The latest entrant in Bollywood’s twisted math of intense love = toxicity and male entitlement is Tere Ishk Mein. Which doesn’t come as a surprise considering that this is not new terrain for director Aanand L. Rai. The man is a repeat offender, having glorified stalking and toxic masculinity packaged as a tragic tale of unrequited love a dozen years ago in Raanjhanaa. That Tere Ishk Mein is said to be set in the same universe as Raanjhanaa is significant; that it is backed by a production house (T-Series) which has put monies on films like Animal and Sonu Ke Titu Ki Sweety is even more telling.
Tere Ishk Mein — in which Rai reunites with his Raanjhanaa man and close friend Dhanush and stars Kriti Sanon as the female lead — perpetuates the notion that there is a very thin line between passion and violence. Consent is a concept that the universe of this film is indifferent to. It semi-romanticises lad culture and camouflages the problematic personality of its protagonist, looking at it through the misplaced lens of what it believes is a ‘childlike’ man whose boorish behaviour and violent streak is born out of childhood trauma.
Truth be told, even with its fair share of problems in intent and implementation, Raanjhanaa had quite a few redeeming features, including a banger of a soundtrack by A.R. Rahman that is still a major contributor to many a ‘Spotify Wrapped’ annual list. Rahman returns to score for Tere Ishk Mein but falls far short of recreating the same magic.
Written by frequent Rai collaborator Himanshu Sharma, along with Neeraj Yadav, Tere Ishk Mein is unwieldy from the get go. It starts off in a Delhi college with Mukti (Kriti Sanon) submitting her thesis in psychology with the claim that violence in human nature can be completely obliterated. When asked to back it with practical proof, Mukti finds her “reformation subject” in the perpetually angsty Shankar. At 42, Dhanush doesn’t look like a college student and referring to Shankar as a jock would be a huge stretch. Mukti believes that she can make the man — who beats anyone within eye distance to pulp and brandishes petrol bombs as a daily accessory — change his wayward ways. The problem arises when Shankar falls in love with her and she doesn’t.
That leads to 169 minutes of a chaotic, confused and often contrived film in which Shankar, dejected in love and rejected by life, becomes the “best pilot” in the Indian Air Force, a grouchy renegade armed with laughable lines like: “Main Tejas udata hoon, Jet Airways nahin”. Mukti, meanwhile, loses the little agency she had, drinks herself silly and also gets her fair share of cringe dialogues like: “Mere liver mein cirrhosis hain, dimaag mein nahin.” She ends up being a counsellor for the defence forces (how else would she and Shankar meet again otherwise?) but is inexplicably so messed up herself — and we use that term very politely — that it is a wonder she has anyone trusting her with their own mental health. As a viewer, you sit through the screaming and shouting, curses and tears, mayhem and melodrama, all the while hoping that things will improve. Save for a few inspired moments, it doesn’t.
I am aware that this review stands perilously close to slipping into a full-fledged rant, but Tere Ishk Mein is the kind of film that will bring out this kind of angst. All the more because it had the potential to be a story of how tangled love is, how emotions can’t always be spelt out, how equations fail to often be bracketed, how life as we know it can derail in the blink of an eye.... But what it ends up as is a mangled mess, including a prolonged climax in which everything from the birth of a child to a suicide mission in war, is crammed in.
What works in making Tere Ishk Mein watchable to a minuscule degree is the acting. Both Dhanush and Kriti plunge with deep sincerity into the skin of their characters, as do seasoned actors Prakash Raj and Tota Roy Choudhury. Another sureshot winner is Tushar Kanti Ray’s camerawork. All of them deserved a film much better than this.
Tere Ishk Mein is yet another reminder that it is time for misogyny and male entitlement to be called out for what it is — and not passed off as just a man (in this case, the reddest of red flags) acting out of (and for) love.
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