Bareilly Ki Barfi: Soft & sweet like a barfi
Cast: Kriti Sanon, Rajkummar Rao, Ayushmann Khurrana, Pankaj Tripathi, Seema Pahwa
Rated: 7.5/10
Just like a good barfi, this film is soft, sweet and flavourful. The endearing small-town nuances, ambience and behaviours are beautifully captured by director Ashwany Iyer Tiwari who makes a two-bit romance between a two-bit boy and girl into a wholesome, unhurried entertainer.
Bareilly Ki Barfi (BKB) is Tiwari’s second tier-III town movie after she debuted with the acclaimed and interesting Nil Battey Sannata (NBS). While Kriti Sanon is the centrepiece of BKB, Swara Bhaskar shaped NBS. Sanon is a bindass Bareilly ki chhori and plays out her role with gumption and allure.
As the small town rebel who loves English movies without knowing much of the language, steals her father’s cigarettes to smoke secretly, takes pillion rides with strangers and pretty much does her own thing till it comes to marriage (obviously she is rejected by boys who want a rasoi ghar wali virgin), she is riveting.
But really, it is her relationship with her over-indulgent father which is the most endearing part of the movie, what with the utterly gifted Pankaj Tripathi doing the honours as a dad who silently breaks all norms of a conservative town to allow his daughter to be what she is — despite his nagging wife who is hyper about boys rejecting Kriti due to her wayward ways. Tripathi’s presence in the film adds as much weight to it as Seema Pahwa carries around her girth as his wife. Without him, the movie would have been mostly uninteresting.
The unconventional, but really small-town romance replete with prem patras, Hindi novel, an imposter hero, his bhaiyyaji wala yaar and the other big take away from the film, Rajkumar Rao, the ghunna dost, has moments dotted all over this family entertainer.
Ayushmann Khurrana does well to merge seamlessly into this ladki-oriented film. As the silent lover, he pretty much stars as that perfect silent lover who has too many cordons around his heart to speak out.
A word about Rao (Pritam Vidrohi) here. He is too good to the role of a loser friend who is bullied into the gameplan to ensnare the girl by Khurana. Rao gives in quite a power-packed performance around a stutter, introverted amma ka launda from Bareilly, lending quite a few laughs to this rollicking film which is a must-see for this week. Kudos to all — the funny dialogue writer (aisi laat marengey ki kulhey pe dimple nikal dengey, happy buddey amma jab bhi ho); director for capturing Bareilly as it is, lyricist for getting the small town words right and the music director for giving the songs that perfect semi-rustic beat.
Source: Sunday Pioneer, 20 August, 2017