Bubble Gum (2011)

Bubble Gum Cast: Sohail Lakhani,Apurva Arora,Sachin Khedekar,Tanvi Azmi
Bubble Gum Producer: Sushma Kaul
Bubble Gum Director: Sanjivan Lal
Bubble Gum Music Director: Hanif Sheikh,Bapi,Tutul

Bubble Gum 2011 Hindi Movie Review:
Rating **

Right at the interval, the director came at the press show stating that his film Bubble Gum isn’t a children film meant for kids. It’s a film that will appeal to people of all age groups. However, the point remains that with no publicity or any sorts and no face value to the product, his message may fade away in no time. After repeated big budget, big star cast films gracing the cinema halls week on week comes this week that has only the small budget films making it to the theatres. One such among the others is Bubble Gum. Now whether this small film has content enough to pull the masses or not remains to be seen.

Set in the times of 1980s in Jamshedpur when there was no computer, internet chatting, long telephonic conversations, mobile, Bubble Gum is the story of Vedant (Sohail Lakhani), a boy who finding it difficult to deal with his teens. He falls head over heels for a colony girl Jenny (Apoorva Arora) but he also has his rival Ratan (Suraj Singh) who too has the hots for the same girl. During this time Vedant’s brother Vidhur (Delzad Hiravali) comes from his hostel to spend the holidays with his family. Vidhur is a deaf and mute teenager who tries really hard to build a bond with his unruly brother but Vedant considers Vidhur a liability and object of ridicule more than his brother. How the bond between the two brother increases and how Vedant wins over Jenny is what forms the rest of the story.

Bubble Gum definitely isn’t a children film. It talks of the times and challenges we all have gone through in our lives. The days when a small clash with a friend would mean the end of the world, when not getting pocket money was the biggest punishment or even the times when you starting looking at people of the opposite sex from a different viewpoint. Yes, these are the things that this film takes us through. Debutante director Sanjeevan Lal sets the mood of the film just right by establishing the times of the 80s in a small town when there were no Blackberry Messengers, no chat rooms, no Play stations and definitely no mobile phones. The situations he presents onscreen actually remind you of your adolescence. It even has the bitter-sweet clashes between siblings, between parents and children, between friends. It has people using the right accent, the film having the right setting, great detailing right from the type of telephone to the cooker to the parties celebrated by kids, to the love letters.

However, what Bubble Gum misses out on is the correct execution or as people call it, the midas touch. Courtesy a novice attempt, the film fails to establish an emotional connect in the situations when it needs the most. So you don’t feel empathetic for the deaf and mute child. Nor do you feel for the growing up challenges of Vedant. Instead of sticking to the plot and developing it, the director has his film going all over the place with varied situations needless. Had it been for a crisp editing, Bubble Gum could’ve been a delightful watch, but it fails even at that. Music of the film by multiple composers like Hanif Sheikh, Bapi and Tutul is disappointing. Sachin Khedekar and Tanvi Azmi as the parents of Vidhur and Vedant act very well. The two most sorted performances. Sohail delivers a decent performance while Delzad deserves a special mention. For a person deaf and dumb in real life, Delzad does an outstanding job.

To sum it up, Bubble Gum is a small film with a big heart but loses itself for amateurish efforts.

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