When Pyaar Ka Punchnama released, the film established its inherently misogynistic vein, in style. And for incomprehensible reasons, it ended up striking a chord with all. The sequel by Luv Ranjan is cut out of the same cloth and is probably a more subtle attempt at comedy than its outlandish predecessor, but the laughs are scattered and the story feels disjointed. The biggest problem here is that the writer-director has fallen complacent and remains in his cushy zone, falling back of the successful template of the franchise's first edition. Yes, the formula worked but the problem with such films is - the magic runs out easily. The makers make it rather evident that monetary success was the only reason why this film was made. Four years after the original, the story isn't novel anymore and since there was no attempt to further the narrative, there is an overpowering feeling of stagnation.
Unleashing his wicked shades, Luv makes the girls more devilish this time around. They continue to be as uni-dimensional and as stereotypical as ever but at least in the film's better part, he gives the characters some substance. Some things might feel distracting, lacking the desired specific detailing, like the promotion-getting Gogo (Katrik Aaryan) doesn't have a specified job besides taking his girlfriend for nail spa. Convenience plagues the plot just like the first edition, where the girls fall in love a little too easily and are way more intolerable than real women. It is a mystery how the boys survived an entire movie with them! It is hard to not ponder whether such women are merely a figment of Ranjan's battered brain (which we presume was a result of some childhood heartbreak) or do they really exist? The venomous fangs and the self-absorbed demeanor hardly feels human.
One would quiz how is this film, a shade lesser in mettle than the previous one. The answer is simple - Such films works primarily because of the chemistry of its leading men, the bromance ala Rock On or the iconic Dil Chahta Hai. PKP had sparse hint of that zing which is obsolete from this movie.
The laughs come thick in the first half. A man surrendering the keys of his precious car to his girlfriend's sloshed friend was a funny sight. The boys enacting Mukesh's No-Smoking commercial in the love lingo was again a hilarious cue and mostly the 7-minute long monologue (that crops out of the blue) is pitch-perfect. For those 7 minutes, it is hard not to laugh your guts out as Kartik continues to rant about the misdeeds of the fairer sex.
Post-interval, the film dips in tempo. There is unnecessary villainifying, melodrama, mistrust and some obnoxious chauvinistic behaviour that is hard to gulp down. For instance, Gogo leaves his phone at his girlfriend's place to record their conversation and use it as trump card during their break-up. The complete disregard for your partner's personal privacy is lame and offensive. The break-up scenes have no build up and probably that draws from the stark lack of chemistry between its pairs. While Nushrat and Kartik have their effortless camaraderie from Akaash Vani and the earlier PKP film, the others neither have a history nor the similar ease in their bonding. While all other actors are strictly average in their parts, boys Omkar Kapoor and Sunny Singh are slightly better than the other ladies in the film.
Yes, the film makes you guffaw, in parts it is laugh-out-loud fun but it all feels very inert and transient. Ranjan's work continues to be in a similar lackadaisical vacuous zone as he fails to evoke the emotional connect with his characters. The men from PKP stay in our mind, but the characters from this installment are all forgettable. Pyaar Ka Punchnama 2 isn't an unbearable loopy mess that one would assume it is, but neither is it the uproarious comedy it was touted to be. It delivers on what it said it would, but is too lazy and disinterested to seek more. The film lacks ambition. Punchnama thankfully won't make you want to punch anyone, but it has nothing worth a mention once the curtains come down on the show. It is an average fare that you can miss but wouldn't mind watching either!
We rate it a 50%
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