Love Aaj Kal

These days I have seen many old english classics mostly of the black noir genre from the black n white days of hollywood. Amidst these, I got to see this new release from bollywood, Imtiaj Ali's "Love Aaj Kal". One would think what exactly is the connection between the noirs and this movie; really there is no connection or even a similarity between these except that I liked all of these.
After successfully directing 'Jab We Met', Imtiaj brings us another one that has something of a newness. Having seen the character of Geet (Kareena in 'Jab...'), it was hard for me to leave behind its freshness while going to watch 'Love...'. It was easily expected from Imtiaj to bring back the same freshness again on the celluloid and this time he has Saif's Jai Wardhan Singh for us. For a guy like me who is so keen in comparing everything to the past, it was not a surprise that I was looking for a comparison rather similarity between the two movies. Well, I got one right up in the title.........hehehe........like the title of the earlier film, 'Love...' has also a hinglish fusion :)
Having said all this, I would like to say that though both the films are about the youths of today and their take on love, they both are completely different. Where 'Jab...' was about a girl who is her own favourite, has her own ways and definition of life and lives every moment of her life and changes completely after breaking up with her boyfriend, 'Love...' is about a boy who has ambitions in life but is completely enjoying life to its fullest, has fallen in love for 13-14 times and celebrates his break up and after it again becomes a छुट्टा सांढ़.
Anyways, 'Love...' is something more than this. The first half an hour are completely about this all but the theme changes with Rishi Kapoor (the london cafe owner) coming into the picture. He starts comparing Saif's time to his own jawani ke din, interstingly, played by Saif himself (but this time with turban on).
The film is a nice attempt to compare the two generations, their values, their views on life and love etc etc etc. The two love stories go collaterally. The black tea in one becomes black coffee in other; The bicycle in one becomes the sports car in other; जिया बैंड, दिल्ली becomes Jia Band, Delhi and so on. Imtiyaz puts a lot of effort and succeeds also in showcasing the essence of realtionships in the two times. The decency of the past times and the carelessness and career orientation of present times is very well evident in the film. The scene where Saif (with turban) goes to calcutta just to have a look of his love and gets a cup of black tea that also not directly in his hands and the scene where saif (without turban) announces his break-up with Deepika and decides to celebrate this are all sufficient to show the differences in the two times.
Maybe, it was never an intent of the director to make a comparison between the two love stories, but as I said earlier for a guy like me who is always keen in comparisons, it is hard not to do that. For me, the Rishi Kapoor love story was the one that won my hearts. The decency and the heartfelt emotions in this love story was fabulous for me and above it all, it was the suspense in this love story that kept me bound to my seat and also propelled the story forwards.
Saif in both the roles is fabulous. Deepika has also done justice to her role. Music is a mix of different genres, where we have Aahun Aahun..... rocking, Aaj Din Charheya in Rahat Fateh Ali Khan's voice is soothing. All in all, for me, it was a good experience with Love Aaj Kal.................