2 States: The Better One

                   I first thought of naming this review 2 States: A Renovation, but then I realised that there wasn't a conscious attempt to make an improvement in the movie. It was just that there were more sensible people than Chetan Bhagat involved in writing the script.

                Now that we have the (so-called) witty line out of the way, let's get to the plot summary. A Punjabi IIT-ian, Krish Malhotra, falls in love with a Tamilian Economics gold medalist, Ananya, at IIM Ahmedabad. They then face the unenviable task of convincing their parents to allow their marriage. So, this is not like one of those stupid series adaptations of American novels whose stories are totally different from that of the source material(I am referring to  Shadowhunters, the series. That show killed Mortal Instruments.). This movie is not better than the book because its story is different, but because of the difference in the way of telling the story. 

          For one, there is no (super-racist) narration. Also, I would've given this movie a point or two over the book just for the good casting, but they go one better. The one or two words that Alia Bhatt speaks in Tamil are reasonably good. She pronounces them almost perfectly. I could find mistakes only in two places. When Krish goes to Ananya's house, she pronounces Tamil in the anglicized form of the word. Also, there she talks her own father in Hindi. But she could've done a lot worse. God, don't get me started on Chennai Express. That movie will get a special treatment one day, after I complete the Goodreads Book Reading Challenge. 

          The other actors are also perfect, though there are a few more mistakes when it comes to Chennai. The Mylapore shown in the movie belongs to the early 20th century. I don't think that the kind of house in which Ananya lives even exists today in Chennai. You could say that I am just picking faults for the sake of it but when they can get Delhi perfectly, why can't they do the same with Chennai? But these mistakes are all nullified by the total absence of "something". What a relief!(Refer to the book review) 

                 Hindi movies are generally very loud, but compared to the novel, this movie was actually very much toned down. Another great thing about this movie is, the songs are all awesome. (But after the songs in Sangili Bungili Kadhava Thorae, I guess every other song sounds beautiful.) I actually hate the fact that they have to cut down the book to make a two and a half hour movie but in this case I am only glad that there was no nonsense about that stupid rich girl who had several petrol bunks to show how crazy Punjabis are and no stuff about the landlord with an impossible name to show how cazy Tamilians are. 

                         Even if we were to ignore the book, the movie is quite impressive. All the actors are good. Even though Alia Bhatt doesn't have a Tamilian accent while speaking Hindi, Revathi has the perfect accent while speaking Hindi and she's not even a Tamilian! Due to the romance between them taking place in IIM-A, it actually forms a greater part of the movie than it did in the book and even though we don't exactly learn much about the college, we atleast get to see the buildings. 

                      Thus, the rating is:

8/10 - Very Good