I don't do reviews but, sometimes I can't help.
"What if we are normal and you all are not?" An irritated Pat throws these words at his folks before going out for a jog. That line sums up 'Silver Linings Playbook'.
A self-confessed RomCom freak I've waded through hundreds of feel good/happily ever after films that show how love changes life and carves out better human beings. Love can make a difference and no one is doubting that but, romantic love as a therapy against mental imbalance. Wow!
The film is about misfits and is sure to touch a cord in many of us. Here is bi-polar and nymphomania co-existing with OCD and superstition. What I realized watching the movie was that all of us are a little crazy and we call it, 'personality'. All we need is for two people with 'compatible' personality disorders to come together and "Boom"!
There was tension. Lots of tension and there's a family and they have friends who also have families of there own and lots of people with 'personalities' - some that try and adjust and others that boil over. These families have people who think and reacted differently, very differently. The society calling some of them misfits, sidelines them, calls them freaks and puts restraining orders on them. The families get together to try fold them back in.
The families want these individuals to be happy. So, they throw a couple of them together and soon, sparks fly!
The emotions are raw and brutally honest. Love the way these 'misfits' react to each other. I love the girl. So, vulnerable, so lost and yet, so compassionate. I wish I had a friend like her. It is no doubt a board sweeping performance.
Jennifer Lawrence has done something unbelievable at age 21. She's pipped Robert De Niro to post in their only scene together and that's blasphemy! It is as much a blasphemy to write about it as it was to actually watch it happen. I was floored and scared - I kept looking out the windows to check if the skies were clouding up and raining fire!
It was equally amazing to see Bradley Cooper being used as more than a hunk of flesh. He was excellent as a grief-demented, tortured soul. I kept wondering all the while if he was the good guy or the bad one? I have seen people like him and he was bang on! He was a good guy but, he was all muddled up in the head but, he's a positive guy and an intelligent man and he wins over his own 'personality disorder' by accepting himself and accepting love when it comes to him via a totally new path.
Others in the cast were seamlessly blended and as the story progressed, they became more homogeneous and together, thickening the bond. Everyone including, Anupam Kher got to try out both the serious and silly. That is how it played out. There was no one in the film who was either good or bad, either silly or smart or successful or a failure. They were all a bit of everything. It was very unsettling pointing out to our own unpredictability and ideosynchronicities. How unique and special each one of us is and how difficult to fathom.
Excellent film, epic romance and people, without the customary drum rolls, and all this without a kiss till the very end. How much more romantic could it get?
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