I Hate Luv Storys – Movie Review

This movie, with it’s quirky semi-cliched title, is a classified as a spoof of Bollywood romantic comedies.  The plot follows Jay (who prefers J)  played by Imran Khan, who hates everything to do with romance and love and production designer Simran played by Sonam Kapoor who literally adores all things romantic and is actually living in her own perfect romance with boyfriend Raj (Sammir Dattani). Working together on the production of Veer’s (Samir Soni) latest love movie Pyra, Pyra, Pyra will ideas be rethought and relationships tested?

This movie was awesome! Be forewarned it is subtitled. I loved the music, and the dancing.  The plot was great. I think the acting was great and you know it’s always so hard to say that about foreign films because it could be great to me but in the country of origin be crap; so it’s really a discretionary issue.  I am of the opinion that the acting was great though (as was the singing)! I think bollywood might be my new favorite genre of movie (yes I’m aware this is classified as a spoof of bollywood movies but I don’t think spoof is used here in the way we associate it usually).  It’s more like calling “The Ugly Truth” a romantic comedy.. it is but it’s also an anti-romantic comedy in that the main characters don’t want it to be romantic. . . whereas a movie like “The Wedding Planner” all characters involved are fine with romance… I hope I’m making sense. It’s late.

Anyway, I fully intend to watch some more Bollywood movies (especially if Imran is in them!) I just can’t explain how invested I was in this film! It was funny, and clever, and had a lot of heart.  One thing that bothered me, and I’m not sure why this happened was the translations.  The film is in (what I’m presuming because I am by no means a linguist) what I’m fairly sure is a mixed English/Hindi blend so there are subtitles which is great… the issue (for me) lies in the fact that the subtitles were wrong at times… I mean, they were misspelled, or grammatically incorrect.  I’m not sure why there were misspellings, I presume the grammar was to keep it as close to the original as possible? But there was one distinct instance I can recall where she said “friends” and it was translated “friens” I mean, not a huge issue, but I was watching from Netflix so I’m pretty sure it wasn’t a bootleg or anything… I feel like a properly produced production should be more legit… and sometimes I don’t think the subtitles quoted everything the person was saying.. J and Simran were conversing once and he responded but there was no subtitle for it, and it wasn’t clear enough English to pick up.. that was my biggest complaint with the subtitles.

Overall though, great film! I was very pleased that I decided to watch it.  I think if you like romantic, foreign, bollywood-eque musicals, then you should definitely watch this! Or if you’re looking for something new and exciting!

I couldn’t find a trailer for the movie in English so here’s a music video! This actually occurs in the movie as one of the Musical scenes (but don’t worry, no spoilers!) I Hate Luv Storys

One thought on “I Hate Luv Storys – Movie Review

  1. mindy March 27, 2011 / 10:32 pm

    Well it sounds fun….but you knoiw me and subtitles!!!!!

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