Half Girlfriend Review: Arjun And Shraddha's Film Lacks Imagination And Reeks Of Wannabe-ness!

Whoever says writers don't get their due in Bollywood is wrong. Mediocre writers surely do and they end up becoming producers of films like these.

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This film is based on Chetan Bhagat's novel and the author has also partly produced the film. So one good thing is you go with zero expectations from the film. Well, that seems to be the only good thing.

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The half-witted script talks about the turmoil that Madhav Jha (Arjun Kapoor) goes through because he's from a 'village area' in Bihar and cannot speak English. Honestly, you need to be totally dimwitted to be not able to even pronounce some basic English words in spite of having reached the age that Madhav has and having the privilege of being sent to a prestigious college. His Bihari classmate (Vikrant Massey) turns out to be a far more likeable character, as he's surely far more sensible and smarter.

So it's no surprise that Madhav promptly falls for a girl, Riya, because she's playing basketball and she's speaking English. And oh yes, Riya is got to be a wonderful person, because whenever she encounters rains, she walks into it willingly in a strange zombie fashion. One is still trying to figure out how the beauty of a Bollywood heroine's character is measured by the amount of willingness she displays in getting drenched.

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Riya shows all signs of being interested in promoting him from the friend zone, she even initiates the first kiss, but 'Madhav from village area' is still not sure. Riya has a half high society family, where people speak English in a strange accent, the mother comes out with a kilo of makeup on her face and she's being married off to a young insufferable man who seems to have digested some random big words for breakfast.

The film lacks imagination, reeks of wannabe-ness and reaches it's lowest point when Bill Gates is shown entering a venue in a Bihari village. No, there is no casting coup here, the director simply decided to cut paste Gates' famous face on some other man's body. Thus we get about ten unintentionally, unbelievably hilarious minutes with 'Gates'.

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Arjun Kapoor is earnest, Shraddha looks pretty but is screechy. They are limited by the shallow characters written for them.

There are some actors like Massey and Rhea Chakraborthy that you wish to see in a better film.

Watch it if you are a Chetan Bhagat fan.