Teri Baaton Mein Aisa Uljha Jiya (2024) Hindi Movie

The hot topic lately has been whether artificial intelligence (AI) matches human intelligence and if it will eventually steal our jobs. Writer-director duo Amit Joshi and Aradhana Sah's romantic comedy explores how close to reality a romance with a robot can be and whether any of this is real.

A robotics engineer, Aryan Agnihotri (Shahid Kapoor), goes to the US to work on a new project for his maasi and boss, Urmila (Dimple Kapadia). There, he is looked after by her manager, Sifra (Kriti Sanon), the robot programmed to make him fall in love with her. And he does. But when he discovers her reality, he is outraged at being used for a lab test. However, he feels drawn towards her and convinces his maasi to send her to India so that she can go through the ultimate test — surviving a big, crazy Indian family (that's obsessed with Aryan's marriage). Whether he will have his happily ever after with the almost-perfect robot forms the rest of the story.

Amit Joshi and Aradhana Sah serve a novel, breezy, and fun concept with a quirky situation. The laughs here are in the absurd situations that the human-robot couple encounters along the way. However, the story takes a while to build up, and the scenes where Aryan's family warms up to Sifra are overstretched. The story picks up steam almost towards the end after a big twist.

Although the concept is unique, the narrative often finds itself going around in circles while trying to build the story around it. The movie also touches upon the man vs machine debate, and using AI and robots responsibly. This aspect seems rushed and wraps up too quickly.

The film elicits quite a few laughs, mainly owing to the characters' reactions. The humour is not so much in the dialogues but in their delivery and timing — especially Aryan's interaction with his friend and colleague, Monty (Ashish Verma), who pulls off his goofy act very well.

The movie's appeal lies in romance, and Shahid Kapoor and Kriti Sanon have a smashing on-screen chemistry. Kriti's poker-faced robotic act and on-cue laughter are hilarious, and she delivers every scene where she glitches in the human world with aplomb. Shahid breezes through the role of an irreverent guy hopelessly in love. Dharmendra as Shahid's grandfather is adorable, and Dimple Kapadia is a treat to watch. Sachin-Jigar, Tanishk Bagchi, and Mitraz deliver a banger of a soundtrack, especially the title track (redux of Raghav's Angel Eyes) and Laal Peeli Ankhiyan.

At a time when mega-scale action films are ruling the big screen, this one comes as a refreshing concept packaged with humour and good music. The situational comedy gets repetitive and doesn't take off as smoothly, but when it lands, it proves to be an entertaining fare.