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Director: Ravi Chopra
Banner: B.R. Films
Cast: Amitabh Bachchan, Salman Khan, John Abraham, Rani Mukherjee, Hema Malini
After Baghban, Ravi Chopra comes back with another emotional tear jerker, starring once again his last film pair, Amitabh Bachchan and Hema Malini with the addition of 3 bigger box office names, Salman Khan, Rani Mukherjee and John Abraham. Based on a plot loosely inspired from the late 60s Marathi film, Kanyadaan, Baabul rises above the average solely because of the exceptional performances by its lead players.
Balraj Kapoor (Amitabh Bachchan) is a rich industrialist whose son Avinash (Salman) returns from "Amreeka" after 7 year of study. He shares a buddy-buddy relationship with Avinash and is very emotionally attached to him. Avinash falls in love with a middle class girl Mili (Rani) and proposes marriage. After a few misunderstandings are resolved she accepts his proposal leaving behind her best pal Rajat (John Abraham) who secretly loved her since childhood. Nursing a broken heart, Rajat, a singer - performer by profession leaves for Europe immediately after Mili's marriage. Time passes by the couple now has a four-year-old kid. In a hurry to reach back home on his son's birthday, Avinash meets with a fatal accident and dies. Mili's life is shattered and she starts living in the past imagining Avinash is around her.
Balraj cannot bear the pain of seeing his daughter-in-law going through all this. He decides to take a bold step of settling Mili's life once again. He traces down Rajat in Europe and on knowing that he secretly loved her and has still remained single, he plans to get him married to Mili. Though Rajat doubts Mili will ever accept any other man in her life again, he joins Balraj hoping if everything works out right his childhood friend shall get her lost happiness back. Balraj's strategies start working out initially as according to his plans Rajat keeps bumping into Mili and slowly becomes a part of their family.
Even Mili's son starts to adore him. But, soon Mili comes to know that Rajat was brought back by her father-in-law to consider remarriage and she expresses her displeasure. Both Rajat and Balraj successfully convince her to rethink her decision of marrying again. On the day of Rajat and Mili's marriage, Balraj's elder brother (Om Puri) and all other relatives come and try to stop this marriage on the grounds of breaking the tradition that widows should not be remarried. Even Shobhana is not able to support her husband. But, Balraj alone fights against all the accusations and upheavals and adorning the role now of Mili's father successfully gets her married.
Ravi Chopra has picked up an age old theme that looks a little out of place in today's modern times. This theme could have still been apt had the setting been in a small town in India where widow remarriage is still considered a taboo. Chopra needs to be applauded though for not letting excessive rona - dhona spoil the proceedings. But it fails to touch your heart the way his last film Baghban did. The dialogues by Dr. Achala Nagar are punch-packed. The camerawork by veteran Barun Mukherjee needs special mention for making Rani look beautiful like never before even without her make-up in many scenes. Aadesh Shrivastava's music is melodious and the title song composed and sung by Big B himself is very touching.
Amongst the actors, it's a Bachchan film all the way. The varied emotions his face exhibits and the energetic enthusiasm he puts in even the most mundane scenes makes you assured yet again that there is no match for Big B in today's times. Salman is charming as his son and his chemistry with Rani works out very well. John looks a little out of place in the first half but manages to come up on his own later. Both Salman and John have two scenes together and both appear competing for being the best performer in the scene. Rani is very expressive and impresses with her performance.
Hema manages to look gorgeous at 56. Om Puri is too loud and wasted. Sarika in a small role of Bachchan's youngest brother's widow is good and manages to make an impression with just one dialogue for her in the entire film. Rajpal Yadav evokes a few laughs. The rest of the star-cast (mostly TV-stars) including Aman Verma, Parmeet Sethi, Vaishnavi, Beena, Avtar Gill are used as mere props in the background. In fact, right till the end one is not sure what Aman Verma's relation to the family is.
-- Abhijit Mhamunkar
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