Sara Ali Khan Archives

Review: ‘Metro … in Dino,’ starring Anupam Kher, Neena Gupta, Konkona Sen Sharma, Pankaj Tripathi, Aditya Roy Kapur, Sara Ali Khan, Ali Fazal, Fatima Sana Shaikh, Saswata Chatterjee

July 5, 2025

by Carla Hay

Cast members of “Metro … in Dino.” Pictured top row, from left to right: Aditya Roy Kapur, Sara Ali Khan, Ali Fazal and Fatima Sana Shaikh. Pictured in bottom row, from left to right: Pankaj Tripathi, Konkona Sen Sharma, Neena Gupta and Anupam Kher. (Photo courtesy of AA Films)

Directed by Anurag Basu

Hindi with subtitles

Culture Representation: Taking place in various cities in India, the musical film “Metro … in Dino” features an all-Asian cast of characters representing the working-class, middle-class and wealthy.

Culture Clash: Eight adults have various struggles in their love lives.

Culture Audience: “Metro … in Dino” will appeal primarily to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and stereotypical romance movies.

Sara Ali Khan and Kush Jotwani in “Metro … in Dino” (Photo courtesy of AA Films)

“Metro … in Dino” is entirely too long (145 minutes) for this uneven romantic musical that is so unimaginative, corny and predictable. The story’s four main couples are tedious when acting out cliché insecurities about infidelity, finances and aging. “Metro … in Dino” is also strangely disjointed because it starts of being a musical (where people sing their conversations in forgettable songs), but the musical concept is abandoned by the last third of the film, which turns into a stale soap opera.

Written and directed by Anurag Basu, “Metro … in Dino” (which means “Metro … Nowadays” in Hindi) takes place in various Indian cities. The movie is a “spiritual sequel” to Basu’s 2007 film “Life in a … Metro,” but there are also obvious inspirations from writer/director Richard Curtis’ 2003 comedy/drama “Love Actually.” “Metro … in Dino” follows eight adults and the various issues they have in their love lives, but the movie has extraneous subplots that just drag out an already boring film.

These are the movie’s eight main characters:

Parth (played by Aditya Roy Kapur), who is in his 20s, is a fun-loving, commitment-phobic bachelor who works as a travel vlogger.
Chumki (played by Sara Ali Khan), who is in her 20s, is a bachelorette with a master’s degree in business and works as a human resources manager in a corporate office, but she’s still unsure of what she wants to do as a career.
Akash (played by Ali Fazal), who is in his 30s, gave up his dream to become a professional musician and took a corporate office job after he got married so that his wife could feel more financially secure.
Shruti (played by Fatima Sana Shaikh), who is in her 30s, is Akash’s wife whose goal is to start a family with him when they are financially stable.
Monty (played by Konkona Sen Sharma), who is in his 40s, is cheating on his wife (whom he’s known for 19 years) by having emotional affairs with younger women whom he meets online.
Kajol (played by Pankaj Tripathi), who is in her 40s, is Monty’s angry wife who finds out about this infidelity and decides to get revenge on him.
Prival (played by Anupam Kher), a widower who is in his 60s, is looking forward to his college reunion, where he reconnects with a former love interest named Shivani.
Shivani (played by Neena Gupta), who is in her 60s and is the unhappily married mother of Kajol and Chumki, feels regret that Shivani gave up too much of her independence and dreams when Shivani became a homemaker spouse.

“Metro … in Dino” begins by showing Akash and his band (in real life: Pritam, Papon, Shashwat Singh, Raghav Chaitanya) performing bland pop music on the rooftop of a high-rise building. The movie has interludes that show the band performing in different locations, usually on the top of a building, as if that’s supposed to make the band’s trite music sound better. It doesn’t. These band scenes just look like awkwardly placed music video clips.

Throughout the movie is scene after scene of romantic movie stereotypes that have no flair and are thrown into the jumbled storylines. There are “meet cute” moments that look unrealistic. There are schemes to make a lover jealous. There are people lying about their identities. And there are “aha” moments where certain people finally decide who they want to be with in a committed romance.

Chumki and Parth, who live in Delhi, have their “meet cute” moment when she accidentally goes into his apartment while she’s very drunk because she thinks it’s her apartment. Parth happens to be taking a shower when she enters his apartment. And when he steps out of the shower, Chumki physically attacks him because she thinks he’s an intruder.

Parth and Chumki have an immediate attraction to each other, but she already has a “perfect” boyfriend when she meets Parth. Chumki’s boyfriend is handsome but shallow Anand (played by Kush Jotwani), who works in the same office as Chumki. Anand and Chumki also have the same boss. As already shown in the “Metro … in Dino” trailer, the relationship between Chumki and Anand gets more serious when they become engaged to be married.

Shruti is Parth’s platonic friend. They confide in each other about problems in their love lives. Parth doesn’t want to blatantly pursue Chumki when he knows that she already has a boyfriend, so he enlists Shruti to pretend to be his wife so he can “accidentally” see Shruti again and invite her to dinner on a double date.

Akash grows tired of his corporate job and decides to quit to revive his pursuit of being a professional musician. He decides to move from Bengaluru to Mumbai to find work as a musician and possibly get a record deal. Akash’s relocation happens around the same time that Shruti finds out that she’s pregnant and has stayed behind in Bengaluru. The long-distance separation takes a toll on the marriage. Shruti becomes attracted to a single father named Amay (played by Varun Tewari) while Akash is away.

Kajol likes to pretend to her friends that she has an idyllic life with Monty and their daughter Pihu (played by Ahana Basu), who is 15 years old. Monty openly brags to his friends that he’s cheating on Kajol with younger women whom he meets online. Kajol finds out about this infidelity and pretends to be a younger woman online and uses the alias Maya so that she can catch Monty (who uses the online alias is Wing Commander Raina) in the act of cheating.

Later in the movie, Kajol and Pihu go to Pune to visit Kajol’s mother Shivani. Shivani lives with her husband Sanjeev (played by Saswata Chatterjee), who takes Shivani for granted and who has cheated on Shivani in the past. When Shivani was young, she wanted to be an actress and shared this passion for movies and acting with her college friend Parimal. You can bet that this passion will be re-ignited when Shivani and Parimal see each other again.

Parimal lives platonically in Kolkata with Jhunuk (played by Darshana Banik), who was the fiancée of his now-deceased son. Jhunuk has a new boyfriend named Rohan (played by Pranay Pachauri) who thinks this living arrangement is unusual, to say the least. The movie goes off on a very dull and clumsy tangent about relationship issues between Rohan and Jhunuk.

Another unnecessary subplot that makes “Metro … in Dino” overstuffed is when teenage Pihu explores her sexuality because she’s not sure if she’s heterosexual or a lesbian. She asks Apple’s Siri app for advice. And then, she asks her aunt Chumki for advice. Chumki tells Pihu that she’ll know what her sexuality is when Pihu kisses a guy and a girl.

The characters of Parth, Chumki, Kajol and Monty get the most eventful relationships. Akash, Shruti, Pirval and Shivanti are sidelined for long stretches of the movie and are mostly underdeveloped characters. Halfway through the movie, it would be understandable if “Metro … in Dino” viewers forget that Pirval and Shivanti exist because Pirval and Shivanti aren’t seen or mentioned at all for such a long period of time in the film. The acting performances are mostly mediocre and occasionally good but not strong enough to make the movie consistently interesting.

“Metro … in Dino” lumbers along with storylines that connect all the main characters, but the result of all this intertwining is like a watching a cinematic version of a tangled and flimsy ball of yarn. After a while, the arguments, misunderstandings, and deceptions that happen in these characters’ relationships become annoying, not endearing, because the movie’s scenarios have been seen and done before in much better films. “Metro … in Dino” is supposed to be a depiction of modern romance among adults, but too many of these adults act like they’re teenagers in an outdated and tacky melodrama.

AA Films released “Metro … in Dino” in select U.S. cinemas and in India on July 4, 2025.

Review: ‘Sky Force’ (2025), starring Akshay Kumar, Veer Pahariya, Sara Ali Khan and Nimrat Kaur

February 9, 2025

by Carla Hay

Veer Pahariya and Akshay Kumar in “Sky Force” (Photo by PVR Inox Pictures)

“Sky Force” (2025)

Directed by Sandeep Kewlani and Abhishek Anil Kapur

Hindi with subtitles

Culture Representation: Taking place from 1965 to 1991, in India and in Pakistan, the action film “Sky Force” (based on a true story) features an Indian and Pakistani cast of characters representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: A wing commander in the Indian Air Force is haunted by the disappearance of his close friend/protégé, who went missing during the Indo-Pakistani war of 1965.

Culture Audience: “Sky Force” will appeal mainly to people who are fans of the movie’s headliners and formulaic war movies.

Akshay Kumar in “Sky Force” (Photo by PVR Inox Pictures)

“Sky Force” has noble intentions to celebrate Indian Air Force heroes of the Indo-Pakistani war of 1965. However, this action flick (based on real events) is too routine and too bloated for a story that deserves a better movie. The acting and visual effects are very mediocre, considering the large budget for this film.

Directed by Sandeep Kewlani and Abhishek Anil Kapur, “Sky Force” (which takes place in India and Pakistan) was written by Kewlani, Aamil Keeyan Khan, Carl Austin and Niren Bhatt. The movie’s time period ranges from 1965 to 1991. “Sky Force” is based on the true story of Indian Air Force members Om Prakash Taneja and Ajjamada Boppayya Devayya.

In “Sky Force,” Wing Commander Kumar Om “K.O.” Ahuja (played by Akshay Kumar), who is this movie’s version of Taneja, is a respected leader in the Indian Air Force. K.O. is a mentor to T. Krishna Vijaya (played by Veer Pahariya), a rebellious younger pilot who reminds K.O. of Kumar’s deceased younger brother Monu. Krishna’s Air Force nickname is Tabby, which is the name he prefers to be called in his everyday life. Tabby is this movie’s version of Devayya.

K.O. and Tabby are both stationed at Adampur Air Force Station, where group captain David Lawrence (played by Manish Choudhary) is their supervisor. (David will later be promoted Air Commodore in the 1970s.) K.O.’s Air Force nickname is Tiger, which is also the name of the squad that he leads. David is strong-willed and considers himself to be ethical when it comes to war rules of engagement. Unfortunately, “Sky Force” makes the other Indian Air Force colleagues utterly generic.

The other members of the Tiger Squad of Air Force pilots (who all have animal nicknames) are Debashish “Cockroach” Chatterjee (played by Soham Majmudar), Prakash “Panther” Rajput (played by Ritik Ghanshani), Duck (played by Fayaz Khan), Goat (played by Karan Chaudhary), Rhino (played by Ramakrishna Dixit), Owl (played by Ankit Kaushik), Scorpio (played by Sagar Rana), Shark (played by Vishal Jinwal), Spider (played by Lakshay Chawla) and Fox (played by Abhishek Mahendra). Viewers won’t remember much about these supporting characters because they don’t have personalities that stand out from each other.

In the Indo-Pakistani air war of 1965, Pakistan attacks India in nighttime battles on Adampur Air Force Station and other Indian Air Force stations on September 6. It’s considered an unfair fight because Pakistan knew that India had outdated planes that were ill-equipped to do combat at night. Pakistan also had an advantage because the United States had recently gifted Pakistan with 12 Star Striker fighter planes.

K.O. had warned David that Pakistan would use this strategy, but David did not take K.O.’s advice to have India attack first. “We are a peace-loving country,” David tells K.O. when explaining that India will only attack in self-defense.

K.O. is put in charge of a mission for the self-defense attack on Sargodha, the most powerful military air base in Pakistan. The mission—set to take place on September 7, 1965—is called Sky Force. There’s some drama between Tabby and K.O. because Tabby objects to being put on standby for the Sky Force mission because Tabby is considered too much of an unpredictable loose cannon. It was David’s decision to put Tabby on standby, but K.O. refuses to tell Tabby who made the decision when Tabby asks K.O.

Tabby is eventually allowed to participate in air combat, but he goes missing during combat. K.O. feels tremendous guilt about it, and he vows to find out what happened to Tabby. Tabby’s wife Geeta Vijaya (played by Sara Ali Khan), who is pregnant with their daughter, bitterly blames K.O. for Tabby’s disappearance. Geeta decides to end her friendship with K.O. and K.O.’s wife Preeti Ahuja (played by Nimrat Kaur) and remains estranged from them for years.

Years later, in 1971, a Pakistani military plot named Ahmed Hussain (played by Sharad Kelkar) is captured by the Indian military. (Ahmed is this movie’s version of Amjad Hussain.) K.O. interrogates Ahmed and finds out that Ahmed was given an award for killing an Indian officer during the 1965 war. Ahmed has a story to tell that might have clues to the mystery of what happened to Tabby.

“Sky Force” lumbers along with typical combat scenes, which often don’t look believable because of the questionable visual effects. These action scenes also have numerous slow-motion shots that look very hokey. Highlights of the action are the aerial views, which are breathtaking but fleeting. The movie’s dialogue is average at best and silly at worst. And because the story is told in non-chronological order, some of the movie’s timeline is messy.

Worst of all, this 125-minute movie (which could have been at least 30 minutes shorter) wastes a lot of time on unnecessary scenes and then rushes through the storyline about what happened to Tabby. “Sky Force” isn’t overly jingoistic, but the main characters don’t have much depth beyond predictable stereotypes. “Sky Force” ultimately comes across like a big-budget video game instead of a meaningful cinematic event about Indian war history.

PVR Inox Pictures released “Sky Force” in U.S. cinemas and in India on January 24, 2025.

Review: ‘Zara Hatke Zara Bachke,’ starring Vicky Kaushal and Sara Ali Khan

June 21, 2023

by Carla Hay

“Zara Hatke Zara Bachke”

Directed by Laxman Utekar

Hindi with subtitles

Culture Representation: Taking place in Indore, India, the comedy/drama film “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” features an Indian cast of characters representing the working-class and middle-class.

Culture Clash: Two spouses with no children want to move out of their very crowded family home to buy their own house, and they get involved in a real-estate scam where they get divorced in order to qualify to buy a house.

Culture Audience: “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” will appeal primarily to people who don’t mind watching a comedy/drama that drags on for too long about marital ups and downs.

Himanshu Kohli, Sara Ali Khan and Vicky Kaushal in “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” (Photo courtesy of Maddock Films)

“Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” is like watching a tiresome couple who can’t decide whether to break up or stay together. Would you fake a marital breakup to buy a house? That’s the weak concept of this long-winded comedy/drama about a married couple getting a divorce as part of a scam to buy their first home. The movie is a clumsy blend of sitcom gimmicks and melodrama. “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” means “go away a little” in Hindi.

Directed by Laxman Utekar, “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” (which takes place in Indore, India) was co-written by Maitrey Bajpai and Ramiz Ilham Khan. This misguided movie is an almost non-stop onslaught of people squawking and arguing over the marriage of Kapil Dubey (played by Vicky Kaushal) and his wife Somya Chawla Dubey (played by Sara Ali Khan), who both go to extreme measures to buy their own home. Kapil (who is a yoga teacher) and Somya (who teaches chemistry at a coaching institute) have no children together and are very unhappy with their crowded living situation of living with several of Kapil’s relatives.

Kapil and Somya want to move out and buy their own house as soon as possible. The problem is that they can’t afford to buy the house that they want, which has a cost ₹4.5 million, or about $55,000 in U.S. dollars in 2023. The couple’s sleazy real-estate agent Ban Das Ishwardas Sahay (played by Inaamulhaq) tells Kapil and Somya about a real-estate scheme that would allow the couple to buy the house: Get a legal divorce, buy the house, and then get married again.

Why is the divorce needed? As a married couple, Kapil and Somya don’t qualify for a loan, based on their combined household income. If they get divorced, they would each qualify for a housing lottery, based on their separate individual incomes. At first, Kapil is completely against the idea. Somya is more open to considering it. Eventually, she thinks this divorce should be the couple’s plan. Somya convinces Kapil that it’s the best and fastest way to get the house that they want.

Somya and Kapil enlist the help of an attorney friend named Manoj Bhagel (played by Himanshu Kohli) to help them with this divorce scheme. Manoj knows that Somya and Kapil are faking their breakup in order to get a house. The divorce paperwork is filed and the plan is set in motion. One of the movie’s big plot holes is that Manoj represents both Somya and Kapil in divorce court. Manoj is hyper, scatterbrained, and nothing but a buffoonish character.

The first time that Kapil and Somya appear before the judge (played by Atul Tiwari) who’s overseeing their divorce case, the judge is skeptical that the marriage needs to end. It just leads to Somya and Kapil going overboard in trying to convince everyone around them that they are a feuding former couple who should definitely get divorced. Kapil and Somya have over-the-top arguments. They also hire a woman named Mehjabeen (played by Srishti Ganguli Rindani) to pretend to be Kapil’s mistress, so that Somya can claim adultery as a reason for the divorce.

Even after Kapil and Somya get divorced, there are still obstacles to them getting the house. And then, the inevitable happens: Kapil and Somya start arguing for real. You know where this is going and how the movie is going to end. But the problem is that “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” makes everything so boring to watch. The movie’s very thin plot is stretched and padded out to a very bloated running time of 132 minutes. “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” also has an annoying sitcom-like musical score that is very intrusive and just makes the low-quality scenes even tackier.

It also doesn’t help that the couple at the center of “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” isn’t as charming as the filmmakers want viewers to believe. Somya is a horrendous teacher who berates, physically smacks, and degrades a young adult male student named Neeraj (played by Gourav Jariya), just because he was doodling a love note to someone in his notebook instead of taking notes from Somya’s lecture.

Neeraj has green-tinted hair. When Somya makes Neeraj the target of her wrath, she basically says that he won’t get any love with a face and hair like that, which is her way of calling him ugly. And when she smacks him, it crosses the line into an assault. In many countries, a teacher who is this abusive would be fired, but in “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke,” it’s treated as perfectly normal, and Somya faces no consequences for her awful actions.

Meanwhile, Kapil is kind of a wimp when it comes to standing up to his parents. His father Ved Prakash Dubey (played by Akash Khurana) rules the household with a domineering force, while Kapil’s mother Mamta Dubey (played by Anubha Fatehpuria) openly makes disdainful remarks about Somya’s Punjabi heritage. Adding to some of the family tension, Kapil is Hindu, while Somya is Muslim.

Other people in the household are Kapil’s uncle Purushottam “Puru” Mama (played by Neeraj Sood), who is Mamta’s brother; Puru’s wife Deepa Mami (played by Kanupriya Shankar Pandit); and Puru and Deepa’s precocious son, who’s about 7 or 8 years old. This child figures out long before most of the adults that Kapil and Somya are faking their breakup. And it should come as no surprise that Somya’s father Harcharan Chawla (played by Rakesh Bedi) and Somya’s mother Roshni Chawla (played by Sushmita Mukherjee) show up and insert themselves into the divorce drama.

A cliché-ridden movie about an argumentative gathering of family member wouldn’t be complete without someone in the clan going through a medical crisis. The mediocre performances in “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” don’t do anything up uplift the very formulaic and often annoying way that this movie was written and directed. The scenes in “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” are just like mush piled on top of each mush, adding up to almost nothing of substance.

Maddock Films released “Zara Hatke Zara Bachke” in select U.S. cinemas and in India on June 2, 2023.