Release date: 12th December 2008

Cast: Anushka Sharma, Shah Rukh Khan

Director: Aditya Chopra

Run time: 2hrs 52mins

Rating: 7.2/10

Shah Rukh Khan plays Surinder Sahni, a working-class simpleton from Amritsar who goes in for an image makeover, and poses as a cooler, trendier fellow so he can woo his young, distracted wife Taani (played by newcomer Anushka Sharma). Picked to be partners in a local dance contest, the lady and her husband-in-disguise, Raj, become fast friends, until she finds herself falling for him.

To be honest, even if you are willing to buy into that bizarre premise – that Taani fails to recognize her own husband because he’s shaved his moustache, lost the spectacles and picked a funky hairstyle – Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi is still an exhausting watch because it’s such a predictable story, because it recycles the same old clichés, and because the characters are so poorly developed.

It’s difficult to get your head around Taani, easily the film’s most confusing character, who takes the drastic step of marrying a man she doesn’t love on the urging of her deathbed-bound father, when her fiancé is killed in a road accident. Never once does she remember or refer to either her fiancé or her father in the film. She’s progressive enough to think it’s cool to be having gol-gappa eating matches with a male friend, but conveniently forgets to tell him she’s married.

Newcomer Anushka Sharma appears confident, and is well cast as the spirited Taani, but saddled with an inconsistent character she fails to leave a lasting impression. The same, thankfully can’t be said forVinay Pathak, who’s absolutely delightful as Suri’s faithful friend Bobby.
Chopra’s return to direction after eight years is marked by a flawed script, which in turn spawns a disappointing film. Where’s the smart dialogue and the spirited characters that defined his debut film,Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge? There’s no trace of either in this film.