LoveYaPa, Trailer and song launch: Aamir dominates press and fan meet, speaks with characteristic candour

LoveYaPa, Trailer and song launch: Aamir dominates press and fan meet, speaks with characteristic candour

It was a roller-coaster ride for the attendees, and a personal nostalgia trip for me, when the title song and trailer of the forthcoming film, LoveYaPa (a pun on Love or Pa), releasing on 07 February, the week preceding Valentine’s Day, in the presence of media and fans. The day was today and the venue was New Excelsior Cinema, now under Mukta A2 ownership, and the time was…well an hour after the slated hour, but worth the wait. The film is Junaid Aamir Khan’s third and Khushi (daughter of Sridevi and Boney, and younger sister of Janhvi) Kapoor’s second. The film is produced by AGS Entertainment (their first Hindi film), and Phantom Films (veterans on the Hindi turf), and written by Pradeep Ranganathan, who starred in the Tamil original.

We were treated to a lot of frank talk and the title song was both hilarious and scintillating, loaded with tech. The trailer told us that it is the story of two lovers who want to get married but the father of the girl (Pa) insists that they swap their phones for a day and then make the decision, after gaining privy to each other’s secrets and crushes. Some might see similarities in this storyline and that of Khel Khel Mein, released last year, but LoveYaPa is a remake of a Tamil film made towards the end of the Covid pandemic and a blockbuster at that. They have woven the Love and the Pa in the title, but could not merge cell/mobile phone. Of course that would be a mouthful. There is a Punjabi word ‘siyapa’, which means trouble or wailing, with roots in the Urdu word siyah. Instead of finding rhyming words, which would be wearisome and trying, the lyricist has gone bananas with concocted words, rhyming with siyapa. There is, obviously, a rhyme with a swear word, which is often passed as meaning nonsense. And I am not going to mention that word here. Doing so would be …….pa.

A romantic comedy, LoveYaPa presents a relatable story of modern love among the Gen-Z. Present on the occasion were the lead pair, real-life Pa Aamir, who turns 60 in March and looks 30 in January, Ashutosh Rana, Grusha Kapoor, Kiku Sharda and the supporting cast of the film. Rohini, the RJ who was seen anchoring an event after a long time, called Aamir on to the stage first, and when Aamir is around, all the others take a back seat (back stand here, for there were no chairs). AK was 23 when he acted in Qayamat Se Qayamat Tak. Junaid will be 32 soon and Khushi turns 25 in November. Grusha Kapoor came into prominence in the TV serials Tara, way back in the mid-90s, a serial in which I wrote and narrated the recap at the beginning of each episode, for almost 500 shows.

The author, with Sanjeev Kumar and Asrani in Anamika, produced by Tahir Hussain

My association with the Khan family, brothers Nasir Hussain and Tahir Hussain goes back to 1972, when I made my acting debut in Tahir Hussain’s film, Anamika. I also contributed in no small measure to Yaadon Ki Baaraat and Hum Kisise Kum Naheen, besides acting in both. Sadly, my role in YKB was edited out, because the film became too long, and shortened in HKKN for the same reason. I had seen QSQT in a preview and met Aamir sometime later, when I invited him to be the judge in my scripted and spoken radio programme, Close-Up Sangeet Muqabla. I told him frankly that he was awkward in QSQT while Juhi was very good. Sporting and introspective Aamir agreed on both counts. When reminded of this incident at the current event, he remembered and reiterated what he had said with characteristic candour. When asked whether Junaid was awkward in his debut-making film Maharaj, he was frank enough to say that he was indeed awkward in some moments.

Recording Aamir Khan for Close-Up Sangeet Muqabla, a radio show

Aamir would not tire of heaping praise on Sridevi and counted the missing out on working with her as one of his greatest misfortunes. He also indulged the press by extending the question time beyond what compère Rohini must have been briefed to end earlier than it did. He answered almost all questions in his unique, personal style, except the one that was most controversial. Junaid is a man of few words, much fewer than Aamir is today, perhaps like the Aamir of the early 90s. Khushi, an alumnus of the New York film school made quite an impression. Some fans bent backwards in their appreciation of Aamir Khan’s body of work, and they must be forgiven for that.

Advait Chandan, who has directed LoveYaPa, directed Aamir in Lal Singh Chaddha, one of Aamir’s rare flops. I have no qualms about admitting that it was a film that deserved better, but merit and money are strange bedfellows. Incidentally, Ashutosh Rana, who plays Khushi’s Pa, the man who challenges the couple to exchange the phones before tying the knot, has already played Janhvi’s father in another film. He was modestly trying to convey that he is a lucky mascot as a fateher of budding heroines. As soon as he began to intersperse his Hindi with some shuddh bhasha, Aamir cautioned him to keep it simple. Perhaps Grusha Kapoor, who spoke very emphatically, clinched the evening, when she declared that every man wants his wife to be his first woman, and every woman wants her husband to be her last man.

Trailer: https://youtu.be/nyYqgtoEQjI