Bollywood adaption of the bestselling novel ‘The Fault in Our Stars’ - Mukesh Chhabra’s Dil Bechara released on 24th July 2020. The amount of love the movie has received is enormous. Fans are going gaga over Sushant and Sanjana’s love story. Since Dil Bechara was the last work of Sushant’s life, viewers are not leaving any stone unturned in praising the film. But the question is: if we set aside the Sushant factor, would Dil Bechara still be so lovely?

The movie introduces Kizie Basu (Sanjana Sanghi) to us. A cancer patient who breathes from an oxygen cylinder 24*7. This cylinder is her constant companion and she has named it Pushpinder. Kizie doesn’t have a lot of things to look up to in her life. Her life is boring and unhappening just like any other girl’s in a typical romantic drama.

As cliché as it can get, an enthusiastic Immanuel Rajkumar Junior or simply known as Manny (Sushant Singh Rajput), enters Kizie’s life and tries to woo her with his filmy personality. The two bond over an incomplete song by a singer Abhimanyu Veer.

The first half of the film is stretched with an unconvincing storyline and enough attention has not been given to the nuances from the book. For instance, the dialogues failed to deliver the depth of the cigarette metaphor as it is portrayed in the book. Instead, the scene fell flat and came across like every other scene used just to progress the plot.

But there isn’t any doubt that the actors have delivered a stellar performance. In her debut as a lead, Sanjana has given an outstanding performance, and as always, Sushant didn’t disappoint me with his character. The supporting cast also plays their roles well. Durgesh Kumar, who was a supporting actor in Highway, has played the role of a rickshaw puller in Dil Bechara. His character doesn’t go unnoticed in the film and manages to steal the attention in every scene he is a part of.

The second half of the movie primarily revolves around cancer and death. The lines between reel and real get blurred when we see Manny talk about life and dreams in an emotional conversation with Kizie’s father. If the real-life death factor hadn’t existed, the movie wouldn’t have made me teary-eyed.

To sum it all, Dil Bechara fails to deliver on plot unlike it’s Hollywood counterpart. But the actors and songs make it worth a watch. While the forced and scattered storyline was as unconvincing as it could be, AR Rahman’s songs kept me going through. Rahman’s Taare Gin is surely one of my new favourites but Chhabra’s movie is just another average adaptation of an above-average story.

Movie Rating: 2.5/5