Review: 'We Are Family' is picturesque but lacks intensity

As is typical of a Karan Johar film, We Are Family boasts of lavish backdrops and picturesque settings but is devoid of intensity, so much so that it almost looks superficial.

 

The film starts on an inviting note with delectable cinematography and aesthetics, and even a storyline that gives you a goody-goody feeling. But as it builds up further, it begins to get quite insipid as it fails to strike a chord with the audience, due to either the lacklustre screenplay or the overly dramatic turn it takes at every moment.

 

Aman (Rampal) and Maya (Kajol) are a couple divorced amicably enough to jointly take care of their three kids Aliya (Munjal), Ankush (Ginsburg) and Anjali (Sonecha). A crisis unfolds, however, when Aman tries to make his girlfriend Shreya (Kapoor) a part of the children's lives. The children are downright hostile to her and reject her open arms.

 

Tragedy strikes when Maya is diagnosed with a terminal illness. The rest of the film takes you through Shreya’s efforts to become a replacement mum. 

 

Of course, Kapoor looks stunning and enriches the glam quotient giving less importance to acting while Kajol, mostly seen sans make-up, is laudable as the stereotypical devoted mother. Even though Rampal looks gaunt and scrawny, his performance as a man torn between the woman he loves and a woman who is the mother of his kids is quite up to snuff. But the life of the film is the youngest child, Anjali, who adds a new dimension to the term ‘cute’. 

 

Though 'adapted' from the 1998 Hollywood blockbuster Stepmom, We Are Family can be safely branded a reproduction of the Susan Sarandon-Julia Roberts film with some scenes (and even dialogues) clearly borrowed from it, which makes the experience of watching it bland. It’s like watching the Hollywood version tailored in a way that embraces an Indianised flavour, Bollywood tadka, and KJO garnishing. There is nothing in the film that can be spoken of as innovative and the disco song-and-dance sequence is a spoiler because it ruins the solemnity of the situation and reminds you (again!) that you are watching a Bollywood film (sigh!).

 

Many scenes in the film are stretched unnecessarily which makes you feel restless and impassive mostly because you know what’s coming next. It leaves you with a hunch that a bit of creative metamorphosis in the screenplay could have done wonders for the film and its viewers.

 

Add to it the extended climax (yawn!) which is thoroughly ravaged by the quintessentially melodramatic Bollywood extra touch (the age leap that takes you straight to Aliya's wedding), and what you have in the end is a disappointing tearjerker.