'Shaadi Ke Side Effects' Looking into a Marriage, with a Smile

BANGALORE: Film: "Shaadi Ke Side Effects";  Cast: Vidya Balan, Farhan Akhtar, Vir Das and Purab Kohli; Director: Saket Chaudhary; Rating: 4/5

"When I do something wrong, I say sorry to my wife. When my wife does something wrong… I say sorry to my wife."

One of the gems that flows out of Farhan Akhtar's mouth while addressing the oldest question on the gender equation: what does a woman really want in a marriage? Could it be the same things as a man? Maybe the route taken by the two individuals is different? Director Saket Chaudhary raises some pertinent questions on the fake road-signs that could lead to an aborted marriage. Not all of the winking homilies work. But the film holds together primarily because of the intelligent writing and the sharp and crisp way the two main actors interpret the parts of the two individuals in a marriage that has a lot going for it. That includes a baby girl who arrives just in time to get this seven-year delayed sequel trotting on the right road.

A lot of pre-production fine-tuning must have gone into making Farhan Akhtar and Vidya Balan look compatible together. The two actors give delectably nuanced performances without looking over-rehearsed. Seldom in recent times have I seen two actors looking so married on screen. Farhan’s Sid and Vidya’s Trisha come together as a couple that desperately wishes to make the marriage work. The script is written entirely from the male point of view. And if there are any doubts on the film's mildly misogynist tone, then there is Farhan's voiceover to remind which side of marriage the script is on.

The film opens with a sequence where the pair plays a tantalizing game in a crowded pub to kindle some additional romance into their togetherness. It's a smoothly done sequence redolent with images of similar sequences we might have seen in other films on impending domestic discord. Yet there is a freshness in the way Farhan and Vidya approach this sequence and their roles. There's a kind of lived-in familiarity with the world of the married couple, and yet played at a detached dispassionate pitch.

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