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What's Your Raashee: Movie Review
Director: AshutoshGowarikar
Cast: Priyanka Chopra, Hurman Baweja
Rating: **
Adapted from US based Gujarati writer Madhu
Rye’s novel Kimball Ravenswood , which has already been made into a TV
series ‘ Mr. Yogi ’ (1989) by Ketan Mehta and adapted into theatre as ‘ A
Suitable Bride ’ by Naushil Mehta, the premise of What’s Your Raashee? is
interesting but the execution isn’t as appealing.
Yogesh Patel (Hurman Baweja) is the last rescue for his debt-ridden Gujarati family. He will inherit his grandfather’s property on marriage and so his family calls him from Chicago and persuades him to get married. Silly as it may sound, the marriage date is fixed, but the bride hunt is to begin.
Yogesh agrees to meet a dozen damsels (Priyanka Chopra), one each from the 12 zodiac signs and choose his bride. In less than a fortnight’s time he meets them all, sings song with each, visits his grandpa in Gujarat, checks-in a hotel room for reasons unknown and gets married by the end.
The basic idea of the story to give diverse perspectives through different characters holds appeal. The gamble of casting the same actress (Priyanka Chopra) in 12 different characters rather than having multiple actresses play the parts pays off pretty well. However the director’s justification on the resemblance of the different characters appears plain corny and is absolutely avoidable. So is the scene when two of these characters confront each other for no good reason.
Another setback is that with as many as 12 Priyanka Chopra, one intermittently gets puzzled in identifying one from the other. Twelve characters are too much for an instant recall. After a point, the boy-girl encounters gets repetitive with cyclic sessions of ‘ What do you do? What are you hobbies? ’ interrogation. The pacing is slow and for a simplistic romantic comedy, What’s Your Raashee is tediously long at a 3 hour 30 minute runtime. And despite that the narrative lacks conviction.
Yogesh Patel (Hurman Baweja) is the last rescue for his debt-ridden Gujarati family. He will inherit his grandfather’s property on marriage and so his family calls him from Chicago and persuades him to get married. Silly as it may sound, the marriage date is fixed, but the bride hunt is to begin.
Yogesh agrees to meet a dozen damsels (Priyanka Chopra), one each from the 12 zodiac signs and choose his bride. In less than a fortnight’s time he meets them all, sings song with each, visits his grandpa in Gujarat, checks-in a hotel room for reasons unknown and gets married by the end.
The basic idea of the story to give diverse perspectives through different characters holds appeal. The gamble of casting the same actress (Priyanka Chopra) in 12 different characters rather than having multiple actresses play the parts pays off pretty well. However the director’s justification on the resemblance of the different characters appears plain corny and is absolutely avoidable. So is the scene when two of these characters confront each other for no good reason.
Another setback is that with as many as 12 Priyanka Chopra, one intermittently gets puzzled in identifying one from the other. Twelve characters are too much for an instant recall. After a point, the boy-girl encounters gets repetitive with cyclic sessions of ‘ What do you do? What are you hobbies? ’ interrogation. The pacing is slow and for a simplistic romantic comedy, What’s Your Raashee is tediously long at a 3 hour 30 minute runtime. And despite that the narrative lacks conviction.
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