Rab Ne Bana Di Jodi (2008)

Surinder (Shahrukh Khan) is a mousy middle-aged man who attends the wedding of his professor's daughter, the much younger Taani (Anushka Sharma), and is immediately smitten by her beauty and vivaciousness. Surinder had been a favorite pupil of his teacher, so when Taani's fiance dies in an accident on the way to the wedding and the professor suffers a heart attack, the professor asks Surinder and Taani on his deathbed to marry so that he can die in peace. They promise, and after their subdued marriage ceremony Surinder brings his grieving new bride to his home in Amritsar, giving her her own room and plenty of space. As their relationship remains formal and distant, Surinder turns to his flamboyant friend Bobby (Vinay Pathak) for advice.

From here the plot takes a turn for the worse. Surinder ends up adopting an alter ego, Raj, to spend time with Taani and to try to make her happy. The Raj persona is developed from film heroes Taani has admired and is Surinder's perception of a cool, uninhibited stud. Raj becomes Taani's partner in dance class, and his totally different personality begins to confuse himself as his flirting begins to confuse Taani. Surinder wants Taani to fall for his Surinder self, not his Raj ruse, but he doesn't do much to sway her in that direction.

And this is where the film really starts to fall apart, in my opinion. Frankly, although Taani's relationship with Raj is a little problematic, I actually prefer it to her one with Surinder. They have almost no scenes together with him as Surinder, and in those few scenes, both of them seem so awkward and uncomfortable that it's rather painful. She seems stifled and unnaturally silent, and his body posture makes him look like an abused puppy. They never seem to talk or connect in any way. Raj, on the other hand, gradually loses most of his bluster and aggression and becomes a confident expression of Surinder's inner sweetness. Also, Taani is much more herself when she's with Raj. Unfortunately, Raj is really Surinder inside-out, with his discomfort suppressed instead of his love, so Surinder's issues don't really leave Taani with any good options.

I ended up not really disliking this film, but not really liking it either. It basically only has three important characters, and perhaps that along with the rather hopeless and bleak storyline was what made the whole film end up seeming a little empty. But in the middle of all that emptiness there was a little tiny romance that you'd have to have a hard heart not to pity.