This review is going to be full of spoilers and trust me, you’ll thank me for the red flags by the end of it. Mohit Suri’s Half Girlfriend is simply unbearable. Even after three very uncomfortable hours, you’re still clueless about the idea at the heart of it – being someone’s half-girlfriend. Madhav (Arjun Kapoor) remains confused about it till the very end and almost loses his sanity over it. Riya (Shraddha Kapoor) a college basketball champ, becomes Madhav’s single point agenda, despite the “I want to do Bihar ka vikas” spiel, that he starts off with.
A few comic moments and a fake Bill Gates are the film’s only highlights to be honest. But I’ll come to that a little later. Bad CGI aside, none of the film’s main characters, or their situations, come together to make much sense.
Madhav is a naive boy, smitten by the college celebrity, Riya Somani. He’s a puppet in the hands of his also Bihari roommate Shailesh, whose only job in the film is to lecture Madhav. He’s a mamma’s boy, proud of his royal lineage, and dreams of speaking English like Riya. Even though he feels like a misfit in the posh New Delhi english medium college, he manages to get by in life without much trouble or judgement. So frankly, not being fluent in English, feels like quite an overrated problem. But yes, he is the mopey sort of loser, whose only mission is to marry the first girl he ever kissed.
Riya likes Madhav because she’s his top priority. Like her music (which is only one song by the way) he’s her escape from the abusive and unhappy privileged life, that she was born into. She dreams of singing in a Jazz bar in New York City, far far away from her misery. But she walks out of Madhav’s life and decides to marry a rich dude at the age of 19, because he’s throws a fit, when she says no to having sex with him. Clearly, Madhav thinks consent is overrated. He even yells at her saying “why can we only kiss when you want to? What about when I want to kiss?” Umm, you wanted to kiss even before you knew her name dude, WTF!
The film’s non-linear timeline only adds to the confusion. With Riya gone, Madhav returns to his ‘village area’ Simrao, where he is treated like royalty and starts helping out his queen mother, played by Seema Biswas. She’s the feminist type, or so you think initially. While she’s working hard to build toilets in the school she runs, so that girls don’t have to drop out, she judges Riya for being divorced, when they finally meet.
Madhav finds out that Microsoft founder Bill Gates is on a similar mission in Bihar. It turns out, he’s doling out cash to schools, whose representatives gives the most heartfelt speech. Coincidentally Riya is now in Patna and is ‘hanging out’ with Madhav again. She’s helping him with his speech. Finally Bill Gates arrives in Madhav’s school. Only, he’s the body of a white man, with a hilariously poor cut out of Bill’s face superimposed on his neck! Believe me, it is more bizarre on screen than what it sounds like. But Bill provides a much needed break from the depressing love story that seems to be going nowhere even after the interval.
Not only does Madhav get the grant, he also gets himself an internship at the UN. But Riya has mysteriously left, once again. The stalker in Madhav doesn’t give up. He goes to New York where he reunites with a slick Shaliesh. He’s all English now and well settled too. Madhav’s search for Riya continues and so does the cringeworthy story. Just when Madhav gives up on his search, she emerges.
The happily ever after climax brings us back to Bihar and you’re left wondering how tedious the Chetan Bhagat novel would be, going by this unconvincing story.
Shraddha and Arjun Kapoor are average in the film at best. I wish their characters had more reason to exist apart from each other. Even basketball didn’t last very long. Fake Bill Gates and some of the supporting actors do bring in the occasional laughs, but they weren’t enough to make up for Mohit Suri’s signature mush. Unlike Suri’s other films, the music of Half Girlfriend is only a quarter impressive too. Stay a Little Longer (and its Hindi version) was meant to be a tribute to Farida Khanum’s iconic ghazal Aaj Jaane Ki Zid Na Karo. But it’s not even halfway there. It does feel like the director embedded a heartfelt plea right through the film.
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