De De Pyaar De Review

De De Pyaar De is a sort of rom-com about a divorced fifty-year-old man, Ashish (Ajay Devgan), and a twenty-six-year-old woman, Ayesha, who fall in love and try to figure out their relationship. The first half of this movie, set in London, works as just that: a love story trying to challenge the age gap. Unfortunately, in the second half of the movie, set in India, it all goes downhill.

The synopsis I read for this movie said something like a fifty-year-old man falls in love with a girl half his age and faces conflict from society, his family and his ex-wife. The big twist is there was barely any conflict! During the first half of the movie in London, the only conflict to their relationship was Ajay’s friend and therapist, Javed Jaffrey, and his real degree (a running joke I never got). But that’s ok cause they were in London and any kind of romantic relationship is cool there. The whole conflict should anyway be in India, where any romantic relationship other than the ‘normal’ is a sin.

So they arrive at the family cottage in India and meet his family and ex-wife, Manju (Tabu), and like in all Bollywood movies Ashish panics and introduces Ayesha as his secretary. The rest of the movie is spent dealing with Ashish’s unannounced arrival, the fallout of him leaving his family and moving to London and the drama of his daughter, Ishita’s, wedding proposal. Then there’s a bunch of nonsense where Ajay is forced to play his ex-wife’s brother (so that’s where the comedy is) and a subtle battle between his ex-wife and his new girlfriend.

After the groom’s father rejects Ishita and her family, we get two minutes of conflict from Ashish’s parents calling him out for romancing with someone his daughter’s age. In an unexpected moment, they’re silenced by Manju who defends Ashish’s new relationship choice and his reason for leaving the family. That’s probably the best thing about the movie as you don’t expect your ex-wife to be so understanding. Although that also causes you to question if that’s how real life goes but anyway.

In the end, I don't know what the film was trying to accomplish. Was it dealing with the age gap in relationships? Was it saying live-in relationships are ok? Maybe it was about Ashish trying to reconnect with his family? Or maybe it was about Manju and Ayesha fighting for Ashish? I give it 4/10.