Ananya Panday is excellent as Chandni. Lakshya plays Aarav. They fall in love. Then a crisis erupts and she pushes him away. We keep waiting for them to get back together. The question is: Will they? The film does a lot of things right, and it might have been better without the bunch of clichés in the second half. But it does remain very watchable. That’s the quick review. A longer analysis follows, and it may contain spoilers
The couple in Chand Mera Dil are Chandni and Aarav, played by Ananya Panday and Lakshya. When the film opens, they are scattered across continents. Aarav has graduated from a Master’s programme in the US. Chandni is on a video call with him, saying congratulations from Hyderabad. Something’s off, though. Their conversation is formal, awkward. Maybe it has to do with the visual that came earlier, where Aarav pulled a cigarette to his lips and then pulled it away. The close-up granted to this seemingly simple act suggests that it’s more significant than it appears. And it turns out that the film itself is something like that. It looks like a breezy-happy movie with breezy-happy colours and two attractive leads, but it’s more complicated. And to get into these complications we slip into a flashback, to a time Chandni and Aarav were doing their undergraduate studies in Hyderabad.
For a while in this flashback, we are in a lovely rom-com. The visual language is young. There’s lots of camera movement, and Hyderabad looks beautiful. The flirting is cute, and also colour-coded in a way that makes you smile. And no, that experimental fusion-Bharatanatyam dance performance is hardly the scandal people have made you believe. But slowly, the drama creeps in. Chandni is moved when Aarav makes a sort-of sacrifice. “Aadat nahin hai,” she says. She grew up in an abusive household and is not used to people doing anything for her, leave alone grand gestures like what Aarav has just done for her. He, too, has domestic issues. He comes from a rich and formal family where appearances matter. He says no one raised their hand, but then, no one really held hands either. These may seem like minor complaints in the larger scheme of things. Someone could say that at least these kids had a home and got clothes and food and a good education. But that’s the point. These are kids. They’re just 21. At that age, you’re allowed to be petulant. You’re not expected to be worldly-wise. You’re allowed to make mistakes. I mean, you’re expected to make mistakes.
The rest of Chand Mera Dil rests on these mistakes made by Chandni and Aarav. The conflict is set up pretty quickly, and very elegantly. (The screenplay is by the director Vivek Soni and Tushar Paranjape.) Chandni becomes pregnant, and they both are in favour of an abortion. But at the clinic, Chandni changes her mind. In one of the most touching lines about what a scientist may call just a bunch of cells, Chandni says… it’s more than a bunch of cells. She feels a life inside her. She tells Aarav, “Maine mehsoos kiya mere andar.” And what can he say! He can only offer the logic that they are undergraduate students and they have a whole lot of other things to accomplish, but Chandni is adamant. She says she will manage on her own. Aarav’s love for Chandni is now compounded by guilt and helplessness and the need to “be a man” and also maybe the need to do the right thing. They get married and play house-house. And then it stops being a game.
Chandni’s delivery is difficult. Taking care of a newborn is difficult. Getting a good job during placement season is difficult. Handling the fact that everyone else is getting a good job and you aren’t is difficult. Making extra money by taking a tuition class filled with cocky students is difficult – though there is a great scene where one such kid is put in his place. And Aarav finally explodes. All of the things bubbling inside his head find their way to his fist as he gets violent with Chandni. And she walks out. Chandni made the first move when they started dating. Chandni made the decision to keep the baby. And now, Chandni makes the decision to split up. This is a hell of a role for an actress and Ananya is fully in. As the film transitions from rom-com to light drama to heavy melodrama, she is tuned into every micro-moment.
In a way, Chand Mera Dil could be seen as Thappad set in a much earlier stage of life. There, we saw a mature woman who experiences domestic violence and decides that that is it. Here, we see a similar scenario play out between a much younger couple who, as Aarav puts it, lack the maturity to handle life. Chandni lacks the maturity to see what her mother has been through in bringing her up as a single parent. All Chandni can do is blame the woman for the love she wanted but did not get. But slowly, in a muted scene where Chandni and her mother are in the kitchen, we sense that the relationship may have become better. Chandni still has boundaries she won’t let her mother cross, but at least, the woman is no longer a convenient punching bag.
The most touching aspect of Chand Mera Dil is that Aarav doesn’t become a punching bag, either. Chandni sees that he isn’t an evil, entitled, or privileged man, despite his fancy background. She sees that he’s a confused kid. And she still loves him. But her childhood traumas have led her to the realisation that “izzat pyaar se badi hoti hai.” And she puts this motto before the man. In the lovely Aitbaar song, we hear these words: Hum bhi sahi the / tum bhi sahi the. The film does not take sides, though it does make Aarav do the penance he deserves to do. The most fascinating angle of this messy relationship is Chandni’s battle with herself to stay away from Aarav. You end up feeling bad for both of them.
But in the second half, we get a bunch of clichés that water down the intensity of this premise. We get a suitor for Chandni that no one on earth is going to believe she’s really going to marry. (This is the kind of role Rahul Khanna used to play.) There’s a dinner party with the parents that you know is going to result in a screaming match. The big rain-soaked climax feels tonally off, like something borrowed from a 1990s romantic melodrama. And Lakshya, who sounds a lot like Ranbir Kapoor, does not have the emotional range to make Aarav more than a moping lover. Compared to Chandni’s ups and downs, Aarav becomes a boring saint after a point. But Chand Mera Dil is always watchable. The film is staged beautifully, with touches like the one where the surrounding voices dissolve into an echo-like blur at the moments when Aarav and Chandni are experiencing their peak moments of angst. And it is nice to get a break from all the bloodshed at the cinemas and see two imperfect people stumble towards each other in an imperfect relationship. There’s enough in here that feels like life.
