, the intent and impact of what we suppose they set out to do, doesn’t translate on screen. The film takes us through some of the most heart-wrenching sites of human tragedy—Omaha Beach, Anne Frank’s house, war memorials in Berlin and Auschwitz. Director Nitesh Tiwary, cinematographer Mitesh Mirchandani and editor Charu Shree Roy display skill in creating visual impact. All this is used as a metaphor as the lead couple battle their doubts and demons in their internal and external journey, but the film fails to make us feel for the characters, their emotions and their story. The parallels drawn between Ajjus’s transformation and one of the darkest, most tragic incidents in human history is where the narrative collapses. The writing and the characters lack depth, so as the film goes along and Ajju goes through his moments of self-realisation, we are left with a sense of disbelief and more questions than answers. And dialogues like “Hum sab bhi thode bahut Hitler jaise hain na” are used to establish the concept further but don’t hit home. They just don’t take off.

Daniel B George’s background score complements the scenes, and Mithoon, Tanishk Bagchi and Akashdeep Sengupta’s tracks are hummable.

Varun Dhawan performs decently as a mediocre and selfish guy who cares about nothing else but his image. He effortlessly pulls off scenes where he admits his flaws. Janhvi Kapoor shines in the role of a bright but humble girl who holds on to the hope of finding love in her husband. Other cast members, including Manoj Pahwa and Anjuman Saxena as his parents, and Mukesh Tiwari as the MLA, lend able support.

The actors put their best foot forward, but the team leading from the front (the makers) misfired. Else this love story had a lot more potential to bloom.