However, watching it, you don’t really need to use your head! [break]
The tale is about two characters, Nikhil (Ali Zafar), an affluent brat who has come to London to pursue a course on filmmaking, and Lalitha (Aditi Rao Hydari), a middle-class committed feminist who is on her way to New York to study political science.
Lalitha misses her connecting flight to New York and has to spend a day in London where they meet and get to know each other.
The two feel free coming out from the confinement of their home country, India, and decide to spend some hours of liberation together by taking a look around London where they fall in love like in other Bollywood flicks.
But, unfortunately Lalitha has to go to a different direction. The guy then makes a pledge to come visit her after six months and they wrap up with some romantic moments.
The story later travels to Paris where they encounter certain issues and concludes in New York all within eight years.
Although the movie starts off at a lighthearted note, the director does a bad job in depicting the situations well as when the characters are experiencing uproar, the dialogues lose its actual feel, and are rather expressed melodramatically in the form of some anxiety.
After watching some instances of the movie, one tends to feel perplexed as there are a lot of things that are unexplained.
For example, they decide not stay in touch with each other as per the conditions laid down by Lalitha who doesn’t want to check her mail every five minutes and fall in love with the computer.
Yet, Nikhil writes her a letter saying he cannot come visit as he needs to go to India to take care of his ill father. Lalitha receives it, and thinks she rather give him a surprise later, then replying to the letter which is never shown in the movie.
But the most debated issue in their relationship, and that baffles the audience, is where is the story heading? The vacuums are nevertheless filled up to a certain degree in the second half.
Moreover, one’s sure to stray from this 100-minute movie as there are scarcely other things but the main characters and their conversations throughout.
Directed and written by newcomer Anu Menon who tries to portray that we change at different stages of our lives, both in terms of appearance and the things that we want, the theme sadly fails to take off and lethargy takes in as the storyline is as dead as rotten vegetable, and the clichéd climax doesn’t do justice, either.
Even though the dialogues and screenplay had a lot of rooms for improvements, thumbs up to Ali Zafar who shouldered multiple responsibilities in this movie.
The first being the main character Nikhil and pulling off his role fairly well, and the other composing and writing lyrics for the songs in the film, which was one of the good things about the movie and sure to please every ear.
Lalitha, on the other hand, isn’t successful in delivering her script well, on most occasions she rather sounds out of place. She looks good in her costumes, nonetheless.
The biggest credit for the movie, however, goes to cinematographer Sameer Arya for the background gives you a surreal feeling. The consistency with which he has maintained the views and feel deserves accolades.
In a nutshell, “London Paris New York” has a lot of loopholes which cannot be overlooked. There’s nothing you get from this movie, either educational or entertainment, just a hole in your pocket if you watch it! But if you are interested in photography or get mesmerized by beautiful places, and camera effects, you may not regret it.
And, yes, the film can be a very good opportunity for critics as they get to pinpoint a lot of flaws!
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