Review: ‘Auron Mein Kahan Dam Tha’ Rests Precariously on Its Cast’s Shoulders

Watching Neeraj Pandey’s latest Auron Mein Kahan Dum Tha makes the title seem ironic and I’ll get into that later on. First, let’s take you into its simplistic but intriguing world – two people fall in love in stolen glances and secret chits only for one event to derail all their plans, separating them for decades.

“Nobody can ever separate us,” Krishna (Shantanu Maheshwari, later: Ajay Devgn) tells his partner Vasu (Saiee Manjrekar, later: Tabu) as they make plans for their future together. It’s love at its most basic, Bollywood identity – two people in love who must find their way back to each other. But Pandey’s film doesn’t want to be that simple.

The film opens in prison and Krishna is introduced as a man who is both feared and beloved – if he takes off his spectacles, the person facing him is done for! Everyone informs everyone else in hushed whispers that he was incarcerated for two murders but little is revealed about his motivations. We hear of a woman outside the prison walls who perhaps Krishna loves or once loved but he is adamant that she won’t be waiting for him when he is released. So far, the film does enough to invite you into its premise but soon, a glaring flaw becomes apparent – the film’s design.

Every scene in the film is portrayed through on-the-nose choices – Krishna must beat up a man twice his size to prove how terrifying he is, things must be spelled out in flashback even though we’re going to see the scenes later again. One can’t help but wonder if the film would’ve benefitted from someone taking a step back and catching the overindulgence. A film in this genre lends itself to experimentation – especially since the screenplay itself is quite simplistic but this experimentation shouldn’t look and feel obvious to the audience.

Camera angles that make no sense and shots that feel too manufactured to make the film feel ‘real’ take away even more. It’s easy to see the vision the director is going for – that ‘art’ feel and look that would ideally reflect the story’s tension but there is no actual balance between the film’s story and its form. The background doesn’t help either – it’s simply too disjoined to not stand out like a sore thumb every time there’s a tonal shift.

But the film’s soundtrack is its saving grace – take a look at how MM Kreem music, Manoj Muntashir’s lyrics, and Sukhwinder Singh-Javed Ali’s powerful vocals come together to create the equally catchy and poetic ‘Tuu’. It’s a shame too because despite the missteps, it’s the cast that you’re always rooting for.

In a story like Auron Mein Kahan Dum Tha, the cast carries the responsibility of making their relationship so convincing that you would believe that they would cross every figurative line for each other. How do you create and execute characters that would place their partner’s life above their own? That requires an almost foolish devotion that both Ajay Devgn and Tabu manage to portray brilliantly. In every interaction between them, the weight of the loss is palpable – all that is left unsaid and unfinished hangs thick in the air between them.

The film’s second half is simply its superior half because of these two brilliant performers sharing the screen. Jimmy Shergill as Abhijeet shines in the back-and-forth between his character and Krishna. Tabu and Devgn perhaps leave behind very big shoes for Maheshwari and Manjrekar to fill – their chemistry feels less convincing. They’re both good performers on their own – Maheshwari is quickly cementing his place as quite the promising artist and Manjrekar, despite not having much to do, holds her own.

The film is reminiscent of the evocative Past Lives – till date, one of my favourite films – in more ways than one. The idea of an invisible string connecting strangers and the question – what does ‘meant for each other’ really mean in the long run?

Despite these similarities, Auron Mein Kahan Dum Tha simply lacks the soul-crushing sophistication of a film like Past Lives. Ironically (told you we would come back to it!) this film’s design is its own undoing because ‘auron mein kahan dum tha’.